Purple_City39

And here's a link for a complete sports forum that also has dedicated team boards

http://live4sportnetwork.com/forumlist/index.php

Tim Freaking Williams.  This defense will be insane.  The offense will cause it's own version of insanity

2 minutes ago, robbie29 said:

You clearly don't understand the value of on-field and locker room leadership. When Reed and Lewis were on the roster, the Ravens were, with few exceptions, perennial contenders. Since their departure, the Ravens have missed the playoffs 3 of 4 seasons and have an overall record under .500. Some of that has to do with a droppoff in drafted talent but I'd argue that more has to do with the leadership and motivation void that has yet to filled since Lewis and Ed Reed retired.

The team that from 2002 (when they paired up) until 2008 never made the playoffs in back to back seasons, and never won a playoff game in that time frame, were perennial contenders?  I loved Ray and Ed on the field as much as the next fan, but man, do they receive more credit than even they might have deserved

I can't fathom the Ravens not going with an edge rusher at this point.  Maybe they like Ju-Ju but I don't know if he'll even be available

Ok so those that follow college football, where would you rate Derek Rivers?  Someone mentioned him to me earlier and I never researched him until today.  I like what I see.

The person in question is a friend of mine who's unfortunately mentally ill because he chose to be a Steelers fan.  Anway,  Humphrey, Watt, and Rivers were on his 1st round hopeful list in that order.

23 minutes ago, usmccharles said:

Nothing we have done says this is a rebuilding

Thank you.  This whole "They didn't get the player I like so we suck and we're rebuilding" mindset gets old quick

6 hours ago, HomeoftheBRAVENS said:

 

Alot of our success against the steelers has been because weve been able to contain Bell.Hes the most important piece in that offense IMO.Even more important than Brown.Just look at how their offense looked in the championship game when he went down or how it looked when he was out of that playoff game we played them in a few years ago.Im bringing up Bells importance because we just lost both of our stud DEs and our stud ILB this off season.I want to wait and see how that impacts our run defense before I get confident that we can continue beating them.Then theres our pass rush.We got no where near Ben with Timmy,Doom and Guy and it kind of was what lost us that game.We should wait and see what we have there too before we get over confident about how we match up with teams. 

I don't think Bell is as big a factor as he's made out to be.  The Ravens success against the Steelers comes from the fact the team has been built to beat the Steelers, as well as the Patriots.  Won't always happen, but the pieces were put in place for those two teams.

The team is 6-3 against the Steelers since Bell was drafted.  Keep in mind the horrible 2015 team that swept them and the 2014 playoff team that beat them with CBs not even good enough for the bargain bin (minus Webb I guess).

in the four seasons before Bell, Baltimore was 5-4 against the Steelers.  So Baltimore was still pretty successful against the Steelers.

Pittsburgh has become too reliant on Bell, and that's what will stop them from truly outplaying the Ravens.  RBs are rarely the x factor against Baltimore, no matter who it is.  There are exceptions, but Bell clearly isn't one of them, not for the Ravens.

On 4/17/2017 at 4:28 PM, Purple_City39 said:

As long as we don't end another season @ Cincinatti, I can't complain.  I wonder if they'll give the team their request to not have that week 4 bye week.  Then again, they'll probably honor the request and give the team a Thursday night road trip against Pittsburgh or Cincinatti instead.

I was close.  Sunday at home against the Steelers instead of on the road,

And the season ends vs Cincy.  So close on all this lol

As long as we don't end another season @ Cincinatti, I can't complain.  I wonder if they'll give the team their request to not have that week 4 bye week.  Then again, they'll probably honor the request and give the team a Thursday night road trip against Pittsburgh or Cincinatti instead.

Thanks folks

Quick question for anyone willing to answer.  I'm the Ravens GM for a collaborative mock draft on another site, and I pick at 11:30.  I'm really considering taking Ahkello Witherspoon.  It's the first pick of the 3rd round and I'm not really a draft nut or college fan, so I don't have as much knowledge as others.  Would that be a good pick spot for him?  I've done some mild research in the last hour and so far think he has potential and won't need to be a day one starter.

If anyone is curious, the first two picks went to TJ Watt and then Ju-Ju Smith-Schuster.  I don't like either at those spots (personal preference), but wasn't available for either pick as I'm an accountant working in a tax office, so both were autopicked.  I really don't want them autopicking any more for Baltimore, so I'm determined to be around for every other pick

4 minutes ago, Moderator 3 said:

This.  He did nothing in the last four games.  All of his sacks came in the first half of the season.

Brandon Williams didn't really help stop teams from averaging 136 rushing yards per game those last 4 weeks, but we still (over)paid him.

Also, for all the focus on Jernigan's sack numbers, I think people are forgetting he was pretty good against the run.  And so was Guy.  As of right now, we've lost two very good run stoppers on the line AND lost two of the better pass rushers on the team (Jernigan and Dumervil).  A lot if depending on young unknown guys from 4 different spots in the front 7 (OLB, ILB, and two D-lineman)

4 minutes ago, JO_75 said:

Yeah then we'll complain on the New board about how we lost him and didn't resign him. He wouldn't have gotten us a high comp pick like Wagner will. 

I'm happy we got something for him that benefits us now opposed to 2 years from now.

It wouldn't have been two years, would have been next year.

And a d-lineman that's pretty good against the run but can also rush the passer would have definitely netted a decent comp pick.  Unless he gets injured, I can't imagine Jernigan not getting 10M a season when whatever teams signs him next year. 

1 minute ago, ALSKAN RAVEN FAN said:

So our comp pick will come 25 picks prior to where we would have selected.

How much money do we save?

 

1M

2 minutes ago, ellicottraven said:

Timmy Jernigan traded to the Eagles in return for their 74th pick! I think this is a great move by the Ravens!!!!!!

If we didn't give up the 99th pick, I'd agree with you.  I fully hate the trade (but who am I, I guess)

Hate it.  It's his contract year.  Watch him ball out for Philly.  All for a swap of picks

8 minutes ago, jazz1988 said:

I'm not denying that Cam Cameron wasn't a problem  and Boldin was money for The Ravens but he was able to play with speedy receiver to take the pressure off of him unlike Derrick Mason. Boldin also was able to  go  to the playoffs consistently out of the three years he has been with The Ravens unlike Steve Smith Sr.Even though I feel like Derrick Mason and Steve Smith Sr were better receivers than Anquan Boldin it's no denying that Boldin just was more fortunate and came in at the right time.

I agree.  Mason did a lot more with less (he had Boller and Wright throwing him the ball and still eclipsed 1k yards) while never having a true threat opposite him.  Smith Sr was just an animal considering his age.  Boldin had the best WR opposite him in his time here among the 3 by far, and thus had less pressure.  Mason did disappear in January though

29 minutes ago, Tank 92 said:

lol.  Where did you read that?

RSR.  On an article written on 4/1/17.  Completely credible and legitimate..........

8 minutes ago, rmcjacket23 said:

Well, just to be clear about one thing that needs reiterating...

Tony Romo mostly sat the bench last year because he got injured in the preseason. If he never gets injured, nobody knows who Dak Prescott is. That takes an incredible amount of "luck" for things to happen the way they did for the Cowboys last season. There was zero foresight from the Cowboys organization that Dak was actually better than Tony and would have won an outright competition over him, so lets not give too much credit. I give them credit for drafting him and evaluating him the way they did, but not for some perception that they actually chose him over Romo, because that didn't really happen.

If people think they can adopt this model from Dallas, then they will be fools and they will fail miserably doing so.

Joe isn't going anywhere. It makes no financial sense. It makes no production sense.

Oh I fully agree.  Just using that as an example to say the cap hit wouldn't be crippling for a backup QB but pretty much all the stars, planets, and galaxies would need to align perfectly which isn't likely

In all honesty, if the Ravens were stupid enough to cut/trade Joe with a post June 1 designation (if cut), they could manage it.  Don't down vote me just yet lol.  They could take the 6M in savings and not touch it, rolling it to next year to offset a little of that cap hit for Joe's dead money, bringing it down from 29M to 23M.  That's huge, but we did just see the Cowboys take a 22M cap hit for Romo to ride the bench all season.  Of course we'd need pretty good QB play from Mallet all season which seems laughable to imagine, we'd need an o-line that's the best in the NFL, we'd need to draft the best rookie class in history that all become day 1 starters, and then we'd need every starter to stay healthy all year...........

That said, this would easily be the stupidest thing the Ravens front office has ever done without question and would cause me to do nothing but call for them all to be fired and Bischotti to sell the team due to pure incompetence.  But in theory, there's a 1% chance it works out somehow

2 hours ago, Tru11 said:

if you make more plays during the first 3 quarters , you don't have to worry when its the 4th quarter.

The Falcons proved you always have to worry in the 4th quarter, even if you make a bunch of plays in the first 3.

The 9ers almost taught the Ravens a similar lesson a few years back.

33 minutes ago, Sherly_Tebow said:

What's shermans cap hit for this year? 11-13 million? I would trade Jernigan for him but it would hurt our cap big time, right?

Yeah, his cap hit is 11M this year and next year.  We'd have to clear out more players to make that happen. 

Perriman will most likely be the breakout star IF they are serious about putting him out there opposite Wallace. 

On defense, Judon really is a great pick.  He has the pass rushing technique and should be able to get to QBs well enough.  If the secondary can hold for just one second longer, Judon may have a big year.

My wildcard will be Kaufusi.  He has a chance to step into Guy's old position if he can beat out Urban.  We haven't seen enough of him at the pro level so he's a wildcard with potential

38 minutes ago, jazz1988 said:

 

I think also if the run game was good that year it would have helped out Thompson and Doss.

36 minutes ago, trevorsteadman said:

Yep so many injuries on the o-line... The team also had an undrafted rookie named Hurst at LT after o-line injuries.

 Yes to both.  In addition to the WR injuries, Pitta injury, and WRs that didn't step up, we also saw o-line injuries, a horrible blocking scheme that caused a poor run game, and some regression at RB.  So much happened to that offense that I always shake my head when someone immediately blames the poor offense on trading away Boldin.

49 minutes ago, jazz1988 said:

Boldin production for most part was pretty average for a guy that was suppose to be The Ravens number one  receiver and even though he was more skilled as a receiver Torrey Smith was the one defenders were afraid of the most.  Boldin did his thing in the playoffs and the  super bowl but letting him go wouldn't have look as dumb as some Ravens seem to  believe if Tandon Doss stepped up and  if Dennis Pitta hip never got injured in training camp. I don't think The Ravens miss Boldin nearly as much if those two things happen especially with the situation with Pitta but Boldin still got replaced any way when The Ravens signed Steve Smith Sr.

I've said this same thing before.  The 2013 plan, similar to 2017 actually, was to have your two speed guys on the outside (Torrey and Jacoby) and have your chain mover in the slot.  Pitta was set to pick up that slack for Anquan with Rice still doing his thing with checkdowns.  Realistically, that wasn't a bad set up.  They also hoped backups like Deonte Thompson and Tandon Doss would take their play to the next level.

Then Pitta dislocated his hip in camp, Jacoby went down in week 1, Thompson had either an illness or a foot injury (I forget) Rice regressed, and Doss never stepped up.  End result, Ravens fans blaming everything on trading Boldin and ignoring the many factors that actually happened.

Also, SSS was a far better WR for the Ravens than Boldin and would have likely never came in 2014 if Anquan wasn't traded (and all those issues happening) in 2013.