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2026 Offseason Thread

UKRaven1827 said:
From listening to that pod I know them boys are pissed about letting Likely walk and keeping Andrews.
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All good, Sadiq’s finna be our savior.
 
rmcjacket23 said:
I think if you're going to put this out publicly, you better be able to draw a reconciliation line back from 3 padded practices in a 6 week period to "excessively hard practices that cause injuries". Brutal sales pitch.

I can guarantee the overwhelming majority of NFL fans assumed that they're in full pads, hitting, Wednesday-Friday during the season.

There's plenty of medical literature out there showing that the league is essentially using the first few games of the year as the "break in" period, because the offseason programs have gotten so light that these guys aren't getting hit and ramping their bodies into game form until September. Which yields a lot of soft-tissue injuries earlier in the year.
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I already touched on that last part where I said training camps need to be run hard for conditioning purposes
 
JoeyFlex5 said:
I already touched on that last part where I said training camps need to be run hard for conditioning purposes
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That's great. The problem is the players don't want that either. Lobbied for, and got, a lot of restrictions in recent CBAs over the rigorous nature of training camps.
Training camps are 21-28 days. For the first 6 days of that, there's no pads and no footballs. Note this is after several different OTAs have occurred.
They're allowed to have full contact padded practices for 2 hours a day max. The totality of on-field practices are limited to 3.5 hours a day, and there's mandatory one day off per week.
 
rmcjacket23 said:
That's great. The problem is the players don't want that either. Lobbied for, and got, a lot of restrictions in recent CBAs over the rigorous nature of training camps.
Training camps are 21-28 days. For the first 6 days of that, there's no pads and no footballs. Note this is after several different OTAs have occurred.
They're allowed to have full contact padded practices for 2 hours a day max. The totality of on-field practices are limited to 3.5 hours a day, and there's mandatory one day off per week.
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I’m saying I don’t agree with players bitching about training camp, because it’s needed, I can understand bitching about in season practices though. that’s all.
 
JoeyFlex5 said:
I’m saying I don’t agree with players bitching about training camp, because it’s needed, I can understand bitching about in season practices though. that’s all.
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And I'm saying that, optically, bitching about 14 practices over four months is, uh, not ideal from a "sympathize with my problems" situation.

Especially when you're a team that's accomplished nothing. Less work is rarely the solution to that problem.
 
rmcjacket23 said:
And I'm saying that, optically, bitching about 14 practices over four months is, uh, not ideal from a "sympathize with my problems" situation.

Especially when you're a team that's accomplished nothing. Less work is rarely the solution to that problem.
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Are we talking less work? Or more appropriate, better targeted work?

We’re melting down in fourth quarters consistently more than any team in the league by a WIDE margin, over a course of like 4 seasons now, seems like whatever we’ve been practicing all this time could be contributing. I know it’s a hot take that consistent 4th quarter meltdowns could be caused by fatigue and a lack of depth in game preparation and fine tuning the playbook.
 
Arguing over practice methods from different eras feels unproductive. Just because something was done a certain way in the past doesn’t mean it should continue unchanged today. The game evolves, and so should training approaches.
If a player who’s actually on the team says the practices contributed to injuries, that perspective deserves to be taken seriously—especially when the team has a consistent history of injury issues. I wouldn’t label Zay as “soft” for being honest about that. In fact, players who’ve joined the team from other organizations have also said the practices are noticeably more intense than what they were used to, which adds credibility to the concern.
 
JoeyFlex5 said:
Are we talking less work? Or more appropriate, better targeted work?

We’re melting down in fourth quarters consistently more than any team in the league by a WIDE margin, over a course of like 4 seasons now, seems like whatever we’ve been practicing all this time could be contributing. I know it’s a hot take that consistent 4th quarter meltdowns could be caused by fatigue and a lack of depth in game preparation and fine tuning the playbook.
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Probably a combination of both. Then you have to figure out does "better targeted work" equate to taking pads off and not hitting each other? Working on techniques we've struggled with, such as open field tackling, is going to be hard to achieve without physical contact.

The timeframe of late game meltdowns also correlates very well with the timeline of the implementation of the last CBA, which cut way back on the quantity and timing of padded practices and significantly changed the offseason program.
 
Florida Raven Fan said:
Arguing over practice methods from different eras feels unproductive. Just because something was done a certain way in the past doesn’t mean it should continue unchanged today. The game evolves, and so should training approaches.
If a player who’s actually on the team says the practices contributed to injuries, that perspective deserves to be taken seriously—especially when the team has a consistent history of injury issues. I wouldn’t label Zay as “soft” for being honest about that. In fact, players who’ve joined the team from other organizations have also said the practices are noticeably more intense than what they were used to, which adds credibility to the concern.
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So a couple issues:
1. He was complaining about late-season injuries. The issue there is, compared to the rest of the league, the Ravens didn't have a lot of late-season injuries. By NFL standards, they were amongst the healthiest in the league. Early-season injuries were an issue.
2. When it comes to late season padded practices, they're basically non-existent. Again, unless the Ravens were violating the CBA, they did a whopping three padded practices in the last six weeks of the season. If he thought practices were to rigorous late in the season, then its not a result of padded work or even physical contact with your teammates.
3. I would certainly hope are practices are more intense. When you see some of the the franchises these players come from, and how they go decades without being relevant, I'm not sure you'd want practices to be less intense.
 
rmcjacket23 said:
So a couple issues:
1. He was complaining about late-season injuries. The issue there is, compared to the rest of the league, the Ravens didn't have a lot of late-season injuries. By NFL standards, they were amongst the healthiest in the league. Early-season injuries were an issue.
2. When it comes to late season padded practices, they're basically non-existent. Again, unless the Ravens were violating the CBA, they did a whopping three padded practices in the last six weeks of the season. If he thought practices were to rigorous late in the season, then its not a result of padded work or even physical contact with your teammates.
3. I would certainly hope are practices are more intense. When you see some of the the franchises these players come from, and how they go decades without being relevant, I'm not sure you'd want practices to be less intense.
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Zay was there , you were not .
 
rmcjacket23 said:
So a couple issues:
1. He was complaining about late-season injuries. The issue there is, compared to the rest of the league, the Ravens didn't have a lot of late-season injuries. By NFL standards, they were amongst the healthiest in the league. Early-season injuries were an issue.
2. When it comes to late season padded practices, they're basically non-existent. Again, unless the Ravens were violating the CBA, they did a whopping three padded practices in the last six weeks of the season. If he thought practices were to rigorous late in the season, then its not a result of padded work or even physical contact with your teammates.
3. I would certainly hope are practices are more intense. When you see some of the the franchises these players come from, and how they go decades without being relevant, I'm not sure you'd want practices to be less intense.
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ravenslord said:
Zay was there , you were not .
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Technically don't know what those guys were dealing with at the end of the season.

I'll say this to defend that smug prick in Jersey. It felt like the team was usually playing better ball going into the latter months.
 
redrum52 said:
Technically don't know what those guys were dealing with at the end of the season.

I'll say this to defend that smug prick in Jersey. It felt like the team was usually playing better ball going into the latter months.
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Felt like most of the issues came up with playing with a lead and just inexplicably stopping what was working.
 
rmcjacket23 said:
Probably a combination of both. Then you have to figure out does "better targeted work" equate to taking pads off and not hitting each other? Working on techniques we've struggled with, such as open field tackling, is going to be hard to achieve without physical contact.

The timeframe of late game meltdowns also correlates very well with the timeline of the implementation of the last CBA, which cut way back on the quantity and timing of padded practices and significantly changed the offseason program.
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Yeah but every team agreed to that cba yet our fourth quarter meltdowns have come more frequently than anyone else. At least since 2022
 
Florida Raven Fan said:
Arguing over practice methods from different eras feels unproductive. Just because something was done a certain way in the past doesn’t mean it should continue unchanged today. The game evolves, and so should training approaches.
If a player who’s actually on the team says the practices contributed to injuries, that perspective deserves to be taken seriously—especially when the team has a consistent history of injury issues. I wouldn’t label Zay as “soft” for being honest about that. In fact, players who’ve joined the team from other organizations have also said the practices are noticeably more intense than what they were used to, which adds credibility to the concern.
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Exactly.

olddays.jpg
 
ravenslord said:
Zay was there , you were not .
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And I'm taking him at his word. Either he's telling the truth, or he's lying.
Plus there's the whole "I'm basically in a contract year and its more convenient for me now to take shots at coaches who aren't here anymore, even though I've had the platform and ability to do it for several years but strategically decided not to".
 
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