RaRaRavens

One above average game and Mink writes like we were the top dogs in the league. PLEASE STOP BEING NAIVE WISHFUL THINKER if you are a journalist and write about things like they are.

Damn it Mink!

Yes, Forsett and O-line had one game where they could run the ball. But considering they have been league's last for 3 weeks, you can't say "running game is now in gear" after 1 successful game. Even if we can run the ball well for the next 2 games, we would still be 3-3 in succesful running game category. This game and success at run game might as well have been a fluke. We need to see constant success after make such statements.

PLEASE STOP SUGAR COATING EVERYTHING!

Are there any medical professionals in here? Maybe someone could share some light if it's normal for a person with concussion not be able to play for 3 weeks?

We have had the strangest injuries this season, and regular injuries lasting forever. What's up with that? Medical personnel of this team has changed or what??

Even as a fan I'm not frustrated anymore, I'm flat out pissed and angry. So I can't imagine what the players must be feeling when they look at the stats, look at the results, look at their performances, and look at the game tape and realize that they have been humiliated in front of national audiences for 6 weeks, are among the dead last teams and are the laughing stock of the entire football community. 

That's why I don't even care so much about the result of the Steelers game, I just want to see them play angry. I want to see them care about the situation we are in. I want them to play like the Steelers just spat in their mothers' faces and hit their fathers over the head with a 2x4. I want them to hurt the Steelers, I want them to play ferocious, I want them to tear Steelers team to pieces! I want every last one of them to play with a hunger, because so far only SSS has done that.

I wouldn't care if we get called 8 personal foul penalties by the middle of the first quarter, I just want them to show to every team in the NFL that even if we'll be 0-6, they must be terrified of us! Opposing players must know that they might win the game against us, but they'll lose their arm, their leg, probably their head and maybe half their liver in the process. So even if we go 0-16, no one would dare to ridicule us. That is what I want to see, because I'm not frustrated anymore. I'm steaming mad and I don't want to see the Ravens become irrelevant opponent in the schedule to other teams 

Consider this. Our last overall win came without any of our current starters on the field on a last minute TD by a QB who is not even on the team anymore.

The lack of motivation and poor work ethic of younger players are the direct result of void in leadership. Both veteran players or coaches can be those leaders, but we have none on either side. And this is purely the fault of FO. 2nd and 3rd year players are not capable of being mental and emotional leaders of a team. Oz was way too optimistic thinking they could.

And to make matters worse, "Ravens' Breshad Perriman aggravates knee injury in warm-ups" as reported by ESPN's Jamison Hensley.

Ravens a Super Bowl contender. ROFLOL

Watching the remaining schedule, and considering we are capable of losing to Oakland, I think 4-12 is more than generous result for us. Wins against Browns at home, Jaguars, Rams and either against Chargers or 49ers.

4-12 should land us a comfortable draft pick around 4th-8th pick. There we now have couple of good choices, but I think DB would be the way to go. There will be some elite CB-s and S-s who are projected to be top 5 draft picks, but could slide if QB-s, WR-s start moving up the board. I'd love to see us grabbing a starting CB so Jimmy could play 2nd CB where he suits better. Then we MIGHT be capable of not allowing 2 100+ yard receivers in every game.

One has to wonder if we are hitting some sort of slump years. I don't think we'll ever go 3-13 with this FO we have, but we could be facing couple of years where we are not able to do better than 8-8. The reason is manifold.

First, drafting at the bottom is catching up to us. Our defensive core of Lewis, Reed, Suggs, Ngata is gone, but we have not been able to find another play maker with the same caliber with late first round draft picks in recent years. We have bunch of solid players, and many average players, but no game changers who could carry this team.

Second, our FO has pulled of some amazing moves and drafted some great players in later rounds. But they have made some shaky moves as well and they are starting to show. Among top 10 players against salary cap on the team are Webb, Smith and Hill, totaling over 15 mil against the cap.They should be the cornerstones and leading players of this secondary. They have been anything but. Same way they overpaid Forsett, a player who hadn't done anything in 6 seasons, but then pulled off a career year under arguably the best OC, who is known to make RB-s look amazing. And of course we sign him to a 3mil contract. Sure enough, he hasn't done anything since. I know we have him at a bargain price considering starting RB salaries, and we had few other options, but no one should make the mistake of thinking he's our solution for the future and a franchise RB. We seriously need to find a new starting RB in the next year or two.

And lastly, we have very very many holes to fill on both sides of the ball. After this year we'll need a starting WR, probably a starting G, upgrade at LT, 2-3 CBs, S, OLB, and RB. We have staggering amount of gaping holes to fill after this year, and all of these areas can not be addressed with one draft and one off-season.

That's why I'm afraid we are going to see couple of down years and a true rebuilding phase of this team. All I can do is hope that once we have re-stacked our team, Flacco will still be here and capable of taking us to another SB.

So many things frustrate me about the state of our team, it's absurd.

We have the same players as last year, yet we can not run the ball whatsoever.

We do not have great DB's, but the play calling by Pees is idiotic. There is no way a DC who can adjust to changing circumstances would let this happen.

Offensive play calling was not any better. 2-3 yard passes to Forsett?? I understand what the thinking was - since we could not run for even a yard, short passes were supposed to keep Bengals hones and near the line of scrimmage. But this was ridiculous at one point! 3&8, we throw a pass to Forsett to the line of scrimmage.

Yes, our coordinators are bad, but our players are not performing either. If Smith and Hill, who supposedly are our best DB's, cannot together tackle Green who is backpedaling, then they are not starting caliber players. Yet we are paying Smith like a starting shutdown corner. Same with Webb, he ended up 4th on the depth chart by the end of yesterdays game, but we are paying him like a starting CB.

To top it all off, the penalties are unacceptable. K.O, Zuttah, Melvin should not be on the field if they are not able to play without committing fouls.

Our two best DBs, Smith and Hill are playing like 2nd tier players. Yet we are paying Smith like a starting shutdown CB. That says a lot about the current state of affairs. We are overpaying players who are not able to play good constantly, make huge mistakes or are injury prone. This is what causes teams to have slump years. I'm seriously afraid that we'll have 2-3 years ahead of us where 0.500 is the best we can do. Too many holes to fill in starting lineup to rebuild this team in 1 year (CB, S, OLB, T, G and WR after this season, RB).

I would not be shocked if we drop this one as well. And MAYBE get our first win against Steelers.

Oih... it's gonna be another loong Sunday :(

I have no doubt the defense will rebound. But it's easy to play good at home. The true sign of a good defense is how well they play away from home. So far the defense has not passed that test with flying colors. Sure, they were stout at Denver, but still could not get off the field when it mattered the most. That's why for me the true test of our defense awaits in week 4.

I won't diss or neg these funny pages or the comments, everyone has the right to their own creations, opinions and interests, no matter how odd they may seem to somebody else. But it's really interesting how we obviously have completely different sense of humor over here in Europe:)

But at least we can all agree on one thing - GO RAVENS!!!

HALLELUJAH!!!

23 smh

At the beginning of the season I predicted we'd go 10-6 in 2015. Hoped for 11-5, feared for 9-7. In all of those predictions I had us 1-1 after 2 weeks. 2-2 after 4 weeks. Basically we are just 1 game behind from my 11-5 season prediction. What I'm trying to say is, NOTHING IS LOST YET!

We've had strong outings from both offense and defense so we know the potential is there. Now it's up to the team to make the changes and generate these results constantly. They are professionals in their field and I'm sure they are capable of doing it.

More than anything else our next game will show us if we can be good on all faces of the game and our next after that will show us if we can do that away from home.

Even if we are are 1-3 after those games, but the team shows some consistency over the next two weeks, everything is still possible!

I bet we'll see the offense of 1st week and defense of 2nd week together in one game some point during this season. My bet is during one of our primetime games.

Season is not yet tanked after 0-2 start, however I see serious reasons for concern after watching first 2 games.

Our defense will not stop any offense with Pees as coordinator with his bend-but-don't-break game plan, thus we can not leave any of our games to be decided by our defense.

As for Trestman, he said he won't change our offensive identity. Yet we've seen almost no power run; 

other than 2-3 good draw run plays our rushing attack has been completely lackluster in general;

no imagination whatsoever on how to use our extremely versatile weapons in Camp, Maxx, Juice;

as soon as Gilmore is double covered everything goes towards SSS;

and don't get me started on the play calling.

Bottom line is, our defense will not win any games for us until Pees changes his approach. At the same time, I'm not sure when Trestman's new offense will be ready to carry this team either. It has not happened in the first 2 weeks and I'm afraid it won't happen in the next 2 either.

Jeesh! That's exactly the problem!

Where was Camp?? Where was Maxx?? Where was Juice?? We have those amazing versatile weapons and Flacco is still tossing every other pass towards SSS, who every defensive player knows is our offenses biggest threat and go-to guy. What you think is going to happen??

0-2 isn't the worst thing in the world... We have a favorable back end to our schedule, 2 weeks out west to start is a tough situation... RELAX

While I agree with you that the walls are not yet falling, I still am concerned. Not because of the 0-2 record, but because of the way this team has played. Granted, D was dominant in 1st week, O was potent in 2nd week.

But the fact of the matter is, Pees' bend-but-don't-break defense is not capable of closing out opponents, which we saw so often last season in close games and sadly enough again last week. At the same time, despite all the talk about not changing our offensive identity, we haven't seen anything that even remotely resembles our last years offense over the first 2 weeks from Trestman. Almost no power run formations, seriously struggling running game except 2-3 draw plays which I guarantee you the Bengals will be ready for, and seriously if-y play calling in the last 2 minutes of games.

Bottom line is, our defense will not shut out anyone with Pees as coordinator thus we can not leave any of our games to be decided by our defense. At the same time, I'm not sure when Trestman's new offense will be ready to carry this team. It has not happened in the first 2 weeks and I'm afraid it won't happen in the next 2 either.

My 2 cents: neither of our coordinators are good enough to carry this team, and this will be our undoing this year.

With Pees it was already evident last year - the defense is not capable of finishing games. Back when we had Ngata, Mcphee and healthy Suggs, his bend-but-don't-break game plan did not work in close games. Even Harbaugh vocally criticized it last month by saying he'd like to get a stop for once from the defense in the last 2 minutes. The problem with his game plan is that the 3 man rush does not generate pressure. We might as well not rush at all. At the same time, our secondary is not capable of covering the whole field. And good QB-s, against whom we are playing all of our close games, will always find that one spot down the field, if they have 5-10 seconds to throw.

Now, as to Trestman. I was never a big fan of him. I've said it before, but there is a reason why he has worked for dozens of teams. And it's not because he's such a good coordinator that everyone tries to buy him over. Of course, we got a little spoiled with Kubiak, but Trestman is not good OC. Our personnel up front is the same as last year, yet we haven't been able to run the ball other than a couple of draw plays last week. And I can guarantee you, Bengals will be ready for those draw plays next week. However, I highly doubt that Trestman will be ready for the Bengals being ready. Which I predict will lead to similar rushing result as we had against the Broncos. However, I am glad that we saw some heavy passing from Flacco. I think everyone in Baltimore has always known what Flacco is capable of, maybe we can prove it to the rest of the league now too.

Still, I don't understand why we haven't used basically any power run formations. Trestman said this offseason he won't be changing the scheme. Over the first 2 weeks he has completely changed our offensive identity. I won't even get started on the playcalling in last 2 minutes.

Bottom line, our defense will not shut out anyone with Pees as coordinator thus we can not leave any of our games to be decided by our defense. At the same time, I'm not sure when Trestman's new offense will be ready to carry this team. It has not happened in the first 2 weeks and I'm afraid it won't happen in the next 2 either.

It's going to be a LOOOOOONG September, and I'm afraid we're going to need some serious help to have a shot at the playoffs.

So...who should we draft with the 14th overall pick at the 2016 NFL draft?