Maryland

Kind of like what they have in MLB. I think that would make a lot of sense. It would encourage teams to be patient with concussions and avoid rushing them back. (Yeah, I know there are independent doctors, but still).

That Dallas game was mostly because Ayanbadejo muffed an onside kick recovery, although Pees did give up a few yards afterwards. /although they did have the chance to tie on a 2-pt conversion before that, so you're right, nvm.

The Bengals seem to be content with only sending their front 4 at the passer on most plays (they were 27th in the league with 21% of defensive snaps blitzed last year, among many other 4-3 teams). Stacking the box doesn't really make sense to me unless we put out a heavy formation, considering Trestman seems much more inclined to pass, even when a run would be much more prudent. Of course, he probably could stack the box if he wanted to, considering we don't have a receiving corps capable of taking advantage of thin coverage, mainly because we lack a deep threat.

For some perspective, the Patriots put Stork (their starting center) on temp-IR because he suffered a concussion. That's a minimum of 8 weeks missed. Concussions are no joke.

Dean Pees feat. the black-eyed sieves

Monroe must have a pretty serous concussion. If it's really bad he may be inclined to preserve his health and retire, and I wouldn't blame him. These things only get worse.

I can't help but look at our common opponent--Oakland on the road--and think the Bengals and Ravens are in two different leagues right now. The Bengals had no problem shutting out Carr when he was in, yet we struggled immensely against such a bad team. Hopefully this does not mean we are worse than the Raiders this year.

It seems like a long vacation out west would also then give the Ravens the same disadvantage west coast teams have traveling east when the Ravens return home.

Chykie Brown on AJ Green with Stewart providing safety help... needless to say no one was surprised by that outcome.

I even drafted Camp in a few deep fantasy leagues as a sleeper because I liked his ability to get open. Surprised they aren't using him.

Doesn't take that much chemistry to run a vertical Although I agree with you that expecting him to play this week or even next week (Thursday) is unlikely.

A couple things: they should limit Doom's snap-count to mainly passing downs as they did last season, and Pees should not abandon the blitz altogether just because we struggle in coverage.

I look forward to watching Melvin play across from Jimmy.

Try to use clock better next time. Don't make two consecutive passes when running once or twice for a first down would end the game or at least make it difficult for the other team to win.

Seems like the Bengals are a must-win to me. Road teams almost always lose Thursday night games (unless the hometeam Chiefs give it away), which is when we will play week 4 @Pittsburgh. NFL should not schedule such important divisional games on a Thursday... (really there should be no games on Thurs). If we lose to the Bengals, it is almost certain we start 0-4.

Webb having a very positive grade on PFF tells you how valuable their DB grades are, which is to say they suck.

We're officially flying under the radar now. The talking heads don't even consider us contenders, our highlights go unmentioned. I guess you could say we're right where we want to be in that regard.

Pees actually had a creative defense in Week 1. Designed some good blitzes. Didn't do anything creative week 2. Just rushed 3 or 4 and dropped the rest into zone most of the time. I wonder if he was concentrating on week 1 and then looking ahead to week 3 (big divisional home-opener). I guess we'll find out Sunday.

Why would anyone even throw out Suggs being cut as a possibility? We would incur a cap HIT of $1.4 mil (you usually only cut players who SAVE you money). Add in that our pass rush is already painfully thin and that Suggs is one of our few remaining team leaders and there is Zero-chance he is cut. Pretty stupid to even suggest it. Even if Suggs doesn't have the same burst next season, he can still set the edge with the best of them. Suggs could even take Upshaw's role, considering Upshaw is a FA, and Suggs, even at age 34 and coming off injury, would still be a better pass rusher than Upshaw. Draft/sign more pass-rushers, but keep Suggs regardless.

McClellan was already out there on several snaps, usually on run downs, but also on a few pass plays. He is markedly worse than Suggs in both situations, though better than Z.Smith vs the run.

It seemed like the whole team lacked energy and focus. It was either the sweltering heat, the extended west coast vacation, depression over the absence of Suggs, or some combination of the three.

We should actually be doing pretty well /w cap space and impending FAs. We should enter 2016 with ~13 mil in space before cuts, Flacco's restructure, and any cap increases. Notable FAs include Yanda, KO, Upshaw, & Tucker. (Tucker gets the tag if he's not re-signed. I think they extend Yanda and KO walks.) Dead money will mostly depend on who we cut (Possible candidates are Webb, Pitta, Canty, Guy, Bilukidi, SSS [retired]). Can't say what will happen with Pitta. I think it will depend on what we see from him this season. We would only save 600k by cutting him pre-June 1, or you could spread out his cap hit with a post June 1 cut. I think all those other guys get cut though.

If you look at the team stats across the league, you quickly realize that it could certainly be worse than what we've had with Pees. He usually has us top-12 in points allowed and somewhere in the teens with total yards since 2012. I think most of the frustration from fans comes with thinking that another DC could do better with our talent; that Pees is not playing up to the roster's potential by having our defense in that top 12-8 range. I agree and disagree. The level-headed side of me admits that our pass rush is weak w/o Suggs, our secondary is vulnerable as long as Webb is on the field (Kendrick Lewis isn't impressing me either), and we miss a surprising amount of tackles. The DC can't make untalented players talented (although he could certainly stop putting Upshaw into coverage situations). Meanwhile, the emotional side of me sees a lot of young talent on defense and believes a better DC could use guys like B.Williams, Jernigan, C.Davis, Mosley, Jimmy, W.Hill, etc. more effectively. Plus the soft coverage is very frustrating to watch. I guess it's a matter of whether you believe this defense would struggle with or without Pees. I don't think there is a DC who could make this pass rush look good with Doom as our only good rush-LB and Webb as our #2 CB, but there are probably DC's out there who could do better than Pees.

I actually thought the holding call on Hill's INT was fine. Looked like he hooked him to me. Idk, I'd have to re-watch it. I can believe everything else you described though. Especially the WR struggles. Seems like the only guy Joe can rely on is SSS. Hope we draft a WR high in 2016.

Draft Vernon Hargreaves III