The Win, The Penalties and Everything Else

[rossihunter2]

FWIW, I don't think McPhee scores (Fulgham is coming back to the ball and practically on top of him), but it is at least 3 more points (Ravens ball near the red zone with 5 to 10 seconds left).

This game was so weird. It ended up very close, but I think the Eagles had a ton of H2 plays break their way:

• Long run from Sanders (this hole was huge), fumble recovered by Arcega-Whiteside (only Eagle among ~5 Ravens)
• Next TD drive had a blown coverage (long pass to Hightower at Q3, 01:04), and then the RTP from Ward after a 3rd down incompletion (don't hit the QBs head...). The latter came after Queen's drop.
• TD drive 3 had the 40 yard scramble from Wentz (which, uh, please tackle him?). And then Wentz just throws it up on 4th&9. The Ravens have both of their top two corners there, yet Fulgham somehow comes down with it. That was after Elliott dropped the gift-wrapped interception (I'm sure that hurt. Zrebiec wrote this week that Elliott really wanted to get a takeaway).
• Final TD drive had the questionable 49 yard PI (there's contact before the ball is there, but I think it's mostly nonsense). Not to mention that the new RT tackled Bowser, else Wentz has no space to step up. That was basically the whole drive.

There's a 3&out and a 4&out interspersed in there too. On the 3&out, Humphrey forced yet another fumble, but the ball went OoB before Peters could recover. Hmm, I feel a lot better about the game now. I'd still like the offense to wake up, but the formula worked despite all of this insane "luck."

that was my general feeling after calming down from the initial overreaction last night - the defence still played lights out and had 3 or 4 unlucky breaks and still managed to close the game just about

the offence is far more troubling right now

 

[rossihunter2]

Mekari was getting a good push in the run game today. I think he could be the starter at RG in two weeks.

its bye week so now would be the right time to make that change if we're going to

 

[rossihunter2]

Man iv really grown to appreciate some of the recent WRs we’ve had before like Steve Smith Sr, Torrey Smith, Derek Mason and Anquan Boldin. Iv always had love for those guys but seeing the receiver play lately has been so frustrating.

watching anquan boldin highlights from the 2012 season is insane when you look at just how dominant he was - a boldin (or boldin-like) player on this team right now would be incredible

that superbowl offence was blessed with weapons that all had complementary skillsets - Boldin, Torrey Smith, Dennis Pitta, Ray Rice

and then those 4 guys were backed up by Jacoby Jones in a part-time role and Bernard Pierce who was great that season as a change of pace back (never did anything after that year though lol)

and then i look at this year's weapons and I see Andrews being awesome and Hollywood's clearly our number 1 WR but no one else that's chipping in and making plays that threaten a defence

right now despite our incredible athleticism on offence we're not stressing defences at all - its so comfortable for them to defend us

 

[rossihunter2]

Not a satisfying game to say the least but glad we got the W. A few takeaways:

-I'm not reading too much into the late game defensive "collapse." It was pretty clear in that game that, for whatever reason, the officiating was highly skewed. Our guys didn't disappear, they were held relentlessly in the second half and it just wasn't called. That happens quite a bit in the NFL and I'm glad we were able to overcome it. I'm not even mad about it, but it was pretty obvious that was the difference.

-It was awesome to see that Lamar has his legs back, that touchdown saved the game.

-The offense isn't "not clicking," it's bad. We are so weak at the RG position that it's dragging down the rest of the line and causing Lamar to bail out of the pocket even when he doesn't have to. I like that his instinct is to protect the football but I'm getting tired of watching him run backward 15 yards when he could've stepped up.

-The league has caught up to the side arm. I like it when he's slipping the ball in somewhere it has no business being like we saw on the touchdown, but the throwing motion from the pocket turns makes the release of our 6' 2" quarterback what it would be if he 5' 10". The problem is I don't know if you can fix that this year and its apparent that the abbreviated offseason has our QB slipping into bad habits.

-Miles Boykin is a good dude, a smart one too, so it baffles me that he can't figure out how to make reads within the offense. For whatever reason he NEVER understands when a run gets checked to a pass. It's a mystery.

We've totally revamped the team during the BYE week before, we'll see what the coaches can come up with over the next couple of weeks.

the bye was huge for us last year - let's hope we come out of the bye looking massively improved just like last year

but there's lots of work to be done to make it work

 

[rossihunter2]

I don't think this is going to happen. He is still being investigated by The NFL for his pending sexual assault case. The Ravens still have a strong stance on domestic violence related issues. Anything is possible but if The Ravens end up signing AB that's going to make them look like hypocrites and it doesn't make sense for them to release Earl Thomas then be willing to sign AB.

i would understand the rationale of AB instead of earl - earl was not liked inside the locker room because he didnt put the work in and was a bit of a loner

you can levy all sorts of criticisms at Antonio Brown but you can never accuse him of not being a hard worker

but the domestic violence/sexual assault/rape allegations that are still seemingly unresolved (as far as im aware) are way more of a problem - im not sure id be comfortable bringing him in with those hanging over his head and given the ravens stance post-ray rice you have to think they probably wont be comfortable bringing him in either

but he's not going to be a locker room problem in the same way earl was if he was brought in - i mean for 1 he's already got 2 pretty important friends in the locker room in Hollywood and Lamar and Lamar clearly likes him

 

[drjohnnyfever]

- Offensive playcalling was reminiscent of Cam freakin' Cameron. Sheesh!
- Lamar's constant sidearming is alarming to me. I don't like it!
- I'd love to see more downfield shots for big chunks to our receivers SOMETIMES opposed to just the TE's.
- The rollout plays to move the pocket were annoying as hell and would take Lamar back 5-10 yards at times and end in throwaways.
- Defense set the tone early and Calais was a BEAST! They started to fizzle later in the game though.
- OFFENSIVE LINE WAS PURE TRASH! Too many penalties!

Sure, the Ravens are 5-1 and that's great but the Ravens haven't looked pristine in their execution for a few weeks now. Bye week!

FIX IT!

I'm glad I'm not the only one seeing Llamar's moves/ roll outs outside the pocket as something that needs to be addressed. There were more than a handful of times that instead of remaining in the pocket to reassess his position and those of his receivers that he rolled/ran to his right, out of the pocket, exposing himself to pursuit of a DEF lineman and LB's to a shrinking or closed sideline escape route. Had he stayed in the pocket, there were occasions where a move right up the middle would have exposed him to fewer defenders and a more wide open field. The quick decision to roll to the right, getting out of the direct line of his blocking, needs to be pointed out to him........ if the coaches even observed it. Hopefully they'll see it in the tape.

The other thing is that I think they have to have the WR's stretch the field. Spread them out to the hatches or beyond to pull the coverage, avoid the bumps from defenders, and get up field. Catch a ball or two and this pulls the LB's out of the middle shading to the hatches.

The O-line needs help, much of the above is affected by that, obviously.

 

[rmcjacket23]

I think that's a fair argument but AB at 50% of what he was in 2015 is still 100% better than Boykin and Snead lol. I suppose it's a non factor at this point I'd just like to see something done for that WR1/2 position for when teams take away Andrews, Boykin ain't it and it might be asking too much of Devin and Proche right now.

OK but I don't think that matters. There's literally dozens of WRs in this league who are better than guys we're trotting out there, so to say AB is better than what we have in terms of depth isn't exactly revolutionary. Its merely a question of "is what he's going to do on the field make up for the headache he will cause in the locker room". And my opinion is no.

One thing I know for certain about AB, and I've seen nothing to suggest this would be different now, is that he's vocal and unhappy when he's not getting the football. And there are NOT many avenues in this offense where he's going to get the football a lot.

People need to realize that a high volume passing game from Lamar is like 30-35 attempts. He's averaging 27, and people think he's throwing too much.

AB is accustomed to getting upwards of 10-12 targets per game. That ain't happening here.
People think we throw to Andrews too much. His season high for targets is 9, and he's averaging about 6 per game.
People think we throw to Brown too much. His season high for targets is 10, and he's averaging 7 per game.

AB is accustomed to getting pretty close to the combined volume of our two highest target hogs COMBINED.

There is no version of AB I know or have ever seen where he's going to come in and be like "yeah, I'm good with 6-7 targets/game". If you merely took Snead and Boykin off the field entirely, and gave all of their volume to AB, he'd still only be averaging less than 6 targets/game.

The only way he would be happy here is if the Ravens turned into a high volume passing attack, throwing 40,45,50 times a game, where he's commanding 20-25% share. I don't think anybody really thinks our offense is better by doing that.

 

[rossihunter2]

One thing I keep going back to is 2012, I just can’t help it. We were tooting the super bowl horn all the way up until late November when the losing streak started, and at no point did that team look as good or have anywhere near the potential that this team has.

we are truly spoiled. It looks ugly at times and Lamar and Roman are really shitting the bed, but compare this team shitting the bed to Flacco and Cameron shitting the bed, my god.. the difference is that Lamar Jackson’s ravens can absolutely shit the bed against a quality opponent and still win, Joe Flacco’s ravens could Be somewhat inconsistent against a bottom dweller and fucking lose.

My hope is that Harbaugh and urban sit down with Roman and go over a philosophy change, do everything to get Lamar’s mechanics back under control, and cut the dead weight on game days, Boykin is a detriment when he’s on the field, I don’t Give a shit That he blocks well because we’ve given up on running the ball so get a threat out there, stop moving the pocket, stop taking Lamars eyes off the defense with these long developing rollouts, go 5 wide and get speedsters deep, open up the whole field, let Lamar see the field and decide whether to challenge them deep in 1v1, find andrews for the 2nd read, or take off running, or even dump off to a dobbins and let him make a play in space, get Lamar in the shotgun taking regular drops where he can observe the play unfolding, he was deadly in 2 phases last year, read option and spread/4wide, read option isn’t working so let the man run some spread/4wide. We have this obsession with short YAC patterns but have zero creativity in the patterns, we have the likes of duvernay, Hollywood, and dobbins, and also 2 excellent TEs, run some goddamn bunch formations and get some rubs going if you wanna pick up YAC, the YAC philosophy simply doesn’t work without creativity in the route combinations.

this team has the talent, it also has the coaching, the coaching just needs to come the fuck together and stop being too cute and get some synergy going with their personnel

we had a pretty significant play-caller change in 2012 that helped spring-board that offence
i hope it doesnt take a similar change this year to get something going because i dont think roman's in any danger of losing his job (certainly not mid-season) - so im hoping that this bye week can revitalise something that's missing

the self-evaluation part of this bye week from a coaching standpoint is going to be huge - ill give them the benefit of the doubt in that they didnt know how teams would defend them heading into week 1 and they didnt know what they'd get out of certain guys when the games came because they'd only had scrimmages

but they've got 6 weeks of tape now and consistent patterns emerging that even laypersons can see - it will be a bad sign if they come out post-bye and the offence still looks flat and uncreative

 

[rossihunter2]

Should we start another thread Fire Roman ?

im not there yet but ask me after the 5 game run beginning and ending with the steelers (basically ask me end of november) and i might be there by then if we've been bounced around by some good teams

 

[rossihunter2]

So Cole's post is a great take.

It's hard for me to have many takeaways from this game. The offense still struggled to move the ball consistently, but that's also not a one game problem, so its mostly status quo.

1. Offensive line was terrible. They were pedestrian in protection, and the penalties were terrible. 8 offensive penalties called on the Oline alone, with 6 being accepted. To further illustrate that...

Ravens ran 65 offensive plays (67, minus two kneels). 21 of those plays involved 10+ yards on distance to a first down, excluding 1st and down. That means that 1 out of every 3 offensive plays, ignoring 1st and 10s, involved us needing 10+ yards to get a first down. That means we were in second and third and long frequently, or 1st and long after a penalty. You REALLY hamstring your playbooks when its 2nd and 10+ a lot.

2. Want to see a stark contract from last season:
Break down of rushing plays by our RBs (not Lamar):
0, 2, 9, 4, -2, 2, 3, 2, 5, -2, 0, 16, 5, 6, 2, 1, -2, -1, 4, 6, 1, 0, 5, -4, 3, 1, 5, -3

Can't argue its a volume issue, since there's 28 RB carries in there, which is more than plenty.
A grand total of one carry over 10 yards (Dobbins 16 yard run)
28.5% of runs were 5+ yards
Roughly 2/3 of our RB carries were for 3 yards or less
Roughly 1/3 of our RB carries were for negative or zero yardage

THIS is the problem. It may seem obvious, but we're sucking running the ball. The box score will show you 5 YPC and 182 rushing yards, but its a mirage. It's all Lamar. He's got 9 for 108, the rest of the team has 28 for 74. That ain't good.

Its pretty clear now... if you can slow down the Ravens rushing attack, you can keep this offense in check. The ONLY way I see to fix that, outside of much better play from our Oline, is to let Lamar run more. I'm not even sure that will yield productivity, because Lamar isn't going to average 12 YPC if he gets more carries. Much of his effectiveness at running yesterday was due to lower frequency, with improvised runs yielding much bigger chunks.

Team needs to get back to more rushing volume (did better yesterday, just not effective). We've got some tough teams on our schedule against the run coming up (namely Pittsburgh), and if our backs are only going to get 3 YPC, we're going to continue to struggle to score points.

3. I honestly don't really read much into the defense's "collapse" yesterday. If we look at the breakdown:
a) shut them out in the first half. They had ONE total yard in their first 5 drives. They had one long drive towards end of half, but we clamped down on short yardage and made the stop. Missed FG drive was largely a product of a ticky tack, should have been non-called, roughing penalty on Campbell after the Sanders run. Ball was intercepted and would have ended the drive.
b) We give up the one big long run to Sanders in the middle of the 3rd. Definitely one big breakdown, but something that can be corrected.
c) Blown coverage on late 3rd quarter TD drive leads to big play, Ravens almost force stoppage on 3rd and goal at the 5, but Jihad Ward had a stupid roughing penalty to keep drive alive.
d) I basically write off the final TD drive for the Eagles entirely, because its a bogus DPI call on Peters. Pretty standard no flag on that play.

So I'm seeing the defense on the hook for somewhere around 14-17 points, primarily from 2-3 big plays given up. That's a pretty comfortable win. One bad penalty call leads to a TD, and another was a stupid penalty that would have stalled the drive.

Obviously not happy with the big runs from Sanders and Wentz, but I also think our expectations were a bit too high after a dominant first half.

100% agree on the running game - it's all lamar right now

right now we're most efficient at passing on 1st down (vs 2nd and 3rd) and yet we pass least on 1st down - when we got stuck yesterday on offence with those repeated 3-5 and outs the drives where we got some rhythm and momentum going came from 1st down passes just to get the offence moving...

2 things are still true from last year:

1. the running game has to involve Lamar as its centrepiece not just as an extra because unless the defence respects the keeper it won't work
2. lamar is at his best passing when he has a regular drop and passes from the pocket - not bootlegging, not moving the pocket - if we do those kinds of things on 1st downs and get ourselves even just a 5 yd pickup it'll open up the running game

lamar should be the focal point of our offence but it doesnt feel like its been designed to make use of his strengths

 

[organizedchaos21]

pretty sure it wasnt even just a 3rd down incompletion but an interception by chuck clark iirc

That was the first RTP (Q2, 00:04). That one was soft and probably called on the wrong player (should've been Ferguson, not Campbell). It led to the missed FG by Elliott to end the half. Of note, Clark's interception was way to close to a completion for me. Unclear if it would have been a TD, but worst case, the Eagles would have had one more snap from inside the 1.

The one I'm referring to came at (Q4, 14:25), just before Wentz hit Jason Croom (PS callup) for a TD.

 

[Sandtown]

I was really impressed by Chris Board on how he covered Zach Ertz. I almost thought he was safety or cornerback for one moment.

 

[gtalk12]

I also don't know what kind of "talent" we're getting from a 32 year old player, who may or may not be anywhere near game shape, and who's been out of the league for over a year at this point. I'm quite confident I'm not getting 2015 AB, so...

Even if you could convince me that he was somewhat close to that player he was on the Steelers I still wouldn't take him. And that is based on what I saw from him on the Steelers and the Patriots. I am out on him completely. This isn't some sort of TO or Randy Moss kind of guy. This guy is beyond selfish. He is not right in the head and needs help.

No, we need coaching to scheme better and get our guys open

 

[gtalk12]

What I saw yesterday told me how dominate we were defensively. Most of their scores came off tacky penalties. Regardless how you feel about the Eagles or any opponent, you give them an additional 3 downs and a 1st they will hurt you. It is what it is.


The only play that bugged me was the deep pass that Peters looked to make a play (looked like he was trying to scoop it for an INT) which honestly I'm not even mad at. He makes that play and he is a genius, got burned this time. What I am more upset about is how close the game was because of all the extra chances being given to the Eagles off penalties that our defense was committing. I think alot of those calls were BS, same goes for our offense. We got in our own way every time we did anything good.

Otherwise this is a blowout.

 

[JoeyFlex5]

You guys know how serious The Ravens stance are when it comes to domestic violence but for some reason AB talent is going to be so undeniable that The Ravens are going to be more than willing to sign him? Come on man there's probably 95 percent chance The Ravens are not going to sign AB at all base off his sexual assault case that's still pending to this day. It's most likely not going to happen and you guys know this.

AB has zero domestic violence in his history and the pending case happening now is almost certainly bullshit and the “investigation” by the nfl seems a whole lot more like a ploy to keep him out of the league because of how he acted last year, this investigation has been going on for a very long time now and there has been no word about it, they’re not investigating shit lol.

and I did not buy the allegations from the very beginning, I didn’t originally want ab because I thought we’d be fine without him, and even then I said it sounds like bullshit, nothing about the allegations make any sense at all.

 

[Justdewinit20]

watching anquan boldin highlights from the 2012 season is insane when you look at just how dominant he was - a boldin (or boldin-like) player on this team right now would be incredible

that superbowl offence was blessed with weapons that all had complementary skillsets - Boldin, Torrey Smith, Dennis Pitta, Ray Rice

and then those 4 guys were backed up by Jacoby Jones in a part-time role and Bernard Pierce who was great that season as a change of pace back (never did anything after that year though lol)

and then i look at this year's weapons and I see Andrews being awesome and Hollywood's clearly our number 1 WR but no one else that's chipping in and making plays that threaten a defence

right now despite our incredible athleticism on offence we're not stressing defences at all - its so comfortable for them to defend us

That team really took off after offensive line changes. Bryant McKinnie at left tackle and KO inside at guard and that team couldn't be stopped on offense.

 

[JoeyFlex5]

i would understand the rationale of AB instead of earl - earl was not liked inside the locker room because he didnt put the work in and was a bit of a loner

you can levy all sorts of criticisms at Antonio Brown but you can never accuse him of not being a hard worker

but the domestic violence/sexual assault/rape allegations that are still seemingly unresolved (as far as im aware) are way more of a problem - im not sure id be comfortable bringing him in with those hanging over his head and given the ravens stance post-ray rice you have to think they probably wont be comfortable bringing him in either

but he's not going to be a locker room problem in the same way earl was if he was brought in - i mean for 1 he's already got 2 pretty important friends in the locker room in Hollywood and Lamar and Lamar clearly likes him

I was looking for a way to state this. Earl was like Stanley From the office, grumpy old fuck who checked out and was done working and didn’t vibe with the younger guys around him. AB would at the very least be part of the culture, long term yeah he would probably end up a problem, but in the short term I just don’t see how he could be winning, playing with his cousin, playing in a great locker room with a great culture, compete for a super bowl, and in only 2 months after taking a year and a half off of football he would throw it all away because he was open and not targeted.

humans learn from the error of their ways, plain and simple. If I never learned from my mistakes holy shit I’d be a worthless alcoholic with a 300 credit score.

 

[RavensMania]

What I saw yesterday told me how dominate we were defensively. Most of their scores came off tacky penalties. Regardless how you feel about the Eagles or any opponent, you give them an additional 3 downs and a 1st they will hurt you. It is what it is.


The only play that bugged me was the deep pass that Peters looked to make a play (looked like he was trying to scoop it for an INT) which honestly I'm not even mad at. He makes that play and he is a genius, got burned this time. What I am more upset about is how close the game was because of all the extra chances being given to the Eagles off penalties that our defense was committing. I think alot of those calls were BS, same goes for our offense. We got in our own way every time we did anything good.

Otherwise this is a blowout.

our defense only had 3 penalites. It was the offense that had the bulk of them (9)

 

[gtalk12]

our defense only had 3 penalites. It was the offense that had the bulk of them (9)

Remember that roughing the passer call? and the PI? Those were HUGE penalties. Without those? Eagles ain't scoring.

 

[rossihunter2]

Remember that roughing the passer call? and the PI? Those were HUGE penalties. Without those? Eagles ain't scoring.

the PI was bullshit though - not much you can do about that