eze17

WHY? We couldn't afford them after 4 years. Yes we could. Plenty of evidence to suggest we will and can. In particular first rounders. If you're a good player for us, and you're a first round pick, you'll get a second contract from us. Its pretty much a foregone conclusion. Well, agree except for the recently retired Chris Chester, who was one of our 1st rounders who played very well for us. New Orleans was willing to give him a bigger paycheck at the time, which we declined to match. So it's not automatic.

I always remember Brady saying he had the # 20 printed on his wristband when the Pat's played the Raven's, to remind himself not to throw towards Ed Reed....

Why not bring him back? The way that trade was handled, not sure if he'd want to come back, however.

Hey, we've had not one, but two guys named Elvis on our team...

I agree that it would be hard to pass up getting a 3rd round pick for Jernigan...Real solid player, but with Mosley's contract coming up next year, we won't be able to afford him. This is shaping up to being one of the deeper drafts in years, so I'd pull a trade if the price was right. Raven's have a lot of holes to fill, and D-line is stacked with good players.Definately won't be upset of we keep him this year, however. Good player who can make plays.

Considering Ozzzie"s past WR draft picks, I'm hopeful we will find a competent veteran WR, if not immediately, then maybe when the June 1st cuts happen. Patience. No need to rush things right now, let's see who we get in the draft, and work from there. My real hope is that Perriman comes into his own. He showed some good moves last year, maybe, just maybe Ozzie finally found a solid WR...

So, shutting down the message boards ... Nice talking w/everybody. Some good exchanges, best of luck, GO RAVEN's!!!

So then we would have three speed deep threats and not a single player we can rely on for short yardage or 3rd down conversions? He's not the type of player we are looking for. Flacco relies on his TE & RB for a lot of his short yard gains...True, having a Mason, Boldin or SSS has also been a big part of the Raven's pass offence. No denial there. But looking how Jackson was used in philly, compared to how he was handled in D.C., I think he could be a more than decent fit. I saw him in a lot of Beagles games. Enthusiastic. Gamer. Exceptional athlete.Good hands. Strong body. No question about being a playmaker, which this team needs at WR. Always open for other possibilities, but I think he would fit here.

DeSean Jackson, if he doesn't command an outrageous salary. Worked great with Marty when they were both with the Eagles, proven veteran, all around solid receiver.

Flacco needs someone to look up to? Serious? You've got a pretty low opinon about our QB, dude.

Supply and demand sets the prices. 32 NFL teams and there's MAYBE 20 competent QBs in the league. Would require gigantic collusion among all 32 NFL teams to drive the market of a position downward that much, or a gigantic infusion of quality talent so that the supply of good QBs exceeds the demand. Neither is going to happen anytime soon. The collusion aspect specifically has too much risk for any individual team, as it only takes one team with a lot of money to spend to break the agreement and spend $20-25M on the best QB. In the grand scheme of things, QB price tags are NOT what is stopping teams from being competitive for the most part. Its certainly not what's stopping the Ravens either. Voice of reason in the wilderness...

It doesn't matter what teams offer their UFA's. They will go to whatever team offers them the most money. Real simple. No.Not that simple. If you had the choice to work for an employer who treated you like garbage and paid you 50$ an hour, or work for a boss who treated you as an equal but only paid 40$ an hour, who would you work for? It's the same in the NFL. Guys who are committed to winning go to teams that are committed to winning, guys who just want the pay check go wherever the moola is. Not everyone is a slave to the dollar, especially when you're a star player in professional sports and want that glory. Depends on the guy's mindset.

Ravenous, I do not see how they can sign BW or Wagner. The $15 mil cap space right now does not include any future contracts with either player and both have played on miniscule contracts till now. Collectively they earned $3.5 mil last year. Next year, just one of them will get 3 times that value. Granted, the cap will expand just because it goes up every year. But it won't help that much; every other teams will increase as well. If memory serves, Williams is part of a 3 man rotation that includes Pierce. The ravens will allow Williams to walk, move Pierce in to take his place then fill the rotation gap in the draft. That is a lock. Plan on both BW or Wagner leaving. The ravens are fast becoming the farm club team of the NFL. We invest 4 years generating great rookies only to find we cannot afford to keep them so they move on to more lucrative contracts. Expect the same to happen this year. We need to jettison the expensive players; generate a good and broad rookie class, then plan to have the money later to sign the good ones to long term deals. The way our division is setting up, the Browns will have the money to hire anyone and everyone in FA. With the cap space they have ($100 mil+) they can easily afford to add a ton of quality FAs long before the draft. Expect that to happen. Last year was Hue Jackson's trial year to determine who he wanted to keep and who he wanted to pitch for this year. Now he knows what he has to work with. You can bet that the Brown's will be active in FA and are 1-2 years away of being a serious problem in our division. JMHO O.K...post started out good, but then dived into insanity. 1: Raven's are not a farm club. Period. Anyone who thinks that they are not committed to winning is kidding them selves or delusional. We are fortunate to have an owner who want's to win championships, not just happy bragging that he owns an NFL team. Biscotti want's to win, Ozzie want's to win, Harbs want's to win. Just because we don't throw a lot of money away to retain good, but not exceptional, players does not make us a farm team. We do re-sign some of the talent we've developed, but I think the team is doing a good job with their decisions about re-signing players overall. FYI, the Pat's let a lot of big name home grown talent walk instead of paying them monster contracts...and they seem to be doing fine. 2: Yea, the Brownies have a lot of cash available for free agents...but they have for several years now, and don't spend it. What big name super star can you name who want's to go to Cleveland? Sure, you'll get paid, but what are your chances at getting a ring? Pretty sure slim to none. If you're a stud name player on the FA market, Cleveland is the first place you've crossed off your list. Unless your simply looking for the pay check, in which case you probably don't have the drive nor ambition to really make a difference anyways. 3: I like Hue Jackson. If given the chance, he possibly could turn things around. But given the Brownie's history, it's pretty likely that another losing season like last year and he get's the boot. He has no real QB. You can't win in the NFL without a real QB. It's that simple. 4: Cleveland is only 1-2 years away from being a contender? Serious? You're going to have to expound on that one, my friend. Give me more data and explanations into how a disfunctional team can go from having the worst record in the league, to becoming a team to be reckoned with...just because they have money to spend means absolutely nothing in the NFL...

Not so crazy. Very good possibility that the Raven's will lose both players to FA, although I expect both of them will get reasonable offers from B-more. (I think Juice stays, we are one of the few teams that still utilizes the FB position.) Interesting that DeSean Jackson's name was brought up towards the end...He's a reciever that I think would be a good fit in our offensive scheme. Not re-signing Williams and Wagner would leave us enough to give Jackson a nice paycheck. Given Ozzie's past history of picking up veteran WR's, could be a possible move.

Will require a good enough to player to be there when we pick. We have about 10 positions where you could easily justify using a first round pick on, as we need playmakers at just about every level. OL, WR, pass rusher, CB, Safety, MLB, even RB or TE are all positions where we could easily use an upgrade. Last thing we want to be doing is picking a position instead of a player. Agreed. Raven's have needs across the board. I just want a playmaker in the 1st round, not to concerned about what position he plays...even an un-sexy pick on the OL would be o.k. if the guy is rock solid, but I'd personally like to see us draft someone w/some fire in their eyes & a chip on their shoulder. Of course, drafting college players is a crap-shoot, but I hope the Ravens have done their homework and bring in a potential game changer.

What a positive outlook...yeah, might as well give up now, before the Raven's even do anything...NOT!!! I don't live in Cleveland, I support B-more, where we've got two rings, and more coming!

So, like the Raven's never had losing records when Ray was here? Check your history books.

Yeah, been done in Cleveland...why not change our name back to the browns? Oh yeah, the Raven's have won two championships, while Cleveland still cries...Art Modell forever, baby!!!

Well, irrelevant is a pretty strong word. While I never take PFF as gospel, they do have some interesting viewpoints. Looking at how our pass rush was last year, signing a player like Sheard would be a typical Raven's move: veteran player who has shown some skills, played for a winning team, and would be paid relatively cheap. Actually he could be a good fit. Not the big splash signing fan's always clamor for, but a guy that has shown some modest production. While there's obviously no verification of the Raven's interest, wouldn't surprise me if they haven't already had an eye on him.

i want to add that having a guy like williams makes it possible for orr and mosley to make tackles at the line of scrimmage because they go unblocked due to williams solid play that demands double teams Orr retired...another off season need for the Ravens. We'll see if Correa can contribute or if we need to pick up an ILB elsewhere.

My opinion? No on Jefferson, no on Cruz, and no on overspending to keep Wagner. The draft is deep with talented safeties, and if we decide to spend money on FA's there are more pressing positions to spend cash on than safety. While Cruz could be an interesting fit, his health issues are a huge red flag. We need dependable WR's, not someone who may or may not be able to give us a consistent presence on the field. And while I appreciate what Wagner brings to the table, I don't consider him as a top tier tackle, which it seems like him and his agent expect to be paid as. The Raven's need to spend their money wisely, and overpaying Wagner wouldn't be very smart. If we overpay anyone, give it to Williams, although I really don't see that happening either considering that we have a lot of talent at his position.

Yeah you're right.... Myles Jack who had a whole 24 tackles his rookie season... Noah Spence who only had 5.5 sacks while Matt Judon the team's 5th round selection got 4 sacks almost as many behind Suggs and Dumervil most the season.... And Sterling Shephard a #3 receiver. Think of the selections the team got while trading back... Kamalei Correa may not be an immediate impact but look at the 4th rounders the team got in return that DID have a huge impact. They wouldn't be in Baltimore if not for the trades. Spence had 5.5 sacks and 3 FF. And might be the best pass rusher from the class aside after Bosa. Sterling Shepard is easily going to be a top 5 slot wr for the next decade- he was the number 2 wr as a rookie, not 3. And only behind Beckam. Shepard- 683 yards and EIGHT tds. Michael Thomas- 1,137 yards and NINE tds Deion Jones and Cody Whitehair slid too and are now future pro bowl main stays. AND KC might not ever be good enough to start. ever. AB2.0. And Henry hasn't played at all yet, Moore hasn't done anything yet, and Lewis hasn't proven anything yet. Love Dixon and Young. Spence, Thomas, Shepard, and Whitehair are all future pro bowlers and are huge areas of need for us. I know some want to wait. But that pick was absurd. Instead of filling a huge area of need with a future pro bowler, or very good player at the very least, we chose a "hustle" player without a position that might not ever be good enough to start, let alone be an impact player. Everyone in the draft saw him as a pass rusher. BUT, he can't take on tackles so now we're "making" him an ILB. If that's the case he has every single opportunity in the world to start this year. He could've played when Mosely was out last year. It's put up this year for him, or it's another awesome high round pick setting us back even more. There's no way around it. Hopefully he shuts us nay sayers up this year, but I'm not counting on it. We'll see. Kufasi too, another hustle player... :/ Shepard and Thomas...the chain mover and red zone target we need right now... This class is loaded with talent. ESP CORNER OZZIE. If we blow more high round picks this year.......ravens fans are soon going to be going "remember when we had those 8-8 years?? That was awesome". The browns have a bunch of picks and money, they'll even pass us up soon. Not making the playoffs this year was just pathetic Its ridiculous to judge a draft class after one year. You can't look at what a guy has done in his first year in the league, and assume that they are going to keep being able to do it (or not be able to doing it) for the rest of their careers. The name RG3 and Vince Young come to mind. Jay Ajayi and Landon Collins had terrible rookie seasons. And I mean absolutely terrible. This year they were 2 of the best players in their respective position groups. Agree. Occasionally you may get a guy who is NFL ready right out of the gate, but it usually takes a year under their belt to jell with the tempo of playing pro ball.

As I understand it, basically one writer from Cleveland, who has a HOF vote, has a total vendetta against Modell and uses his influence to keep him out of the HOF...Really is a shame that such a groundbreaking owner is still being punished for moving his team to Baltimore.

T.O. is lying...if the HOF meant nothing to him, he wouldn't even bother responding. Maybe you should have accepted that trade to B-More and things may have worked out different. You'll get in eventually, but glad their making you wait.

Personally, I like DeSean Jackson of the listed FA. And that was before I saw his YDS/REC ratio, which is very good. Guy was an outstanding player when he played under Andy Reid in Philly, and still looks to have some gas in the tank. Rumors are that Philly wants him back, and they are super desperate for ANY WR who can catch a ball, so I could see them overspending, especially considering he was a fan favorite before Chip Kelly basically gutted the Beagles of all their star players. Would be worthwhile to at least kick the tires on him in any case. LaFell might be another player to look at who would come relatively cheap and still have the potential to put up good numbers.