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The Running Game, The Mess and The Greg Roman
- Thread starter Ludy51
- Start date
rmcjacket23
Ravens Ring of Honor
Well, to be clear, Ravens aren't a "bad" football team. You aren't bad when you're 9-5, and there are teams much, much worse than us. We beat one of them just last week.
Whether we're a "good team" or not is debatable. Also very much looks week to week. But that's true of a lot of teams also.
UPennChem
Hall of Famer
I mean first of all I don't even get your point. Second using record to determine whether a team is good or not literally makes no sense. If Mahomes tore his acl next week the Chiefs would be a bad team independent of record. The one POSSIBLE exception to this is SF but even so not really because neither Lance nor Garrapolo were top tier QBs to begin with.
This Ravens team is underachieving unambiguously. And I think you'll find even with Lamar that we're probably going to continue underachieving this year
Davesta
Ravens Ring of Honor
That’s not the ravens way. Defense only here.
First round safety.
Follow that up by drafting a second round LB who’s coming off an Achilles tear.
Don’t draft any WRs with our 5 mid round draft picks.
“Oh no, our offense sucks.”
Oh well, let’s triple-down and trade for a MLB midseason.
It’s crazy
rmcjacket23
Ravens Ring of Honor
OK but I don't think the Chiefs would be a bad team without Mahomes. I don't think they'd be a playoff team, but they wouldn't be a bad team.
Bad teams play bad pretty frequently. It's not hard to figure out whether they are or aren't. There's a small handful of truly bad teams in this league, and there's a small handful of truly great teams in this league. Everybody else is sort of in the middle of just teams who struggle with consistency or have better or worse injury luck than others.
As to where the Ravens are, I think they're going to finish pretty much where a lot of people expected. Wasn't a 10-11 win team the median, mean and mode of outcome predictions at the beginning of the year? Are we not trending exactly towards that?
Offensively, they're underachieving. But then again, what was the expectation? Most people have hated Roman for years, and so he's performing exactly as one would expect, and lack of playmakers at receiver seems to be exactly on par with what people saw in June. So the WR core is basically the worst in the league (due partly because Bateman is out) and the OC sucks. So what's a reasonable expectation for the offense what that happens? Can also add in the fluctuations in talent at the RB position.
Defensively, I think we're pretty universally overachieving. New DC and a pretty significant scheme shift. There's not a whole lot in terms of "special" on this defense from an individual player perspective. I think Marlon, Roquan, and Marcus Williams are clear studs at their positions, but two of those guys missed like half the season based on when they were acquired and injuries. There's no premier pass rushers I see, the Dline is good not great, and we have depth issues in the secondary. Yet, here we are, top 5 in points allowed.
rmcjacket23
Ravens Ring of Honor
In terms of moving up for those guys, probably wouldn't have been opposed to it. I think ultimately Jameson Williams would have been high on their list and I think, like many, they were highly surprised to see Detroit come up that far to get him (especially in a trade with a division rival). I thought they were in a prime spot to have him fall, mostly because Vikings and Eagles weren't taking a WR there. But ultimately I don't know what it would have taken to come into the top 10 to get those guys. Likely at least a 2nd and 3rd rounder, and maybe more.
No issues with the Hamilton choice... was a position of need and he's shown to be a premier SCB. Our secondary would be in big, big, big trouble if he wasn't on this team right now.
I can go back and forth on the Ojabo selection, but pass rusher was the #1 priority of the offseason by a country mile.
In terms of total draft picks, I'd have liked to have seen a receiver be taken, but then I look at 3rd-7th round WRs, and I say "ok, who?".
In terms of trade deadline, I didn't really want anything to with any of the receivers who were actually available. A lot of the guys the fans talked up were never available, and I have zero interest whatsoever in the Claypool's of the world for a 2nd or even 3rd rounder. He's a total JAG to me.
Would he be the best WR on this team? Sure, but that's not saying much. If I'm looking to upgrade, I'm upgrading significantly, not nominally.
QtR Nevermore
Pro Bowler
Tyus Bowser wrote the notes. This fan is just the fall guy.
Davesta
Ravens Ring of Honor
Lamar Jackson didn’t travel with the team to Cleveland. He had plenty of time to lay those papers around the facility while they fly back. Also a person who got access to everything in the building.
Yeah, imma say it’s Lamar.
JoeyFlex5
Hall of Famer
At the time we had just lost almost half of our games due to huge fourth quarter collapses in every loss
So it does make sense
UPennChem
Hall of Famer
We certainly have different definitions of bad which are not close. But I can agree with your logic using that definition.
Also this defense is nowhere even close to overachieving and I hope you of all people are not going to "go to the stats" on this one. Your Mr. Theyre usually irrelevant and in this case, totally are. This defense does it best to help you lose every game in the 4th quarter
gtalk12
Ravens Ring of Honor
I’m not mad at making the trade for R Smith even though we needed help on the offensive side. I’m not sure just how willing teams would be to let go of talent at the receiver position.
The only thing I can have an issue with was the draft where we took 2 TEs. One of which hasn’t played. The other would be Ojabo who I also go back and forth on.
The only thing I can have an issue with was the draft where we took 2 TEs. One of which hasn’t played. The other would be Ojabo who I also go back and forth on.
I doubt it, since it is his IG account.
I think the biggest domino was Drake London going eighth overall. I personally thought they'd go receiver, but they could have gone several different directions, but taking London with the Jets (near) guaranteed to take a receiver and the Commanders likely in the market for a receiver back to back at 10 and 11 meant getting one of the "premier" without trading up was going to be tough because that meant only one more of the "premier" guys was available.
I'm actually surprised that the Vikings not only made a divisional trade, but that the Lions traded up so far for a player coming off an ACL tear. I'm with you- I'd have expected Williams to fall or it to be a small move up, like the Saints, but that trade really caught me off guard.
As for compensation? I'd think you'd be looking at a third. The Saints moved up five spots and it cost a third and a fourth. The Jets probably weren't going to play ball with the Ravens being that they'd be targeting the same position, but I think maybe the Seahawks would have been game at 9? I think it'd have been a third and a few fourths, but obviously hard to know. Otherwise, the Ravens could have tried to work out a similar deal with the Commanders.
rmcjacket23
Ravens Ring of Honor
Sure, but this defense last year was doing the same things in the 1st, 2nd and 3rd quarter that they're doing in the 4th quarter this year. We're in games because of our defense this year, and this defense also has closed out many games that the offense simply refused to close out.
This defense is significantly better than I expected it to be.
rmcjacket23
Ravens Ring of Honor
Right but I guess that's my point. If you really want a receiver of your choice, you probably need to get to #7 or #8. That's taking a second rounder, minimum, and probably more.
And if I'm the Ravens, I'm also sitting there saying to myself "ok, we're at #10 in the draft, and there's 3 WRs I like on the board (assuming that's true, which it may not be) and only four picks until I pick... why do I have to move". And I think that logic is fine. Know Jets are taking a WR, but Minnesota and Philadelphia are not. So it literally requires two trade-ups in front to make it happen, which is what happened.
was it at the facility or the hotel?
rmcjacket23
Ravens Ring of Honor
Ojabo is a 2-3 year evaluation. Everybody knew that. It's somewhat amusing to me though, because had Ojabo not gotten injured at Michigan, he would have gone top 10 and if he didn't, and he had fallen to our spot, the entire fanbase would have been salivating at the mouth to select him.
TEs I generally agree with. Though I will say that I probably wouldn't have swapped Kolar for just a WR either, because I don't think there's going to be much, if anything, coming out of the 2022 draft in the middle-to-late rounds from WRs. Just doesn't look like a good class to me at all. I personally would have been looking at a RB perhaps in that spot as opposed to waiting until the 6th round.
According to Bobby Baltimore who used have access to the facility, the tile and floor looked every bit like the facility.
gtalk12
Ravens Ring of Honor
The only guy would have been Pickens and he was in the 2nd round. Not sure anything else was to be had in the late rounds. This year it was understood that Ojabo had a low chance of playing let alone have an impact.
On paper we potentially got 2 top 15 players because of the risk we took in round 2. I am all for it. Sometime I do look at Pickens and think what if and then I remember we have Roman so we would send him out there on a route that ends up within 6 yards of a TE and FB just to give room on the other side for the QB to run to lol