Ravens vs Titans, Divisional Round Thread

The Titans won the game in the trenches... they pushed around the OL, no rush lanes, no escape for Lamar save for that one run when a Titan blew the tackle. The DL got straight punched in the mouth, Brandon Williams and Pierce got pushed around like they were play-doh.... Earl Thomas takes too many plays off for my liking.. come with it every damn play or get off the field bro..... The Titans had guys marking our TE's and took them away, they stayed in their gaps and stopped the Dive play and didn't bite on the RPO, they held the edge and played so disciplined defense and that is a huge credit to Mike Vrabel and his staff. They found the way to slow down the offense and got the lead, which is the one thing you CANNOT do against the Titans, fall behind.

Their gameplan exposed the Ravens weaknesses which was a suspect DL/LB core and their lack of WR that can get open consistently. Lamar also is still young and is progressing with learning how to come off his first and second reads but that's no excuse. He did what he could but it wasn't nearly enough.

Turnovers, and a great game plan sent our Ravens home way too early. Good season but one that won't be remembered because it didn't end with a ticker tape parade and hoisting the Lombardi over their heads.

 

The Titans bent but didn't break, as a matter of fact they bent so far they went over backwards. 500 +yards is bent bad, but they stopped you guys from getting points.

 

Most of those yards were in the 4th after they were down 28-6, those yards meant fk all. The Turnovers were a damn killer and allowing Henry to run wild. The Bottom line is the Ravens lost, and they lost bad.

 

Agree. The Titans spent virtually the entire 4th quarter in a 2 deep zone - basically conceding yards and running time off the clock at the same time.

 

Yahoo Buckaroo.........Titans moving on.....they beat the # 1 seed.

 

Well, I warned everyone.

Remember that Belichik was taking notes on the sidelines during the Ravens game? Think they may have talked? Because Tennessee had a great defensive scheme against the Ravens, playing 8 in the box. That and some questionable coaching decisions (going for it on 4th, down 7, in your own territory??) and untimely, costly mistakes. Mistakes this team doesn't usually make.

On paper the Ravens should have beaten this team, but give the Titans credit. They took advantage of opportunities, ran the ball down our throat and took the Ravens out of their comfort zone.

I wrote this, on this thread, a few days before the game after reading some of the posts. Everyone was so confident; too confident. As confident as I was when the Colts played the Jets:

"As a very old Baltimore football fan, it is the "I can't see the Titans beating you guys" remark that scares me. Everyone seems to be thinking that way. Reminds me of the 17 points I gave to guys in my Barracks back in 1969 when the Colts played the Jets. Remember How that went?

The Titans are a formidable offense, and similar in many ways to the Ravens. Ravens 2nd in Rushing, Titans 3rd. Ravens 27th in passing, Titans 21st. Overall, Ravens offense finished #2, Titans #12.

Statistically, on paper, the Titans should have trouble stopping the Ravens, They are 12th against the Rush and 24th against the pass. The Ravens are 5th and 6th, respectively so, on paper, they should have some success stopping the Titans offense.
But stats mean nothing at this point. It's one game.

Our defense will have it's hands full. With the way the Ravens blitz, they better have a dependable tackler shadowing Henry, looking for the screen. Tannehill was one of the best QB's in the league against the blitz.
It would be nice to see the Ravens stop Henry the way they did last year. In that game the D also had what, 7 sacks? But that was also Mariotta.

The Ravens should win this game. It is at Home, against a team they should beat.

Just trying to remind everyone. Anything can happen.

 

^^^
I found Faulk’s burner account.

 

A few things. First, Jimmy Smith is a free agent. It'll be interesting to see if we re-sign him or not.

I also disagree that Lamar balled. I'm not blaming him, and he wasn't even in my top 3 reasons we lost, but I don't think he balled. 375 yards looks good, but on 60 attempts it's not imo. He had a great run late in the game though. He did the best he could though. I definitely don't blame him for the first INT and I even understand trying to make something happen on the 2nd. I do blame him for the fumble though. He knew that defender was behind him. You can't stand there and keep pump faking like that. He should have took off or thrown it away

I FULLY agree that the coaches sucked. Idk why we get to the playoffs and then switch up everything that worked. A 14 point second quarter deficit is not a reason to abandon a historic running game. When the game was cut to 8, you definite HAVE TO RUN if that's what got you to the playoffs. Let the defense rest, wear down the opposition, and score. Why did a gimpy Ingram have more rush attempts than Edwards?? Edwards had 2 freaking attempts. Multiple 4th and 1 attempts and not one run with your power back? Seriously? And then whatever genius decided to make the best catching TE, who is also the fastest TE, the 3rd option at TE in the game. He's had the best catch percentage all year, and I don't think a single pass has bounced off his hands. So coaches feature the guy on the bum ankle.

Drops made a huge difference also. You can blame it on the pass catcher or the QB, I don't care. The INT off Andrews' hands (because his ankle wouldn't allow him to do a small jump) on a drive where the team was moving well. Seth Roberts with a drop on a good pass when the defender fell and their was nobody between him and the endzone. These 2 set the team up for failure, especially with how the coaches handled the game.

 

I agree with most of this.

The only throw he made resulting in a drop that was bad-ish, was the one where he over shot hurst i think and he had to lay out to get it but it still ended up hitting the TE in the hands, and you gotta make those in the big games.

I dont really want to play semantics going forward, not suggesting you are here, but Jackson did play well. The fumble is kinda on him for sure, but the entire pocket was fucked. Both ints were not bad throws. He had so many clutch 3rd down throws and was hitting guys in strides.

You catch half of our drops and that could very well led to 10 extra points and a lack of momentum for the titans. They got so far ahead that they felt comfortable to just run. I am not just going by stats, watch the game against after the feeling of wanting to castrate yourself has passed, lamar played well. I will defend this against anyone, he made good reads and made the throws and runs he had to, even those little 3-4yard runs for 1st down, he was the ravens last night.

As for Smith, He is one of my fav plays since he came out of college but i think with what we have, unless he takes a reduce contract, i am ok with moving on. It is the smart play from a Cap perspective, great servant and player or the club. I would love for him to stay, as he is still good.

We need to work on our Run D badly. Our db's can allow mediocre pass rush to get home with coverage sacks but there really is no good substitute for a stout front 7. We miss CJ really badly.

It sucks, it will suck, but i hope we can all stay healthy and go again.

2k

 

I agree that we'll leave the semantics aside (I don't think either of us are doing this). We just have a different view on how Lamar played, but neither of us think he played poorly or was the reason for the loss.

I agree about Jimmy but reallllllly hope they keep him. Humphrey gets all the love, and a lot more passes for mistakes, frok fans but I still feel Smith is the best cover corner we have. Yesterday did nothing to change that thought. I'm biased though. I've been a huge Jimmy defender since he was drafted as well

I agree they need run stoppers, but I hope that's not where they look to improve first. Not a lot of Derrick Henrys out there, thankfully. We need a top tier pass rusher badly. And unless Boykin shows up more on the passing game, we need another receiving option at WR. Hollywood has been better than I thought he'd be, but we need more consistency. Someone consistent in the short and intermediate passing game opposite Brown. Maybe Boykin steps up mext year. Maybe they actually play Jaleel Scott.......probably not though

 

Unpopular......actually, I'm going to say this is a popular opinion. Earl Thomas was a bad signing. Looked great in the offseason to add him behind our corners, but damn. He's been a waste of salary cap to me and has done nothing but talk big and give excuses. Sadly, I think we're locked in for at least another year. Maybe he'll look better next year.

Speaking of next year, it may be interesting to see a fully healthy Hollywood from week 1. I'm hoping Boykin also makes the big year 1 to year 2 jump that Lamar made, while Lamar makes another nice jump to year 3. After that, get me a legit pass rusher or two, and things could look promising

 

Wow, that was a tough, tough one. Everyone has posted some commentary and opinion so I will not respond to those but just to post my own to clear my cache, so to speak.....(LOL)

I think the blame for me rests on Roman and Lamar. I think Roman came out and panicked way too early and went to a super pass happy offense and couple that with Lamar then trying to do way too much on his own. It felt like he kept every running play for himself and every RPO he had he chose pass. It felt to me like we got away from our plan right after the first interception and we went to panic mode and never went back.

I felt that the game was never out of reach in the first half and we were only looking for the big strike and would not take the shorter stuff in the middle they were giving. It felt like Lamar was forcing those out routes way too often and he ended up paying for it.

Bottom line, Lamar has to learn to reel it in a bit and turning the ball over like that will lose you the game way more than it will win with the aggressiveness.

The defense looked equally bad. The 2 big things were the Henry running and deep play action shots. Those 2 things absolutely killed our defense all night.

It almost felt like the Ravens walked out and thought they could just roll out whatever they wanted and it would turn to gold. Clearly it did not.

Ok, so this had better fuel our guys to work even harder in the off season and understand that it was all a waste if you can't make it pay in the playoffs.

Looking forward to a good productive off season.

 

I also don't think Lamar played poorly or was the reason for the loss. However . . . in the early stages of the game, a lot of his throws were high and behind the receiver. (There were a few where the ball was placed right where it should have been and the receiver just dropped it.) Now, because the frequency of this diminished as the game progressed, I tend to believe that "rust" may have been an issue. Whether or not this "rust" would have been present had the starters played in week 17 would be pure speculation on my part.

At any rate, the 2019 season is now in the books. The Ravens had a tremendous season that their fans should be proud of.

 

You guys didn't fight the injury bug this season. In the NFL luck like that doesn't carry over to the next season.

 

I said it earlier, but this will still go down as one of the NFLs worst losses or historic upsets. Everything that needed to go wrong did. I'm laying the brunt of this on the playcalling. They designed the game to feature our weakest position group, and were rewarded with errors and drops.

Regarding Lamar, I think he played fine, but not MVP level fine. Again, I stopped watching before the 3rd quarter ended, but nothing happening in the 4th would have any bearing on the game. I think Lamar did have a hand in losing though. I think he tried to do far too much in the game solo. This was a similar thing in the KC and Browns game. Both of his decisions for run lanes were poor on the 4th down calls, but going for it on 4th down, I'm not questioning at all.

For the draft, the Ravens need interior pass rush and outside pass rush coupled with a receiver, inside linebacker, and OG or C.

I know we just hit on Hollywood, but the positional group is so incredibly weak overall. I still don't love the Snead signing. He's just a bit piece. Boykin I hope takes a leap, but despite the preseason success of Scott, he essentially never saw the field, so no reason to count on him. We need some talent there.

I don't know what you pick at 28. Here's the problem - your stud pass rushers anywhere will be gone if the draft plays out like it has recently. So that means, do you take a day 2 pass rushed or do you take a top receiver? I can't see them doing receiver again, but if the choice of best receiver in the draft falls to them for a third year in a row vs taking the 8th best pass rusher, they better take it.

Regarding free agents, I guess you have to make a play at Judon, but I absolutely hate the idea. He's not worth the FA deal he will get, but if you don't pay him, I really don't like what we have. It's not an ideal situation at all for the front office.

 

Also is it possible to stop the bullshit of coaches interviewing before the season ends? I get it that the losing teams are getting on to their next season, but how aren't there rules in place about talking and attempting to poach coaches like there are players?

 

They can only talk to them during the bye week. Don't get a bye week and they won't be able to talk to them.

 

Didn't the Browns interview the Vikings OC?

 

They hired him. I thought the rule was only the bye week coaches could be interviewed. But you're right the Browns had to interview him while the Vikings were prepping for a game. That means his full attention on game week wasn't on the game.They need to at least limit the interviews to bye weeks. How can a team form a game plan if your coordinators are running around doing interviews.

 

Yep. They sure did . . . A playoff team must make coaches available during their bye week. If they don't have a bye week the team requesting the interview has to wait until the playoff team is no longer in the playoffs unless the playoff team grants permission to interview. In the case of the Vikings' OC being hired to be the Browns' HC, the Vikings granted the Browns permission to interview him during a non-bye week.