Decided I'd start this thread since there wasn't one. Here are some of my thoughts about what we witnessed yesterday. 1. Lamar Jackson has definitely improved his mechanics, which will be a dangerous thing because he was already doing a good things as a QB last year (like scanning the field and making good passing decisions). It seems many are saying "it was the Dolphins and they are tanking" and whereas that may be true, how many offenses do people expect to put up 59 points while benching most offensive skill players for the 4th quarter? I think the bigger explanation is that Miami was caught off guard. They bought into the hype that Lamar and the Ravens were going to run all day. I was at the game and it seemed like their line was more dedicated to keeping Jackson in the pocket, which was clearly fine with the Ravens as Lamar only had 3 rushing attempts for 6 yards, and one was a kneel down. My biggest take away from the performance was that he was accurate with improved mechanics. Doesn't matter what team it was against, a QB throwing accurately is a QB throwing accurately. There was good ball placement when defenders could have made a play (see slant TD pass to Brown and TD pass to Snead) as well as a pass where he threw a WR open.......while throwing off his backfoot......with pressure in front of him (see Boykin TD). The secondary was supposed to be the strength of Miami, and they got torched. Let's remember that it's only Jackson's 9th career start. 2. The running game is going to be a problem regardless of whether teams stack the box or not. 265 yards with only 6 coming from Lamar. That's a dominating rushing performance with the Ravens not even using their full rushing capabilities. 60 or so of those yards came from a fake punt, but that still leaves the team at around 200 yards rushing if you remove that play 3. Eric DeCosta's vision for an offense seems scary. From how it looked to me, the Dolphins simply didn't expect Lamar to throw like he did early on, but after going up 21-0, after those 2 TD passes to Hollywood, the Dolphins didn't seem to know who to defend. The defense just looked lost, as if they simply didn't account for the fact Lamar could pass or Brown's speed. I think that's what led to all the defensive holding. Hell, on the second Brown TD there was definitely illegal contact/defensive holding that occurred on Brown. That was the only reason that defender was even close to him when he caught it. 4. Bradley Boseman had a very good game at LG. He had a great pull on Ingram's long run to start the game, and he held up overall pretty well. This was a huge cause of concern, especially after Baltimore traded away to potential LGs, but for at least one game, that position wasn't an issue. Skura held up fairly well also. The weak link on the team was actually Ronnie Stanley who had multiple penalties on the day. Overall, the line was pretty good. 5. Jimmy Smith just has bad luck. I know the immediate thought is how he's just so injury prone, which he really is, but this was just unfortunate. Peanut, if I'm not mistaken, ended up rolling into his leg from what I've read (admittedly I didn't see it live and Miami didn't replay it on the screens). 6. Speaking of the secondary, Averitt has a lot to improve upon. As expected, he was targeted a lot. I wonder why he came in instead of Carr though. I know people hated when they focused on defense in the draft, but I can't see how 2 of the first 3 people next season don't go to edge rusher and CB. 7. Boykin was used a lot less than expected. Considering he dominated the preseason/offseason and Hollywood barely practiced, it was a surprise to see how much time Brown got over him (although it clearly was a good idea). 8. The pass rush was underwhelming. They did get, I think 3 sacks and they kept the Dolphins QBs moving. They didn't allow Fitzpatrick or Rosen to stand tall in the pocket for too long. This is still a huge concern though since Miami literally traded away their best o-lineman a weak or so ago AND the rest of the line wasn't really going to be confused as elite. Baltimore couldn't get much going with a 4 man rush either. Not sure why they put Ferguson as inactive. 9. The Dolphins may end up the worst team in 2019, but the Ravens did what they were supposed to do. They crushed them from start to finish. They set a team high in points and yards. Lamar set a personal high in pretty much every stat. Lamar set a Ravens franchise high in passing TDs and passer rating (only Ravens QB to ever have a perfect rating). The running game ran wild. The offense set franchise records for points scored and yards gained 10. No matter how this season turns out, the one thing I feel confident in saying that it won't be boring Bonus - The Browns and Steelers each lost by 30 and the Bengals also couldn't pull off a win, but they could actually be fairly proud of their performance even with their star WR missing. Mixon's injury could be an issue for them though
Okay, just did some research. Boykin actually got more snaps than Brown (18 vs 14). It really didn't seem like he took more snaps. He was mostly invisible out there, and that's said to say.
