Minionhunter

Ravenshine, I thought you were Dorota for a minute, this seems like something she would point out, but you hit the mark on the head. It's the O-Line! We were playing all backups, a rookie at LT (out of position, too) except for the starting Center who was the weakest link on the line when it was all starters. How anyone can think that Joe should be amazing behind that line would be crazy! Did Harbs praise the line, yep and he should have because they did a great job for it being a makeshift unit. The average lack of thought behind some of the comments and analysis is baffling to me. Yes, it sucks we are loosing, especially since we are in every game until the last minute, literally. However that is the amazing thing how well we are doing this year in-spite of all the problems, the exact opposite take of what most are saying, which is how awful we are doing since we should "just be winning" because we are the Ravens because you know "Pixies" or "magic" or something. Trestman is gone now and that was needed, now we have to get rid of Pees, but with Suggs gone, Leslie can take the end of year heat and survive or we can find someone better if he goes too, Pees must go. Putting one backup corner on OBJ and not double teaming him after the first TD is a fire-able offense. So was keeping Lewis over Brooks. Pees is now in a bend then break defense, I don't care what the stats say. The only reason he looks good is because of Weddle and arguably Leslie teaching the new guys on defense how to intercept balls. Harbs gets one more year without that idiot who was the only Patriots DC under Belichick to be "mutually, let go" instead of going on to become a head coach somewhere else. He destroyed the NE defense, he destroyed the Baltimore defense and needs to be fired.

Lol. Well said. I would prefer if we don't make the tournament, that we loose out the rest of the season and don't get anyone else hurt. Dallas was my surrogate team when the Colts were stolen. Because, copulate the Redskins and my blowhard childhood neighbors.

That is a good point, Flacco said that he wanted to keep his playmakers on the field instead of using eveyrone like Trestman was trying to do. You have to give your guys the chance to get hot. I have a feeling that Perriman will get hot once he has his first big game, but they have to keep throwing to him for that to happen. Remember Gary, he only went to the backups in the last part of games where the primary targets either were not producing or the game was already decided. Other than that, it was going to the same guys over and over again with confusion on the looks he showed.

Everyone saying how great Dak Prescott looks, tell me, which team has the best O-line in the NFL? If it is not Dallas, they are either #2 or #3. Remember when they picked Zack Martin just before we were going to pick him. They always seem to pick just before us and take the player we need the most. This year we picked so high it didn't really matter, but still we could have Elliot. Screw Ramsey.

Mallet beat the Steelers because they got over confident and were shell shocked when he was throwing it. They had no game plan for it because he was so new to the team, and everyone spent an enormous amount of time helping him get ready that week. Mallet has a million dollar arm and a 50 cent head.

Yep, and he was asked to throw it 48 times! There was more running this game, and I know that the play-action passing off of a typical run formation look helped contribute to the imbalance (and I'm OK with that), but we still need to run more. Either that or we needed to keep going to play-action because it was working. The one thing the coaching doesn't seem to do is to adjust to keep throwing what works at the opposing team until they prove they can stop it. MM was a little better than MT, but he still needed to keep at it more. Dean Pees does not seem to adjust well at all, especially when his corners started dropping like flies.

See, this is what the stats articles don't factor in. You see it in all QB, every single one of them, when they have a terrible line and they are constantly getting hit and pressured. Plus the change in OC which was needed, makes it so that only some of the playbook can be changed so they have to work with the Trestman plays which are not schemed up to have tons of stuff we need (max protection for deep routes, running plays that come out of different looks, etc...). You can't just expect MM to change everything on a dime, and redesign the entire playbook and everyone to memorize it immediately, I think at best we can hope for is increasingly new plays being inserted as we go. Its a bear of a situation to be in. Still Buffalo seems to be working it out in a good fashion, but their D is better (not just in stats, but what counts = wins).

If we can't make the playoffs, I would prefer we don't win again this season. I'm sick of everyone complaining about the drafting who point out the the success of the players we have who were picked when we had high round picks (worse years) and the lack of ability when we have low round years (went far in the playoffs).

Sure, Joe has not looked good this year. However anyone blaming him is out of their mind. All these stats based articles are a great way to disprove why stats alone are terrible indicators. It's the O-line which wasn't very good to start with (two rookies starting on the left which is INSANE) and is now in shambles, the center being the stable piece who was the worst performing member of the starting line. This leads to Joe getting hit or running for his life. No wonder his is anxious to throw, the same thing happens when Rogers or Brady or anyone does not have a good line and is getting hit constantly. Plus the new RB core is worse at protection now and is untrustworthy. Also, Flacco has consistently delivered good balls and the receivers drop them. Perriman, Morre and Wallace are all guilty of dropping easy catches and game winning catches, mostly on buddy pass like balls. You can't win if you deliver the perfect pass on the perfectly called play and the receiver drops it. Flacco still had the team in position and drove them down the field with a chance to win, again. Also, he wasn't the one who called on him to throw it 48 times this past game, he can only do what he is told, which is exactly what he does. Also, Flacco is not responsible for 200+ yards and 2 TD to OBJ with the stupid coverage that Pees dials up. No one wants to say it but this game was lost due to injuries. 3 starting O Linemen out, our most sure handed SSS is out, on the Defense CJ Mosley out, Jimmy Smith went out (OBJ was nothing until Jimmy went down), and then two more corners were lost. Now Suggs is gone, remember last year when Suggs was lost? How did that go. We can't replace Yanda, Stanley, Suggs or Jimmy, no one on the roster can do that. The only wonder people should be thinking is how on Earth did Joe keep us in that game until the final drive. This is what elite players do, they give you the chance to win every time, they don't guarantee it every time.

You are correct, unfortunately.

What precious points? Just because we went for it on 4th down does not mean jack! The secondary is HORRENDOUS! Plain and simple! Completely wrong, sir. If they take the FG, guess what? Ravens only need a FG to win. They lost 27-23. They could've been down 27-26 instead, with Tucker to ice the game. But nope, Harbs makes yet ANOTHER bonehead call. I've defended him for years. Not anymore. No, you are completely wrong. If you kick the field goal, it changes every play after that. Instead of being pinned down in their end zone and then punting (which led to a FG), the Ravens kickoff and the Giants get the ball on the 25. New set of plays. Thinking you can change 1 play without affecting any of the other plays is foolish. Thank goodness for sanity tonight.

"The patchwork offensive line deserves kudos for the most part. Playing without anchors Marshal Yanda and Ronnie Stanley, it opened holes for West and gave Flacco enough time to throw on most plays. Oh, but those penalties." Uhhh, you spent a lot of article space saying penalties killed us, the line had quite a few. I disagree they gave Joe time to throw on most plays. Joe was getting killed, throwing early to not get killed, or running for his life when he wasn't using play action or handing off. You pointed out what turned the game, Jimmy getting the concussion. Then Suggs with a torn biceps or triceps sealed our fate. We have no replacement for either player unless we are going to make some unforeseen blockbuster trade...

If Suggs is out for any amount of time, I fear a repeat of last year. Especially with the bubble gum and duct tape holding both our O-line and quarterback's knee together.

Although I may criticize they still are My Team! This just helps me deal with the pain of losing. It's fine to criticize, just have some consistency please. You just said Flacco is a coach killer but poor Marty because the line is terrible now and better when Cam was fired. Flacco is fresh off an ACL which most quarterbacks take more than a year to get right after suffering, and he looks pretty darn good for the injury return, so much so that we forget he is still recovering from that. He has an all rookie left side of the line on his blindside then that gets traded and is in disarray and the right side is screwed up. So he looks frazzled from that and is ground down by the end of these games, to me he looks like he is playing in significant pain, but he is Joe, so he hides it well. He is getting killed unless he bootlegs on that injured knee. He gets leads consistently and then constantly has to regain them after the defense gives them right back up. He is still running Trestman's garbage offense for which Trestman was fired from Chicago for doing the exact same thing. This week now Marty is calling it until he can gradually put in his own play list. Flacco is not the problem. This week it was injuries. Outside the O-line, Jimmy was the worst, but Suggs may be the most serious since we have zero way to replace his skill set and talent, and Doom is out indefinitely. If Suggs is out then it will be similar to last year. I really wish we had Spence, either that or we didn't put KC through the Dean Pees cycle of overwhelming your new talent with so much out of position responsibility he can't play and is destroyed just like Elam and Brooks.

I wish it were true. Unfortunately they will hang around just to post negative comments.

Yeah but we sure as hell had a better O-line with Cam than what poor Marty has now. Again, Flacco is the Offensive Coordinator Killer! He gets a pass and they lose their jobs cause he sucks. Nope. Try again.

Still throwing to juice is a Trestman hangover.

You could say that for Wallace too except they only called one penalty of the six or seven committed by the DBs guarding him.

Vikings have a stellar defense and a gifted OC with a number 1 overall pick at QB. Patriots have a stable offensive system, and they cheat.

We didn't win the first one after Cam was fired either.

The bolded statement is incorrect. Mornhinweg and Trestman were together in San Fran. Mornhinweg followed Trestman as OC in SF.

Well, if it had worked, everyone would be praising the play, it just didn't work out..... I personally have no problem with trying a few potential "trick plays", sometimes they work, sometimes they don't, but I would also prefer we have more points on the board when trying these types of plays ?? I'm with you. I like the aggressiveness of Harbaugh. I love it really, more coaches need to do it. I also am with you on that I don't think it was the time, however I'm not the one watching my OC abandon the only thing that was working on offense. He may have been thinking he needed to do something to spark the team and the fake field goal was it. The Skins said they didn't notice tucker lined up left, so he might have caught them sleeping too. Also it was nearly executed to give us the TD, just slightly under thrown. The defender had it hit him in the back of the helmet, it wasn't like he was playing it perfectly. The bigger question IMHO was what was going on right before the half?

The Jets likely see Butler as an opportunity (desperate or not) because they need a possession receiver now that Decker is getting surgery to end his season. OTOH The Bucs just didn't want the Ravens to pick up Butler so they called him up last week and then cut him again. I said this last week, petty moves rarely benefit a team, just look at the Browns and T. West....

Two weeks in a row now the team playing us has been awarded special teams player of the week.

Flaccos mechanics is one thing Kubiak really stressed...FOOTWORK. It seems Trestman got completely away from that and was stressing more quick release. Flacco needs to get back to working on his footwork. Its not the whole answer but it would make him more accurate. I thought I was the only one who noticed this Sami. Excellent point. Gary and Rick hammered(!) how footwork connects to both reads and throwing. Testman lost that immediately on arrival last year and never fixed it. I hope they fix it now.