Fastynart

Although the headlines of the article is right, "Losing Jimmy Smith Dooms Ravens", it shouldn't be. If you lose one guy on defense, your defense shouldn't fall apart, but it does. Drafting has killed the Ravens, especially on defense, where bad picks and emphasis on offense have done them in. Oh, maybe we should draft a few more wide receivers next year. That should fix it.

Where were the two number one picks from the great Oz who knows all? I am talking about Perriman and Elam. Perriman didn't make one catch and Elam, well, I have said it too many times already, but here goes again.....STINKS. That is what has killed the Ravens, poor drafting, especially in the early rounds. The Ravens have no excuses. They are just not good enough. Steve Smith, Wallace, and Yanda are. The rest of them on offense, including the overpaid quarterback, are mediocre at best. On defense, if you can't play well after losing one guy, you are ill prepared for competition in the NFL. Jimmy Smith is not the best corner to ever play the game, but he is our best corner. Losing him should not have the effect that it does. Time for cleaning house of these average players on defense. I wouldn't pay any of them a plug nickel. Let them walk when their time comes.

OH, and maybe we should draft some more wide receivers again next year. Obviously the great Oz thinks that is where our problems are. Good grief.

No one should be surprised by the outcome. The Ravens held their own through the first half.....UNTIL...the last Cowboy possession, where the defense went soft and allowed the Cowboys to march down the field unchallenged. They played the same way in the second half. Wright is abominable and the rest weren't much better. It is so frustrating to watch them line up 10 yards off the receivers, watch the receivers catch the ball and run before anyone lays a hand on them. Just a ridiculous defensive alignment.

There is nothing new here. Joe has always been inconsistent in the regular season but brilliant in the playoffs. Is it passion? Is it concentration? Who knows? No one has been able to figure it out. He won't become Ray Lewis so forget about it. If the offense doesn't produce in this one, it will be a disaster. They cannot continually go three and out against a quality opponent like the Cowboys. You may get away with that against Cleveland, but you'd better do better this week.

If retread Asa Jackson is the best the Ravens can find, Smith and Young better stay healthy. I don't understand this move. Jackson was cut, "bounced around other teams", then the Ravens resign him. Seriously? If he was any good, he wouldn't have been cut in the first place. If others thought he was any good, he wouldn't have "bounced around". Maybe I am missing something but it makes no sense to me.

Well, lets see, the FACTS are that the Cowboys are 8-1. Meanwhile the Ravens have played exactly one decent half of offensive football in the last 6 games. The defense is not the problem, although we have seen improvement there where Young has replaced all the failed veteran projects. This type of imbalance may win some games against lesser or equal opponents, but it won't against the true "elite" of the NFL. Glad both Pitt and Cincy lost so we do have room for failure, but, sooner or later, the Ravens will have to put it together if they hope to win the division. Beating up on Cleveland, while satisfying, means nothing.

Good news for Ravens fans. The NFL is the most mediocre that we have seen it in a long time. Take away Dallas, the Patriots, and maybe Seattle and Oakland, and the rest are middle of the road, where "on any given Sunday" who knows who will win. In a division of complete incompetence, the Ravens have so far managed to stay on top. Imagine, if you would, had they not tanked to the Jets, Giants, and Redskins, where they would be.

OMG, 80 YARDS! Stop the presses. He is the next Gayle Sayers or Walter Payton. Seriously. Ok, he had a good game against a really bad team. He did a lot of things right. In the first half against the awful Browns, the Ravens were the same awful team they have been the last 4 losses. The only reason they weren't in worse shape at the half is that the Browns were more inept. At least they managed to put together a good second half while the Browns were still the Browns. Lets see what happens with Dallas before all this chest thumping starts.

Why the heck should the defense have to carry the team when you are paying your quarterback 20 mil a year? Doesn't anyone ever ask that question? I am not a Perriman fan and have made that quite clear, but, I give him credit for that TD catch. It was great. The first half they looked like the same Ravens. Fortunately the Browns, with the exception of one TD pass looked worse. Beating the Browns and puffing out your chest about it is like stealing cookie money from the Girl Scouts and bragging what a tough guy you are. We will see over the next couple of weeks what this team is made of when the big boys show up. Kudos to Young and Suggs. They were great.

Yanda should not play. He should take the extra time off to improve his health for much tougher games to come. If the Ravens can't beat Cleveland, then there is little hope for them beating anyone. Cleveland is a lost team without leadership. There is a reason they are 0-9. They flat out stink. The Ravens need to bring it, both on offense and defense. Tired of this fooling around and playing safe. Where has that gotten them? In a weak division, they cannot afford a loss this week because the big boys are looming.

The Ravens are 4-4 this year, with every game decided by 8 or fewer points. I wonder what our record would be if we actually had an offense?

O gee, what a shock. We are not expected to "steamroll" the Browns. We couldn't even "steamroll" the Brownies. With an offense that struggles to score once a game, it is a given that the Ravens aren't going to "steamroll" anyone. Every game with this hapless offense is a challenge. I don't see it changing any time this year. Maybe next year if Bisciotti gets rid of Harbaugh.

All the time, money, and draft picks put into this so called offense and the best they can do is score one TD on ONE play. Other than that, they did nothing. Defense and special teams won the game. Any team that thinks it can win without scoring from the offense better look at the rest of the NFL. Flacco is playing horribly. His mechanics still suck and he either can't or won't correct them. He has gotten too complacent. This is his worst season yet and some moron was telling everyone how this would be his "Pro Bowl" year. Right.

You are absolutely right. Flacco is far from "elite". His play right now is a detriment to the team and Harbaugh won't sit him down, if only for a few sets to get his head out of his you know what. He has gotten too complacent and his terrible mechanics are still an issue. He is either too stubborn or too dense to make the corrections.

The defense upped its game for three quarters. You just knew when the fourth started that the defense would go soft and the non existent offense (their nickname should be Three and Out) wouldn't move the ball. Fortunately the Steelers didn't have time to erase a 3 TD deficit. Other than that it was a normal Ravens fourth quarter performance, the same one that lost us games the previous weeks.

I don't understand how Flacco still has such poor mechanics after being in the league for 8 years. Either he is too bull headed or too stupid to adjust. Just like staring down receivers, his poor footwork throws him off balance and makes him inaccurate. If Roethlisberger had played the first 3 quarters of this game the way he did the last, the Steelers would have blown the Ravens out. He was just as bad if not worse than Flacco until the fourth quarter.

I was glad to see Webb have a good game. He is a good guy but has been slowed by injuries and it has hurt his performances. Also. Young and Jimmy Smith played well. The line did its job against the rush, but, once again, no pressure on the quarterback. Roethlisberger looked as bad or worse than Flacco. Take away that one Flacco pass to Wallace, and he did nothing the whole game. Three and outs constantly. Given the ball inside the opponents territory and come away with nothing. While it is good to get a win, especially against the hated Steelers, nothing much has changed. The offense is still inept. Joe is still underperforming. The defense still has no pass rush. Even so, they should beat the worst NFL team, the Browns and, thanks to the mediocre division they are in, they have a chance.

OMG! Stop the presses. Matt Elam is back. Wait a minute. Who? Oh, Matt Elam, the guy who can't cover anybody or tackle either. Wow, so glad to see him back. Another Ozzie Newsome pick that went down the tubes. Elam should have been cut, but the Ravens will keep him around long enough so that people forget what a lousy choice they made. He flat out stinks. Ugh.

I don't believe Flacco is soft. I believe he is a dullard. He still stares down receivers. He still has poor mechanics, often throwing like he is shooting a fade away jumper. He still cannot read defenses and change the play at the line of scrimmage. He played about as poorly a game against the Jets as he has since being drafted. Yet, Harbaugh, the other dullard, leaves him in to lose the game. Even after those two awful picks, we had a chance. So what did Mr. Elite do then? Go three and out for every second half series but the last one, when the Jets backed off to protect their slim lead.

Here we go again. Musical mediocre cornerback chairs. Ho hum. Heard it all before, time and time again. If we could draft worth a darn we wouldn't need to constantly sign, release, and sign more cornerbacks, none of whom have been worth a darn.

Ozzie, the genius, hasn't had a good draft for 6 years. He has blown high draft choices on the likes of Elam, Perriman, and the immortal Sergio Kindle. If that is genius, a dog could do better. That is why the Ravens are in the sad state that they are, not because of inept Offensive Coordinators.

O baloney. The four game losing streak has nothing to do with the offensive line. That is not to say it has done its job, but the last awful showing, against a Jet team whose quarterback was so bad they benched him, yet he lit up the Ravens like the reincarnation of Johnny Unitas. Flacco has been on a downward spiral since the Super Bowl win. He was just awful in the Jets game. The offensive line gave him time and he couldn't even hit his receivers when he had it. Still throwing off his back foot. Still short arming passes into the ground. Still throwing over the heads of receivers. He should have been pulled from the game.

Lets see. Fact: The Ravens can't beat the Giants, the Redskins, the Raiders, or the Jets, but people are picking them to win the next 3 of five games. A realist would make them 1-4. The only victory might, I say might, happen against Cleveland, but even that is not a gimme. Pittsburgh and Dallas will destroy them. Cincy probably will too. I look for the Dolphins game to be close, but, given the Ravens penchant for tossing games away, they will find a way to lose this one too. Instead of being in the drivers seat and beating 3 bad teams, they choked on them and now find themselves with must wins against much stiffer competition. Good luck with that.

He is right about us being spoiled, but he is wrong about our unhappiness with this current team. We are not competitive because our draft has sucked over the last 6 years. Especially in the high rounds, there are more busts and only one, Mosely, even close to what is expected. Ozzie Newsome's picks have killed the Ravens. Blowing first round picks by taking the likes of Sergio Kindle, Elam, and now Perriman, who is nothing more than a mediocre receiver who drops as many passes as he catches, has decimated our team.