The Running Game, The Passing Game and Dallas's Defence

[rmcjacket23]

I’m concerned with ngakoues lack of pressure, and I am very much chalking it up to his narrow alignment.

why do the ravens hate letting players do what they do well?

I think with no Judon on the other side, he's playing on a unit that lacks any consistent rush from anybody, and any real threat. No Judon, Campbell not playing much, and its pretty obvious that expecting a lot of snaps from guys like McPhee or Bowser isn't great for the pass rush unit, as they seem to tire out quickly. They're better as situational rushers. Bowser played 70% of snaps last night. While I think he's earned more playing time, that's probably a stretch.

 

[rmcjacket23]

They seemed particular biased tonight. I know Aikman did call out the Cowboys defense numerous times, but man were they rough tonight. Thought it was crazy how much they were calling for the flag to be picked up when Luke Wilson was basically assaulted by 2 guys. It was only uncatchable because he was tackled before even getting a chance to jump. Throw wasn’t good but as clear of a PI as can be.

Well, sort of. I don't think he's catching that pass ever. I think when they judge for catchability, its like pretending like the receiver is Megatron with a freakish-level wingspan. Was a poorly thrown ball that he ain't catching, but it shouldn't be ruled uncatchable based on the standard the NFL sets.

I think if anything it was Troy sort of jabbing at Lamar being like "hey your guy is getting mugged" and your not even throwing a good enough ball to get the call. He did, but airmailed many passes last night and throws bad enough won't get the call in the future for that very reason.

 

[rmcjacket23]

Fuck the commentators. Out here laughing about jinxing our football demigod and simping for Erin Andrews' shoes. "tHEy'rE hOT." Gimme me a break with that nonsense.

Felt like the defense gave up at least 25 and they should have if Zurlein doesn't miss his kicks.

I mean, I don't think the defense was great at all. But that being said...
1. First 3 points comes off the interception
2. Next TD comes off a 66 yard kick return that puts them near the red zone already. So like Cowboys have two drives where they start in FG range. So even if you make the stop, that's 6 points that's not really on the defense.
3. Missed 40 yard FG. Agree that should be 3 points charged to defense.
4. Second and Third missed FG I don't really factor in. Its a 52 yarder. People in Baltimore are spoiled by Tucker, so they think that's a make.
The league itself, after last night, is about 66% from 50+ yards. So they're missing 1 out of 3. Zuerlein, himself, was 1/4 from 50+ coming into the game. So like the expectation is that he'll miss that kick or at least miss one of them.
5. Ravens give up the late TD, up 17, playing much softer coverage.

So like I'm probably charging the defense for about 19 points last night, which includes a late TD in garbage time. Anything under 20 is very good in this league, and even though Dallas has injury concerns, there's still a lot of talent on offense on that team. WR and RB's are as good as any in the league as units.

 

[JoeyFlex5]

Biggest takeaway, once again, is that we cannot continue to force feed Ingram.

with the way we are playing, defense losing steam, passing game horrible, we cannot afford to keep wasting first downs by giving it to Ingram for a 1-2 yard gain, we just can’t. Literally every time we use gus or dobbins last night they gain chunks, gus might have averaged 20 fucking YPC last night and dobbins was gashing them too, but when we use Ingram he’s bottled up quickly, it happens so consistently that you literally can’t dispute it anymore.

why don’t the coaches see it...

 

[UPennChem]

I’m concerned with ngakoues lack of pressure, and I am very much chalking it up to his narrow alignment.

why do the ravens hate letting players do what they do well?

Is this true? He's had few sacks, you're right. But over the last 3 games or so I feel like I've seen him in the backfield constantly. Additionally I feel like I can recall 3 or so instances in the last few games where he was actually about a half second away from forcing a fumble.

 

[JoeyFlex5]

I think with no Judon on the other side, he's playing on a unit that lacks any consistent rush from anybody, and any real threat. No Judon, Campbell not playing much, and its pretty obvious that expecting a lot of snaps from guys like McPhee or Bowser isn't great for the pass rush unit, as they seem to tire out quickly. They're better as situational rushers. Bowser played 70% of snaps last night. While I think he's earned more playing time, that's probably a stretch.

Campbell looked like he was hurting like a mf out there, I’m not sure he was ready to come back. Sucks Judon got COVID just as he was heating up, hopefully it doesn’t knock him off track.

if we can get early season Campbell and bwill, and pair that with what we’ve gotten out of Wolfe and Judon this past month, then I think our front will be fine in terms of run defense, we just haven’t had our unit in a very long time but it looks like they’re slowly coming back together they just need to play up to their standards, I’m worried about Campbell’s recovery though...

The pass rush is a different story, we need Campbell to come back strong, and we need ngakoue to start being the guy, but unfortunately his one and only pass rush move, and a super effective one, almost requires a wide 9 rush and it doesn’t seem like he’s gonna get to do that here.

 

[JoeyFlex5]

Is this true? He's had few sacks, you're right. But over the last 3 games or so I feel like I've seen him in the backfield constantly. Additionally I feel like I can recall 3 or so instances in the last few games where he was actually about a half second away from forcing a fumble.

He is getting in the backfield, but he’s only gotten I believe 1 sack here, and when you watch him rush you see him struggle to flatten at the arc and it seems his only option is to reach for the ball because so often he’s already ran himself past the sack.

the explosion is evident but he’s an average bender and were asking him to bend by keeping him narrow.

look at a lot of his sacks in Jax and Min and you’ll see MANY wide 9 rushes getting home, he doesn’t have to bend, he darts in from out wide, chops the hands, and blows past the blocker with pure speed after he takes out the hands, when he’s rushing from the 7 he can still disengage but at that point he struggles to flatten, I guess that’s a byproduct of his go-to rush move requiring him to reach and extend so much that bending becomes difficult.

seems he’s got the natural ability to get pressures but he’s not gelling with our philosophy. My hope is that either wink allows him to rush wide 9 or he just clicks and eventually finds out “his way” of getting home more consistently from a more narrow alignment

 

[Deebo813]

I saw hollywood in slot majority of time last night so thats a good sign i guess, however.... i didnt like the way we motioned him. Its like we motioned him as a decoy. He was running pretty fast like he was getting a reverse or something. Our offense took some baby steps even though it was against the worst defense in nfl.

 

[Deebo813]

I like lamar but for a guy that was considered better than watson, arod and on up their with pat mahommes, he shouldnt be missing those throws

 

[JoeyFlex5]

I saw hollywood in slot majority of time last night so thats a good sign i guess, however.... i didnt like the way we motioned him. Its like we motioned him as a decoy. He was running pretty fast like he was getting a reverse or something. Our offense took some baby steps even though it was against the worst defense in nfl.

Maybe Roman is scared to try anything at all against a quality defense...

I like lamar but for a guy that was considered better than watson, arod and on up their with pat mahommes, he shouldnt be missing those throws

I agree, he took the game into his own hands with his legs, but he was pretty horrible passing last night, why has he completely regressed from his mechanical improvement last year...

 

[rossihunter2]

BWill played against the Chiefs in 2019, but then the Chiefs didn't really win the game on the ground (whereas the Browns put the game away with the long Chubb rush).

As far as Campbell's return, I'd pump the breaks on that. He played very sparingly (I charted him with only 23 snaps). He was not involved in the goal line stop at all (Ngakoue, Williams, Wolfe, and Ward on all 4 snaps). He's clearly not 100%.

A reminder that Lamar did not practice from the Friday/Saturday prior to the Titans game (Nov 20/21) until Dec 7. His worst performance of the season (excluding the debacle against PIT) came against CIN when he missed practice due to injury (imo some combination of injury and lack of practice led to poor on-field results). His mechanics have certainly been bad even with practice, but the time off didn't help (and I expect the COVID offseason really messed him up). If he comes back in 2021 with bad mechanics, that's when I'd really start to worry (I'd hope the Ravens are prepared for anything this offseason, even if COVID fucks up the offseason schedule again).

100% - im happy to write off this season for lamar (in terms of his mechanics) but there'll be no excuses - they know what's not working with his elbow so they need to get it fixed

his footwork is still much better based on the improvements made in the 2019 offseason so he clearly has the ability to completely rework his mechanics in an offseason so that they stick - he spent the whole offseason working on that footwork and it's still there (mostly) even when the play breaks down or he gets flushed etc. but now he's getting a bit loose with the arm angle and elbow

it's clear now that through 3 years he really needs reps to stay in rhythm mechanically

 

[rossihunter2]

I’m concerned with ngakoues lack of pressure, and I am very much chalking it up to his narrow alignment.

why do the ravens hate letting players do what they do well?

still seems to line up a lot in wide-9
havent specifically looked for it in this game but it was notable he wasnt turning the corner but i dont know that it was necessarily related to not being lined up in the wide-9 vs a normal 5t

 

[rossihunter2]

Is it a trend or a coincidence that Lamar seems to throw his best dimes when he’s rolling left?

i think if that's true it might be related to the fact that rolling left forces him to properly use his mechanics because it becomes physically impossible to be lazy with your mechanics in that situation unless you want to just throw it out of bounds lol

 

[rossihunter2]

Biggest takeaway, once again, is that we cannot continue to force feed Ingram.

with the way we are playing, defense losing steam, passing game horrible, we cannot afford to keep wasting first downs by giving it to Ingram for a 1-2 yard gain, we just can’t. Literally every time we use gus or dobbins last night they gain chunks, gus might have averaged 20 fucking YPC last night and dobbins was gashing them too, but when we use Ingram he’s bottled up quickly, it happens so consistently that you literally can’t dispute it anymore.

why don’t the coaches see it...

tbf ingram the last 2 games he's played has only had 6 snaps and 11 snaps so it's not like he's getting a big load

what's frustrating is that he still nominally seems to be getting the start - what's the point in putting him in the backfield on the first play of the game just to basically waste that down knowing it'll get between 1-3 yards

the actual number Gus averaged was 14.4 yds per carry lol which is unbelievable
101 yards on 7 carries

 

[rossihunter2]

I saw hollywood in slot majority of time last night so thats a good sign i guess, however.... i didnt like the way we motioned him. Its like we motioned him as a decoy. He was running pretty fast like he was getting a reverse or something. Our offense took some baby steps even though it was against the worst defense in nfl.

idk - passing game still looked really stale and simple - not much separation, not much creativity

 

[Deebo813]

idk - passing game still looked really stale and simple - not much separation, not much creativity

Yes i agree but there were less 1 yrd dump offs, even though it was to ingram we finally ran a screen play lol. Did snead get any targets cause i dnt remember?

 

[Deebo813]

Maybe Roman is scared to try anything at all against a quality defense...


I agree, he took the game into his own hands with his legs, but he was pretty horrible passing last night, why has he completely regressed from his mechanical improvement last year...

Idk whats going on with lamar man. Like how he make that pass to hollywood, but not the other ones

 

[rossihunter2]

Yes i agree but there were less 1 yrd dump offs, even though it was to ingram we finally ran a screen play lol. Did snead get any targets cause i dnt remember?

snead was still on the covid list so no lol

 

[JoeyFlex5]

still seems to line up a lot in wide-9
havent specifically looked for it in this game but it was notable he wasnt turning the corner but i dont know that it was necessarily related to not being lined up in the wide-9 vs a normal 5t

I don’t see it often, he’s one of the players I’m always looking out for in real time and I just don’t see it often, and when he’s in the 7 or 5t he struggles to bend, and connecting the dots, considering his rush plan, it seems very likely that it correlates

 

[JoeyFlex5]

tbf ingram the last 2 games he's played has only had 6 snaps and 11 snaps so it's not like he's getting a big load

what's frustrating is that he still nominally seems to be getting the start - what's the point in putting him in the backfield on the first play of the game just to basically waste that down knowing it'll get between 1-3 yards

the actual number Gus averaged was 14.4 yds per carry lol which is unbelievable
101 yards on 7 carries

Well he was coming off of an injury in that game, then he came back from covid, so there were reasons for a pitch count, and we still forced the carries at moments, it worries me what we might do if Ingram has no need for a pitch count. When gus and dobbins are getting the ball we ROLL, and Ingram is wasting snaps, there’s no need for 3 backs, you go with the hot hand in the run game and then you have your third down back, at most you rotate 2 primary backs to keep the change of pace, rotating Ingram even as a third back is just hurting the team