The Random Thought Thread

[redrum52]

My player by player thoughts this year. Offense for now and defense to come later...

QB:
Lamar Jackson - we'd be nothing without him, and it's a shame that so many other positions have been decimated because he could be a bonafide superstar with his improvements and a 2019 OL and running game. He's not perfect but he's made big strides and I hope they continue once we get healthy next year

Tyler Huntley - N/A


RB:
Latavius Murray - he is what he is. If you need 4 yards and a hole is open for 4 yards, he'll get you 4 yards. Showing a touch of elusiveness but not much.

Devonta Freeman - he's been a good rotational piece. He doesn't have the long speed anymore but has enough elusiveness to be a role player and we could do a lot worse

Le'Veon Bell - he's not too dissimilar from Latavius. His roster status should be up in the air but we've been extraordinarily patient with this group

Ty'Son Williams - the athleticism is there but the vision and aggressiveness aren't. I'd like to see him get another shot at this with the old farts above not doing much, but it's clear he's just a body right now.

Pat Ricard (FB) - nothing much to say here. Ricard is doing Ricard things. He's an important cog in the offense.


WR:
Marquise Brown - still struggling with some drops on occasion but has greatly improved. He's working more in the intermediate range and has shown a lot more fight after the catch. Trending toward a WR1 but not fully there just yet.

Rashod Bateman - small sample size but no surprises to this point. Tough and dependable with good hands. He should be a key player for years to come.

Sammy Watkins - was solid before the injury and then just looked disconnected last night. Hopefully he returns to pre-injury form because he was a solid enough player for us.

Devin Duvernay - get the ball in his hands. Good things happen. He's progressed well in the technical intricacies of the game and should ascend to WR3 next year.

James Proche - solid when he gets an opportunity. Athletically limited but can make the tough catch. Should slot in well at the back of the WR rotation once again going forward.

Tylan Wallace - N/A as a receiver but has embraced ST

Miles Boykin - N/A as a receiver so far. They've been using him as a big slot a lot more since he returned. Curious to see how that goes heading into next year


TE:
Mark Andrews - we know what we have here. Very good TE who can disappear at times but takes over the game when he needs to.

Eric Tomlinson - solid blocker and has been a great Boyle replacement.

Josh Oliver- JAG. Has serious ball security issues and is likely gone when/if Boyle finally returns.


OL:
Alejandro Villanueva - Up and down but mostly down. Not sure what we saw here in the first place but he should be a 1 year and done guy.

Ben Powers - at his best, he's a solid player. At his worst, he's really bad. You can always improve here. He's just been the healthy one up to this point. But you can tell they want to do better when the opportunity presents itself.

Bradley Bozeman - he's been solid and dependable in the middle. Not a superstar by any stretch but a massive improvement.

Kevin Zeitler - another good, solid piece. Fits in well and should be a key returning player next year.

Patrick Mekari - he was a savior and his return should help solidify the OL once again. Not sure where his ultimate home is but he's been a godsend and should be playing for us for years to come if we can.

Tyre Phillips - playing T out of necessity. He's so good at moving to the next level and would greatly benefit from getting some run at G. But his own health and needs elsewhere have necessitated his move.

Trystan Colon - N/A for the most part but has been a good 6th OL.

Ben Cleveland - N/A for the most part but showed promise in the rotation before he got hurt.

AV was most likely brought in as Brown replacement/LT backup if things didn't go well and I'm beginning to think the FO had an idea something like this might happen.

Sad to hear Wolfe is done on an already thin DL.

At this point hoping for post-season just to get the young guys experience but don't see it going well. Same problems from last year with the OL are now worse as is the defense.

 

[BloodRaven]

We were warned about Wolfes inability to stay healthy

 

[JoeyFlex5]

We were warned about Wolfes inability to stay healthy

Yet we opted for him over the currently healthy brockers.

And yes I know the contracts are way different, but I’d take brockers at his price, over Wolfe on IR at any price, along with bwill who’s been a fantastic waste of cap this year as well.

fuck man this year couldn’t have gone much worse from a cap standpoint. We’ve gotten boned at every turn

 

[jboy19]

Yet we opted for him over the currently healthy brockers.

And yes I know the contracts are way different, but I’d take brockers at his price, over Wolfe on IR at any price, along with bwill who’s been a fantastic waste of cap this year as well.

fuck man this year couldn’t have gone much worse from a cap standpoint. We’ve gotten boned at every turn

The biggest cap issue with this team has always been the long string of players with large cap numbers who retired, were cut, or played elsewhere (Rice, Monroe, Pitta, Flacco (post-trade), Earl Thomas). I'm not sure any other team has had such a consistent issue with dead cap money. It's a bigger problem (imo) than paying guys who simply underperform (BWill, AV, etc.) or get temporarily injured.

 

[BloodRaven]

Yet we opted for him over the currently healthy brockers.

And yes I know the contracts are way different, but I’d take brockers at his price, over Wolfe on IR at any price, along with bwill who’s been a fantastic waste of cap this year as well.

fuck man this year couldn’t have gone much worse from a cap standpoint. We’ve gotten boned at every turn

I was pro Brockers too, Wolfe offers more disruption in the passing game but you basically roll the dice on his health.

 

[Simba]

It’s easy to say now that he’s missing a year but Wolfe was a high quality player for us last year and it was a no brainer to re-sign him.

 

[Nurps]

Alright so I'm heading to Baltimore next Friday for the SNF game against the Browns. For those who have gone to games this season....

1) Do you need proof of Vaccination? I have a picture of my card on my phone just in case.

2) Are masks required or no?

Just do what I did with the Miami game. Check the stadiums website. Should give you all pertinent info.

 

[rossihunter2]

I like Brown but he has an injury history dating back to high school, even this season hes missed multiple games due to back injury.

i mean sure - but at the end of the 3rd round, it's tough to get a player at a high-value position like that without some sort of profile flaw...

i didnt know about the injury stuff with him - my main concern was about a lack of anchor/mass - he just seemed a bit thin (which i wasnt too worried about because an nfl weight room should - and seemingly has - fixed it) and obviously his height means he gives up a ton of natural leverage

much like when we got orlando - guys with that kind of talent and tape who fall to those kinds of draft spots are likely going to have something you dont like about their profile but idk it feels like the position is so important and the potential reward so high that it's worth the risk - especially when 3rd round picks iirc only pan out statistically like a third of the time anyway

it doesnt really matter anyway because he got taken before our pick so it's not like we passed on him - but given what they were saying about cleveland (about how they'd been waiting for him for ages) and how they reportedly werent that enamoured with the 2021 OT draft class anyway that they probably still take cleveland anyway

 

[rossihunter2]

Yet we opted for him over the currently healthy brockers.

And yes I know the contracts are way different, but I’d take brockers at his price, over Wolfe on IR at any price, along with bwill who’s been a fantastic waste of cap this year as well.

fuck man this year couldn’t have gone much worse from a cap standpoint. We’ve gotten boned at every turn

so much cap space just not playing each week lol - and because lots of the deals are quite recent it means we didnt have a ton of flexibility with restructures either (which is why we've been so hard up against the cap all year)

but it does make me glad that EDC didnt do any void years on contracts this year because it would have frustrated me if we'd taken cap from future years to support this year only to have 20+ guys on i/r tank that investment - that's the silver-lining although we have had to do more restructures than we'd want

 

[rossihunter2]

It’s easy to say now that he’s missing a year but Wolfe was a high quality player for us last year and it was a no brainer to re-sign him.

yeah i dont think a single person disliked that re-signing when it happened

 

[purplepittabread88]

I think we’re going to look back very disappointed in what we did with money while Lamar was on a rookie contract. I know a lot of it is bad luck and injuries, but jeez yannick, earl and honestly Cambell have been disappointing uses of cap freedom. At least we got Peters

 

[JoeyFlex5]

It’s easy to say now that he’s missing a year but Wolfe was a high quality player for us last year and it was a no brainer to re-sign him.

i agree but it’s still a goddamn shame

I think we’re going to look back very disappointed in what we did with money while Lamar was on a rookie contract. I know a lot of it is bad luck and injuries, but jeez yannick, earl and honestly Cambell have been disappointing uses of cap freedom. At least we got Peters

Yup. Really tough breaks. The bwill and Tony Jefferson contracts I think are the ones that have haunted us the most, aside from earl Thomas of course but that’s such an outlier I’ll leave it alone. Jefferson and bwill got signed in the same offseason, bwill had his place but was grossly overpaid for what he did, period, and Jefferson got a fat deal and if he didn’t get injured in 2019 he would’ve tanked our season, he was a total waste of cap space and he was replaced by a 6th rounder from the same year we signed him. Not that the Jefferson contract still hurts now but those things have ripple effects, you sign him instead of someone else, then the next offseason he’s on the books so you pass on someone else, and again, and maybe even the draft is affected by it as well, those 2 stand out as the biggest mistakes to me because they just weren’t worth the dollars spent.

earl Thomas can eat a sea of dicks, like a fucking ocean full of dicks. Starting with his brother since he’s into that kinda shit apparently. Fucking pathetic excuse for a human being that guy.

 

[JoeyFlex5]

Hold on I meant to post about this the other day but forgot to, mike Preston who IS in the ravens building and has connections with the team, no matter how bad we dislike his pessimism, he is in the loop, he said, plain as day on 105.7 on Friday morning, basically that the team had to jump on Stanley’s ass about his recovery because he spent the offseason halfassing it and the coaches were pissed. I’ll try to quote it as close as I can remember:

“the scuttlebutt around the castle was that the coaches weren’t too happy with stanley, he kinda laid around the whole offseason and a month or 2 out from camp he decided okay now I gotta kick it into gear, they had to stay on him about putting in the work to rehab his ankle and he just wasn’t doing it”

he went on to suggest that he hopes this blunder of a year gets his head right and he’s learned that he’s gotta be all in, and that the coaches got through to him after his comeback attempt failed.

he was noncommittal about any specifics, but he was very clear to say that the coaches were in fact livid with Stanley at multiple points this offseason because of a lack of effort in his rehab.

as much as we dislike Preston’s takes, he is a legitimate journalist and to the best of my knowledge he has never willingly spread false information as fact.

 

[Deebo813]

could next season potentially be a start of a rebuild?

 

[rossihunter2]

i agree but it’s still a goddamn shame



Yup. Really tough breaks. The bwill and Tony Jefferson contracts I think are the ones that have haunted us the most, aside from earl Thomas of course but that’s such an outlier I’ll leave it alone. Jefferson and bwill got signed in the same offseason, bwill had his place but was grossly overpaid for what he did, period, and Jefferson got a fat deal and if he didn’t get injured in 2019 he would’ve tanked our season, he was a total waste of cap space and he was replaced by a 6th rounder from the same year we signed him. Not that the Jefferson contract still hurts now but those things have ripple effects, you sign him instead of someone else, then the next offseason he’s on the books so you pass on someone else, and again, and maybe even the draft is affected by it as well, those 2 stand out as the biggest mistakes to me because they just weren’t worth the dollars spent.

earl Thomas can eat a sea of dicks, like a fucking ocean full of dicks. Starting with his brother since he’s into that kinda shit apparently. Fucking pathetic excuse for a human being that guy.

Bwill hurt because they paid him to become something he’d not shown when they paid him with regards to pass rush and post-ngata that really hamstrung us - never massively but he’s constantly been near the top of our cap list despite being a nose who comes off the field on passing downs

he’s been an awesome nose tackle and should be regarded as one of the best run-stuffers of the last decade regardless of team and it’s testament to him that so often our run defence fell apart without him but it’s not ridiculous to think he might have been a classic 80-20 candidate if we had anyone to play the nose coming up behind him when we initially signed him

if Davis or Henry had shown anything promising in that space of time we might have moved on - didn’t help that we’d clearly decided Jernigan wasn’t a long-term option and urban was promising but an end not a tackle

 

[Dom McRaven]

Hold on I meant to post about this the other day but forgot to, mike Preston who IS in the ravens building and has connections with the team, no matter how bad we dislike his pessimism, he is in the loop, he said, plain as day on 105.7 on Friday morning, basically that the team had to jump on Stanley’s ass about his recovery because he spent the offseason halfassing it and the coaches were pissed. I’ll try to quote it as close as I can remember:

“the scuttlebutt around the castle was that the coaches weren’t too happy with stanley, he kinda laid around the whole offseason and a month or 2 out from camp he decided okay now I gotta kick it into gear, they had to stay on him about putting in the work to rehab his ankle and he just wasn’t doing it”

he went on to suggest that he hopes this blunder of a year gets his head right and he’s learned that he’s gotta be all in, and that the coaches got through to him after his comeback attempt failed.

he was noncommittal about any specifics, but he was very clear to say that the coaches were in fact livid with Stanley at multiple points this offseason because of a lack of effort in his rehab.

as much as we dislike Preston’s takes, he is a legitimate journalist and to the best of my knowledge he has never willingly spread false information as fact.

Very disappointed in Stanley if this is true. Barring setbacks, he better be 150% all in come this offseason. The moment we even get a competent OL across the board................

 

[Dom McRaven]

could next season potentially be a start of a rebuild?

Depends on your definition of rebuild. Our skill positions on offense is pretty young. Defense.........well.........yeah.

 

[rossihunter2]

Hold on I meant to post about this the other day but forgot to, mike Preston who IS in the ravens building and has connections with the team, no matter how bad we dislike his pessimism, he is in the loop, he said, plain as day on 105.7 on Friday morning, basically that the team had to jump on Stanley’s ass about his recovery because he spent the offseason halfassing it and the coaches were pissed. I’ll try to quote it as close as I can remember:

“the scuttlebutt around the castle was that the coaches weren’t too happy with stanley, he kinda laid around the whole offseason and a month or 2 out from camp he decided okay now I gotta kick it into gear, they had to stay on him about putting in the work to rehab his ankle and he just wasn’t doing it”

he went on to suggest that he hopes this blunder of a year gets his head right and he’s learned that he’s gotta be all in, and that the coaches got through to him after his comeback attempt failed.

he was noncommittal about any specifics, but he was very clear to say that the coaches were in fact livid with Stanley at multiple points this offseason because of a lack of effort in his rehab.

as much as we dislike Preston’s takes, he is a legitimate journalist and to the best of my knowledge he has never willingly spread false information as fact.

Idk I’ve seen him spread deliberate falsehoods this year about stadium attendance for example to push an agenda and I’ve not heard anything about Stanley from what I consider a “more reputable” beat guy

all signs about Stanley would suggest that he fought his ass off to come back - the fact it took so long to finally shut him down and that it required yet more surgery would suggest that not much he could have done this offseason to rehab it better

just based on everything we know about Stanley it would shock me if this was even remotely true

and if they had doubts about his commitment to rehab they’d have known before the draft and we wouldn’t have traded Orlando...

just smells funky from Preston to me

 

[JAAM]

Holy shit

 

[rossihunter2]

could next season potentially be a start of a rebuild?

certainly on defence for sure

absolutely not on offence lol - we’ve got our franchise qb, 2 1st rounders at WR, a TE we just paid top money to, an all-pro LT (if he comes back) and 2 top RBs... as well as a G and another TE being paid nice money

would be no reason to do much to that offence except potentially at tackle, re-signing project pat and working out what we’re doing at C with Bozeman