Ravens 2021 Offseason Free Agency and Draft Discussion

He should have gone somewhere else so he could be the main back. He’s the kind of back you could run 30+ times a game and destroy defenses.

 

Hard to assume that when he’s never had 150 carries in a season.

I think what it says the most is that they fully intend to stay with a RB by committee approach. It hurts both backs fantasy value, but real football, it’s a total win for the team’s success rate.

 

Ravens sign Justin Houston. 1 year deal worth up to 4M. Hopefully he's a better pass rusher for Baltimore than Ngakoue was

EDIT: They reached an agreement. He hasn't officially signed yet

 

He also turned down more money from other teams to join Baltimore. You gotta love hearing that

 

So Bateman and Oweh have been looking great so far. Proche may actually edge out Boykin for the 6th WR spot.

Justin Houston hasn't practiced yet but I can't believe the value we got him for. 3 AFC North teams signed a FA pass rusher but the Ravens spent the least amount of money for the one who's had the most sacks the last 5 years. How crazy is that? If Houston continues his career play, and Oweh continues to play how he's practiced, this defense will be number 1. We have run stoppers and our secondary is top 3 imo. You add good individual pass rushers and this defense will be a nightmare.

 

Boykin looks like another receiver that won’t develop during his time in Baltimore.

It’s a really interesting thing to see happen again, and I’m curious to read your thoughts on why that trend continues?

 

There were many issues for him. 1 seems to be it just took him longer to learn the playbook. He's run wrong routes more than any other WR. Roman's route concepts have sucked and led to multiple receivers in the same place multiple times though, so that probably made it harder on Miles. That said, we've had more than one play where WRs ran into each other and he's been apart of them all.

He also seems to occasionally struggle tracking the ball which has led to incompletions. He has all the physical tools to dominate, but his second biggest issue seems to be mental. He just always seems like he's thinking too much.

Notice I said second biggest issue. His biggest issue has been opportunity. Miles, when he's on, gets open. He gets good separation on routes across the middle or the short to intermediate routes. His biggest issue is that either Lamar doesn't trust him or Lamar locks into Hollywood and Andrews more. Then again Snead consitently got more catches and I think Ingram did in 2019 also.......ok just checked. Ingram AND Seth Roberts both had more targets in 2019. Duvernay and Dobbins almost matched his targets last year.

I don't know if it's because he doesn't show up to all the events WRs have had in the offseason or when Lamar gets together to throw the ball with them, but Lamar just doesn't look his way often, and Roman never tries to scheme him open. So far this offseason it's been mostly bad reports. Lots of drops by Miles (the mental aspect again) or just being invisible during practice. Being injured now is going to almost guarantee he gets cut or put on IR for another evaluation next year.

 

When you look at the individual (as you did in solid detail) it paints one picture.

When you look at it in the historical context of the Ravens not being able to develop receivers in house, it paints a different one, IMO.

What's your take on the Ravens inability to groom their own talent at that position?

 

In many cases, it's a QB issue. I think it's too early to say whether Jackson is good/bad/indifferent in that department. It's too early in his own development.

 

I would argue pretty quickly that the Ravens have had above average quarterback play for a good enough cross section of drafted receivers that the evidence shows it to be more of a failure at development than an inability to put the ball in the air with some efficiency.

 

That's anothrr question that's requires a deeper answer to be accurate. At surface value, the Ravens suck at developing WRs, no arguing that and no denying that. The reason for it is multifaceted.

First off, prior to Joe and excluding 1 year of McNair, the QBs have been trash since Vinny T left. That's going to hurt most WRs. The offensive identity also hurts. When the gameplan is to run it down their throats, it's hard for WRs to succeed. Baltimore just never valued WRs in the Ozzie Newsome era, and when they did they seemed to go after athletic WRs who had questionable hands that they felt they could develop in early rounds (Smith, Perriman). In the end, it's been poor drafting, poor focus on improving the WRs, and sometimes both.

It's too weird to me that we can do very very well with TEs but fail at WRs. Very different positions but enough similarities to not be this big of a disparity. Since DeCosta took over, he seems to be focusing on WRs also, and his philosophy is different from Ozzie. He's going after guys with the physical tools who can also catch. I don't know why it took that long to do this. They went and go two guys to assist in the passing game and coaching up WRs. You can even tell the playbook has been modified as they've been practicing a ton of outside the numbers passes and deep routes.

I think they are finally trying to turn the corner on the passing game. I'm even going to predict that one of the two WRs Baltimore has that they drafted in the 1st will end their career with all or most Ravens WR records.......which shouldn't be too hard.

 

I woule agree with this, at least from 2008 to the present. Joe and Lamar getting the ball to WRs isn't the problem. Route concepts, calling good passing plays, coaching up WRs, and training are all vastly bigger issues. Giving WRs an opportunity to make a play is also an issue

 

I know some will disagree because narratives are instilled in their heads about Lamar, but imo if Andy Reid was designing and calling plays for Baltimore, you'd never hear questions about Lamar throwing.

Lamar has accomplished things passing that the average fan would never guess. Random sites, that are unbiased, track the most interesting stats and Lamar tends to be high on most. For example, in 2019 he was the highest rated QB at throwing tight window passes (tight window being defined as less than 1 yard of separation). You have to be an accurate passer for this, but what do people constantly say about Lamar? He's not accurate, that's the narrative.




For whatever reason, Lamar is the only QB I can think of where people will ignore his completion percentage and passer rating in order to say he's not a good passer. They'll find people who rate below him in both categories, while having vastlt superior WRs, and say that QB can throw but Lamar can't. It's baffling honestly

 

The truth is, most people that have opinions going into the draft will refuse to change their mind afterwards because they don't want to be seen as wrong.

I'll definitely fight to the end on players I believe in, and I'll point to where I had it right when everyone is looking at something different. But when I'm wrong I always try to figure out where I missed and how to correct it in the future. If someone says "hey, you fucked that one up!", if they're right and I did, it sucks but I'll cop to it.

It would be a lot easier if I got credit when I was right, but hell hasn't froze over and the moon still ain't made of cheese so that shit is never happening. lol

With Lamar, I can give you why I thought he would have issues with certain types of accuracy and not others -

The one thing that the above metric doesn't provide is what the context of those throws were. If it was a spot throw (receiver already set in space) than I can believe that metric to be accurate without questioning it much. He's a lot like Mayfield with regard to how accurate he can be at throwing bullseyes on a dartboard. He also has the ability to simply flick his wrist and put enough air under the ball to let a receiver run past the defense to get underneath it. That's why the drafting of Brown made so much sense. However, he still lacks the kind of precision I was concerned with predraft - anticipatory accuracy. He's much better at hitting an already open target than he is at throwing a target open, which is something else that he shares with Mayfield. Those two players are actually a lot alike in their throwing strengths, which is why I enjoy reading the back and forth between the fan bases on which one is better.

 

Well, clearly Lamar is better .


For the record, I also agree that he has areas to improve on. The assertions that he can't throw, is highly inaccurate, or things along that nature are what annoys me. I think you're right on the pre-draft comments, but I also think there are two other factors. 1 being that people tend to believe if you don't throw a lot it's because you can't. And the 2nd is that people seem to believe that if a QB can run well then he must not be able to throw.

 

This is an interesting one because I've had this conversation with numerous people over the years and there are some definite narratives that surround certain running passers, most notably scrambling black quarterbacks.

• "He's got a cannon but he's not accurate"
• "He has to create open throwing windows with the threat of running"
• "It's a good thing he can run because he can't read a defense"

I know that things have changed a lot over the years with how perceptions on race affect opinion, but you get into people my age group and this is still some of the type of shit you hear.

Meanwhile, one of the most accurate passers of all time that also ran an offense that required him to read the defense and make transitions on every snap was also a black quarterback that scrambled about as much as I do to the kitchen in the middle of the night. lol

 

Another problem with Lamar that no one has talked about in this long narrative you guys have going is his ball protection when he’s not throwing. Every game I have seen him lose he usually has multiple fumbles recovered by the other team. He fumbles a lot in games they win too but most go out of bounds. He needs to protect the ball and stop carrying it like a loaf of bread. If he ever learned how to protect the ball when he’s running the ravens might be unbeatable.

 

I wasn't talking about QB play or ability, I was talking about a QB as a coach and helping their development as players. Having a QB that understands every offensive position so that when a player is running the route soft or hard, he can tell them what they need to do differently to be on the same page. I don't think Flacco had any desire to develop players, but the best QBs do. Montana, Manning Brady, they talk to their receivers in practice AND games and explain why a route didn't work. They can help them better understand what needs to be done to make that route work so they can use it differently depending on what the defense shows them and even as the play develops.

 

Warren Moon?

I know he wasn't a running QB, but man could he extend plays.

 

Yep.


Warren is one of my all time favorite players and still one of the most underrated passers in league history, IMO.