balfan23

I'm referring to a game in the 2014 regular season where Jimmy was out and the Steelers put up 43 and Ben threw for 6 TDs (Brown caught 10 passes for 138 yards and a score). Bottom line is our secondary without Jimmy sees a pretty good drop-off .... no matter who we are playing.

Regardless of specific assignment, we've generally had good success vs. Brown ... but only when Jimmy is there. The only game I can recall where Jimmy was out vs. PIT, our defense got torched for 6 TD passes. No doubt ... facing A. J. has always caused us trouble, with or with out Smith. But the potential to feel his absence exists with PIT as well.

Yeah, I really wish this wasn't on Christmas day. The rest of my family already doesn't understand why I turn into a basket case on game day ... especially one as big as this ... but on Christmas? Ugh ... I'm really going to have to keep my emotions in check.

Well, I can't say for sure how you ended up posting this topic twice, but I shut down the duplicate one that had not received any responses.

Wow, what a super topic thread to start. Thanks for posting! I wish you and all those in Ravensland Happy Holidays ... to health and prosperity in the New Year. My theme this holiday is to chill with immediate family. No road trips, no parties. Just a little peace and quiet to ring out a very hectic 2016.

Before I even get to how ludicrous that highlighted item is, let me first say .... the dolphins don't have to win out. If they win at BUF, then it won't matter what NE does. Now ... on what the Pats will do in the final week ... if the Raiders beat Indy ... then NE has to win out to get the #1 seed. So I'm pretty sure they'll care about their game against the Dolphins. Even if the Raiders lose to Indy and NE clinches the #1 seed before week 17, do you really think it is in the Pats nature to throw a game? Do you think they'll want the impression that they did that because .. .why? Because they're afraid of the Ravens? Did we give them any reason to be afraid of us when we last met? I think they'd relish another opportunity to show that they are in a totally different class than we are. I'm sure that organization is tired of hearing how we're some sort of kryptonite for their organization in the playoffs.

Well, I think we'd love to give the position to Marty ... but I just don't know if he's earning it. He still has a season to finish out, but if we see more of the same, then I have to think we'll be looking for other options. The trick is ... finding a better option. I also do think we are going to be reluctant to pick some young up and comer ... because that feels like a no-win, one year option. If the guy stinks, you have to fire him ... if he does well, he will almost certainly be an HC immediately after. We really need to find a long-term solution and stop the OC carousel.

We just don't see what these guys are looking like in the practices. We always have to realize that we see about 5% of what these guys do (and then we only see what is painfully obvious), while the staff sees everything. I was surprised from the get-go that Jensen was not our starting LG and that Lewis had taken his place. I have to think if Jensen was truly our best option, he'd be out there.

I've hated it since the Yankees bought their way to a championship in the late 70s. The problem is, a cap will never be instituted. The power of the players union is so strong and the league has devised ways for some teams to spend nothing, perennially suck and still make money. There is no appetite for the kind of labor bloodbath that would be required to even try to institute a cap in the sport. So - teams like ours ... who are middle of the road in terms of what they can afford, can hold on to some above average talents and have no chance of holding on to a true marquee player. Others are forced to move their big names to big money teams, pluck their prospects and pray they can develop them quickly enough to have them produce before they have to wave goodbye to them. Back in the Oriole hay-day, I was a bigger baseball fan than a football fan. But the state of the game has caused me to lose interest over time. I still keep an eye to the Os and root for them, but my expectations are never going to be very high.

Yeah and his reaction also speaks to the potential seriousness of the injury. I'm thinking we'll be fortunate to make the playoffs without him and we won't see him until the 1st round of the postseason at the earliest.

For a week or so, I've been thinking ... why don't we just put Webb back there for punts and let him call a fair catch every time? He's sure handed and its not like we've gotten anything truly positive from Hester. Hester's poor play was surprising. I knew he wasn't going to be blazing by people and taking it to the house every other return, but with his experience, I thought he'd at least be able to field a punt in the air at the 15 instead of letting it bounce to the 2. His mishandling and poor judgement was very unexpected.

It is going to be interesting to see him continue to develop. Since he missed time, he's been steadily getting more and more solid. He's really looking like the real deal. As the FO said, they had to nail that one and they apparently did.

Said before that for this team to go somewhere, they need some extremely good fortunes regarding injury. Joe can't go down (despite all the criticism, he's the only one on the team that has the ability to take this team far - even if he doesn't always show it) ... The O line cannot take a hit and none of Suggs, Doom, Weddle or Jimmy can go down if we're to have a chance. So much for that. We've seen what happens in the secondary when Jimmy is gone. If we have more of the same, we'll possibly survive the Eagles game at home, but winning in PIT ... a game that was already going to be tough to win ... just got a lot tougher.

Drop WR from that list and add OL. Just my opinion. Not talking 1st rounder or anything, maybe not second .. but by the 3rd, I wouldn't be at all surprised. You've been around .... you know how this works ... if there is a stud O lineman when we're on the clock that we value highly, we're taking him.

The Good: Capitalizing on the gifts that NE gave us in order to make it a game. People can say they gave us 2 TDs, but we still had to get it in the end zone, which has been far from a guarantee with this offense over the course of the year. The Bad: The ONLY TDs we could score were the ones that we started our possession in the red zone. Squandered 2 massive plays (the romp by Juice and the bomb to Perriman) and got 3 points combined out of what needed to be 14. The Ugly: The #1 defense in the league got shredded. True, the offense didn't inspire anything, but the D ... while they held up on a few possessions had other possessions where they simply had no answer for what was coming at them. You tell me before the game that Brady is going throw for 400+ yards and I'll tell you we're looking at a loss, no matter what the offense would do.

I hear you ... I'm still at work. I have 1,000 things to finish before the start of the day on Weds, so I guess tomorrow is an all-nighter. I have to be in front of the TV for the opening kick. Hope you get to see the game and even more so, I hope we have a Ravens win to celebrate after it is over.

I disagree. I have a feeling the Bengals are going to be a tough out playing at home for both the Steelers and for us. Let's just win the next 3 now and the division is clinched. I'd love to go into that last week not needing to beat the Bengals to get in. Let us be able to rest starters as we did at CIN a few years ago. I liked the results of the postseason that followed!

No doubt ... discussion around Miami is all about having a safety net. If we win the division ... hell yeah, let the Dolphins run the table. I'd certainly rather host them in the opener than the Steelers!

As you imply by saying our DBs have to "stick to their guy" ... we need to be all over their receivers off the line of scrimmage. When they squeaked by in the playoffs the last time we met, our pass rush was on fire going into the game and it was totally neutralized by quick passes. We played scared to death in the secondary, as our personnel was extraordinarily susceptible to receivers getting behind us. So we gave a cushion and Brady dink and dunked us to death - until the end of the game when he finally got a deep ball behind us. Our rush didn't stand a chance with the ball coming out in 2 seconds. We have to make Brady hold the ball at least a little bit ... then we have to get to him. I don't expect them to even try to run the ball, but look to use their RBs as receivers coming out of the backfield. This game has become even more critical given yesterday's results. I gotta stop thinking about it, or it will make me crazy. Trying to put it out of my mind until I sit down to watch the game.

I don't know if we can stick a fork in the Dolphins. They get the Jets next week and the Jets seem to have thrown in the towel. Then they get the Bills, who did not appear to be prepared to play vs. PIT and got worked over ... and that was when they had hope of making the post season. Will they show up in week 16? Maybe, maybe not. Sure MIA will probably lose to NE, but that's possibly their only loss, which would put them at 10-6. Who knows what Moore will bring. It is not as if Tannehill was lighting things up. Their success has been their D and Ajaya more than anything. It would have been nice if ARZ would have not shot themselves in the foot 10 times to start that game. We sure could have used MIA dropping that one.

Understood. I'm not sure what you saw in my post that implies I would not think that way. Giving blame for past and not giving credit for present .... as well as not giving blame for the past but giving credit for the present .. are both wrong. My statement that injury as a reason for poor performance started to sound like an excuse and the fact that many considered his dismissal a possibility would also indicate that I felt like he was on the hot seat.

Nothing like success to calm the angry horde. So many were calling for Pees' head this off-season. While I didn't advocate that he should be fired, I would not have been upset had the team made that move. Injuries hurt this D bad over the last couple years, but it doesn't take too long before injuries start sounding more like an excuse rather than a reason. The acquisition of Weddle, the emergence of Jernigan, the shift of Webb to S and the surprise performances from Orr and Young have transformed this defense. A lot of credit needs to go to Pees for that. Certainly we want to blame coaches when players don't meet their expectation, so when they meet or exceed that, the coaches also deserve some credit. But the fact remains ... we need to stay healthy. If any of our key pieces are lost here, we may not go back to being as weak as we've seen this unit in past couple years, but we'll certainly not look as dominant as we have.

Buffalo's season comes down to this weeks game. If they can pull of the win v. PIT, they have a real shot at getting in. Their remaining schedule is pretty soft. Their most challenging game is MIA and they have them at home. CLE is, well, CLE and NYJ seems to have all but thrown in the towel. If we drop two and finish at 9-7, we'll need a lot of things to go right, but if multiple teams fall to 9-7, we have the inside track based on our conference record.

Well, there is Sunday and the great thing about being in playoff contention is that there are multiple games worth watching. Obviously PIT v. BUF. I'd throw in ARI v. MIA and DEN v. TEN. I'll be looking at those to keep my mind off Monday Night until game day.

I tell you, it is weird. I know there are lot of people who don't think our team gets much national love and I can tend to agree with them somewhat. After the beatdown we gave Miami and the way Joe looked has gotten a lot of buzz this week. On sports radio - even on ESPN with Mike and Mike, people are talking about how Joe looked like he did on the super bowl run and that our D is legit. We are starting to become a fashionable dark horse pick to make some noise in the playoffs. Let's just hold on ... we have to get to the playoffs first and the road to get there isn't exactly easy. And with respect to this game, there is a lot of talk on how we're not afraid of NE and how we play well against them, even up in Foxboro. Well, you know this is a battle cry for the Pats to come out and give us an A game. Get ready for some new crazy wrinkle that the evil genius will throw at us. It is a double edge sword. We like to see our team get respected, but there is a degree of challenge in living up to it. GO RAVENS!