Minionhunter

And they are making us do color rush on a non-Thursday game so the steelers can wear all black and we wear all white. Terrible decision.

I'm sure most of you don't care but I just found out that the xmas game will only be on nfl network. I am currently out of the area and dont have nfl network. So the game I've been waiting all year for will not be available to me. I have game pass but waiting until Monday to watch sucks. This is a huge reason that my intrest in the NFL has faded. To greedy to broadcast big games nationwide. I have lived and breathed football for 30 years but seriously doubt I will watch next year. Count me as one more fallen fan. How much money is enough for the NFL? I can tell you a dynasty dies slowly so they never see it coming. 

I didn't know that, it has to be a premier match-up that day, why the networks didn't demand it for Christmas night (or even the prime match-up at the afternoon slot) is beyond me. All the others on the networks set for the afternoon slot are horrible! Absolutely horrible match-ups, nothing going for them. They made the mistake of taking them out of prime-time twice last year, now they do it again. I wonder if they fear the Steelers will embarrass themselves on national television. The NFL worked so hard to get their most popular six franchises into the playoff hunt (Patriots, Giants, Cowboys, Steelers, Raiders, and Packers) Top 6 most popular teams all "nudged" into the playoffs during a year when their ratings were down because of poor game play early in the season (because of poor product and too many commercials during breaks and announcers to support whatever the call was on the field, even if they don't believe it).

Only way Phil Simms can be on the air is being a yes man to the NFL and agreeing with the call the refs make, "Oh, that call was totally right, I can't believe it wasn't made sooner and harsher." [Unless another call goes the opposite way - which he will also claim is the only way it could have been called.] lol

At least John knows how bad of a play call that was. The HC should not have to be telling the OC not to do that in a game at that stage.

Does anybody else think like me and believe the Patriots decision to work out Hester was a jab at the Ravens?.

I think they did it to get the Ravens ST playbook just in case they have to play us again this year. BB handshake at the end of the game said it all, I hate you Harbs, I will hate you until the end of time and there is nothing you can do to fix it. The only other time it was like that was when he shook Mangini's hand....

"Browns get their only win this year against Pittsburgh." That's a headline I'm hoping to see.

Everyone except steelers fans should clamoring for that.

  23 hours ago, CQ1 said:

You’ve heard John Harbaugh say it through the years: “Iron sharpens iron.”
I'm so tired of that. Actually, any metal / material SLIGHTLY harder than iron will sharpen it......Harder than iron- I'm not seeing it this year.
Perhaps we should go with, "if any part of the fish stinks- the entire fish stinks"; or, "just cut the head of the snake off (I love reptiles- I better watch myself)". I guess whatever that 'head' is- we all have our definitions ( either player or front office). Then again, "an iron fish hook taken out of a fish with bad breath......:)

Regardless if we win or lose, there is a lot more than football (beat Pittsburgh!).
Have a great and safe Holiday!
-CQ1

Some people will stick their head in the sand and give up. Spread nasty comments about a team who never gives up like they do. I personally am not going to stick my head in the sand. I'm going to root for this team regardless of outcome. Go Ravens!

Wish more people were like you Floridaravens

"“I take responsibility for this happening,” Rosburg said. “I take it very personally. It’s my fault that he didn’t have better opportunities to return and really show what he can do. We didn’t block well enough for him, we didn’t coach well enough for him, and when I talked to Devin, as you might expect, his response was, ‘It’s a team thing.’ He took full responsibility, and he understands that we all have to do this together. It was telling on his character, and that’s the kind of man he is.”

Sorry, Jerry, but I call BS here. If, as you say, it wasn't Hester's fault that he wasn't nearly as effective as hoped - then why was he released in the first place? Was he fired because his support cast didn't do a good enough job???

You can tell from BB game plan vs. Hester. Kick deep so he takes a knee (BB never does that this year) so Hester still dangerous with time and room to run. But kick it high and right to him on punts, Hester has the yips and his decision making is bad currently. You need go no farther than that to see what is up with Hester. Also BB worked him out, but didn't sign him. Likely to see what Hester said the game plan was against them with the Ravens just in case they have to face us again this year.

When the patriots play the Ravens, they pull out all tricks out of their bag to beat us. But when we play them, we stick to our vanilla scheme. When the offense needs something desperate I don't understand why we don't do any trick plays anymore that could spark some fire. We used to do this in Flacco's initial years but we stopped them completely in recent years.

Yeah, the offense, it is on MM. Even the Pats homers and "neutral" commenters up here were picking apart where it was MM causing this stuff. He is not the right guy as much as MT was not the right guy, but his is friendly with Harbs and from the Andy Reid coaching tree (clock mismanagement University - slow pace and 2 minute drills). Harbs needs to get savage and cut out the cancer on the offensive side of the ball this offseason, gut it to the point of cut out healthy stuff (TE coaching and WR coaching) if it that is what it takes to get rid of MM and Castillo. Put in a good system even taking a risk with a great coordinator from college if he wants to bring in his entire staff, but just make sure they can hold onto them longer than a year.

If SSS is right, and if Flacco is missing passes, checking down too early, too lackadaisical, then what do we do? Flacco's not going anywhere. How do we get him to produce?

Monday night, when Brady chewed out Edelman, I wondered what Flacco would have done in the same situation with Pitta. They would have gone over to the sideline and laughed about it.

I feel bad for Smith. He wants to go out with a bang, and this team is not giving him that.

Why do you assume Steve is saying Joe is missing passes when he, by his own admission, has lost a step. He, also by his own admission, is tougher on himself than anyone else, saying what he does to motivate himself. If might be he is angry for not being faster or getting to where he needed to be when he needed to be there. There are a lot of reason a pass is overthrown, not just the QB throwing it too far because he erred. Joe is throwing to a spot and the spot is based on timing, we didn't see it so we don't know why the ball was not caught and appeared overthrown.

  2 hours ago, Bat-mite said:

If SSS is right, and if Flacco is missing passes, checking down too early, too lackadaisical, then what do we do? Flacco's not going anywhere. How do we get him to produce?

Monday night, when Brady chewed out Edelman, I wondered what Flacco would have done in the same situation with Pitta. They would have gone over to the sideline and laughed about it.

I feel bad for Smith. He wants to go out with a bang, and this team is not giving him that.

Smith has said in the past, without being asked about it, that he prefers "calm", and that he loves playing with a qb with Joe's demeanor. He referenced a play in his first game here, where he dropped a pass, and came back to the huddle expecting to get chewed out, and Flacco simply called the next play. He also mentioned a time in his first training camp where he was yelling at Joe for not getting the ball, and Flacco simply responded, "get your depth." He raved about Flacco's leadership style and calm confidence, and again, he wasn't asked about it. He completely brought that up on his own.

Sometimes an emotional outburst is just that - an emotional outburst. It doesn't mean Steve Smith has any issues with Flacco.

I'm in agreement here with you. Steve may be getting ansy though. Last week he said "We go as Joe goes" which I didn't know how to take at the time. Also Joe wants his recievers to be where they are supposed to be and he is really accurate, hence the "get your depth" comment. Steve also missed one and Joe got on him for it early in this past game, and even Gruden commented on it. Steve is coming to the end of things and wants the ball and wants it to be there. I'm not worried.

  1 hour ago, whobilly said:

We've been working on "fixing things" since September. When will they actually get fixed?

We've been working on penalties since we were complaining about Michael Oher getting 4 a game 8 years ago. Seems the problem stems from exactly where the coach has repeatedly said it stems from, coaching. Discipline is solely the responsibility of the head coach and for 8 years he hasn't figured out how to teach his offensive lineman how to not commit a false start. 8 freaking years.

I was a little hard on Joe after the Patriots game but after re-watching the first half I have to agree with respecttheraven, our receivers dropped more passes than they caught. Wallace cost an interception and just straight out dropped a TD. Perriman was caught in la la land out on the edge when a ball smacked him in the chest when he wasnt looking. How can you blame Joe? Between penalties and receivers who have grease on their hands, as much as we get frustrated with Joe as the game winds down, had those who needed to take care of their own business earlier in the game had done so, it wouldn't have ended up that Flacco had to hurry us down the field.

Let's hope they get it together before these last three games however, I am not holding out much hope but the silver lining is we had a great draft, if we can follow that up with another one, lock up B Williams and a few others and we will do far better next season.

Even Steve Smith was off, Joe even called him out on the field on the first play. I think everyone was a little too amped or something. But that game was a lot closer than everyone thought and the lazy line that the Pats rolled us if not for ST gaffs on their part is just plain wrong, if you say that, then you have to say that all our ST trouble (except the blocked kick) was just a fluke too and you come down to like a 10 to 6 game in the Patriots favor IF you go by throwoing out the fluke stuff. Refs were approximately equally bad at calls/no calls during the game. So it was a close game and the Pats were the more desperate team that night. They threw everything and the kitchen sink at us and they needed to. They unleashed everything in the toolbox and they needed everything.

I'm with Suggs, they better pray they don't see us again.

  9 minutes ago, Minionhunter said:

  1 hour ago, rmcjacket23 said:

  1 hour ago, Minionhunter said:

  2 hours ago, OriolesMagicPlease said:

  2 hours ago, MadStorkSociety said:

Thought the same thing. Four guys all at the first down marker. We have speedsters, one of them should be heading for the endzone corner.

Yet so many want to blame Joe. Team sport!

Yes, everyone even supposedly unbiased national reporters still blame Joe for poor offensive coordinator game plans. I swear the game plan was MM making a statement that he was in charge and not Joe. All the coordinator changes has got to be killing Joe, no consistency and stability. Harbs is still paying for not Firing Trestman at the end of last year. Harbs MUST be Savage this year and gut the entire offensive coaching system and get in someone who can fix both Joe and the line (Bobby might be the only safe guy, but still when you have everyone stopping short of the sticks, you would think that he should be coaching the guys up to get beyone that and not on the same parallel line); and then they need to stay for multiple years.

So when its poor mechanics and erratic accuracy (which it mostly was on Monday night), you can't blame coaches. There's just no logic behind it.

And for the millionth time, the reason why receivers can't just "run to the sticks" and catch a pass is because there's a thing called an opposing defense.

Said opposing defense just so happens to also know precisely where the 1st down marker is. And you know what smart defenses do? Flood that line. Go back and watch film of the Patriots schemes on 3rd down. Guess what you'll see an absolute ton of? A bunch of Patriots guys surrounding the line of gain.

And the fan strategy is to throw directly into those guys. Speaking of bad game plans... that one takes the cake.

You also could look at the other offense. They have a QB who is going to the HOF, based frequently on throwing to receivers who are well short of the first down marker on 3rd down and still manage to get a 1st down.

No what was not done was repeatedly send 2 WR on deep routes or one deep and one crossing. Steve Smith was frustrated at Earwig. They had no game plan for if the Pats decided, hey, that Miami thing they did in the middle, we best stop that. The Ravens didn't attack that weak secondary and throw deep. And they didn't realize their one corner couldn't cover until mid way through the 4th.

No actually this isn't what happened. What happened was that the Patriots typically play man coverage and they spent almost the entire game in zone coverage, which the Ravens greatly unexpected and didn't adapt to.

I mean I guess we could just throw deep into zone coverage, but not sure exactly how you expect that to work very often. The notable time we did Joe threw into double coverage to Wallace, who then let the ball go right through his hands into the arms of the safety, who was right there to make a play.

Became borderline impossible to do once you get to the 2nd half, when you're down 20 points already.

I see what you are saying and I agree. What I mean is planning for it and sending two speed threats deep on the outside so they have to pick their poison. Just like us the Pats weakness is the secondary. They will break when repeatedly tested and probed for that weakness.

Yes also you point out the Wallace thing, which may have made Joe hesitant to trust the deep ball. That would be odd though since he is usually confident in throwing it even if it is a gamble. Here he would have needed to gamble or read which way the zone was going and throw out of it, or have well designed plays to get his matchup. This is why I say it is the OC and game plan, plus zero adaption at the half.

That picture of the coverage on Niko's sack is absolutely embarrassing!!! All 4 receivers run straight to their defender and doesn't even appear they were trying to get open (can tell by the result of the play). Then you have 3 guys against 1 defender; 1 OLmen against 3 defenders and 2 OLmen taking 1 guy to the ground - NO WONDER JOE GOT SACKED!!! But i guess people will only blame Joe for the sack and not even blink an eye at crappy play by the receivers and the OL... This picture is the epitome of what the receivers and OL have been doing all season!!!

Yep. And notice neither you or I or anyone else is saying Joe wasn't part of the problem. He has his own share in this. He missed several throws badly, he failed to recognize open guys on at least two plays (that should have been easy reads, nothing crazy), and he took at least one of those sacks when he should have thrown it away and had time to realize that. But that loss was not on him, and I believe that slow lethargic play is MM making the calls too slowly and getting them in slow and dragging Joe down with that. MM is certainly NOT encouraging Joe to move that 2 minute quickly, you can see Joe having to think and that is causing the slow play. When he runs it himself, then he is really quick, makes the reads smoothly and it all seems to work, but when the OC is making him kowtow to his play, then it bogs Joe down, he thinks too much and it fails. That is what we saw to end the game Monday night.

  1 hour ago, Minionhunter said:

  2 hours ago, OriolesMagicPlease said:

  2 hours ago, MadStorkSociety said:

Thought the same thing. Four guys all at the first down marker. We have speedsters, one of them should be heading for the endzone corner.

Yet so many want to blame Joe. Team sport!

Yes, everyone even supposedly unbiased national reporters still blame Joe for poor offensive coordinator game plans. I swear the game plan was MM making a statement that he was in charge and not Joe. All the coordinator changes has got to be killing Joe, no consistency and stability. Harbs is still paying for not Firing Trestman at the end of last year. Harbs MUST be Savage this year and gut the entire offensive coaching system and get in someone who can fix both Joe and the line (Bobby might be the only safe guy, but still when you have everyone stopping short of the sticks, you would think that he should be coaching the guys up to get beyone that and not on the same parallel line); and then they need to stay for multiple years.

So when its poor mechanics and erratic accuracy (which it mostly was on Monday night), you can't blame coaches. There's just no logic behind it.

And for the millionth time, the reason why receivers can't just "run to the sticks" and catch a pass is because there's a thing called an opposing defense.

Said opposing defense just so happens to also know precisely where the 1st down marker is. And you know what smart defenses do? Flood that line. Go back and watch film of the Patriots schemes on 3rd down. Guess what you'll see an absolute ton of? A bunch of Patriots guys surrounding the line of gain.

And the fan strategy is to throw directly into those guys. Speaking of bad game plans... that one takes the cake.

You also could look at the other offense. They have a QB who is going to the HOF, based frequently on throwing to receivers who are well short of the first down marker on 3rd down and still manage to get a 1st down.

No what was not done was repeatedly send 2 WR on deep routes or one deep and one crossing. Steve Smith was frustrated at Earwig. They had no game plan for if the Pats decided, hey, that Miami thing they did in the middle, we best stop that. The Ravens didn't attack that weak secondary and throw deep. And they didn't realize their one corner couldn't cover until mid way through the 4th.

  55 minutes ago, MadStorkSociety said:

Thought the same thing. Four guys all at the first down marker. We have speedsters, one of them should be heading for the endzone corner.

Yet so many want to blame Joe. Team sport!

Yes, everyone even supposedly unbiased national reporters still blame Joe for poor offensive coordinator game plans. I swear the game plan was MM making a statement that he was in charge and not Joe. All the coordinator changes has got to be killing Joe, no consistency and stability. Harbs is still paying for not Firing Trestman at the end of last year. Harbs MUST be Savage this year and gut the entire offensive coaching system and get in someone who can fix both Joe and the line (Bobby might be the only safe guy, but still when you have everyone stopping short of the sticks, you would think that he should be coaching the guys up to get beyone that and not on the same parallel line); and then they need to stay for multiple years.

This was an offensive coaching failure stright up. Failure to have a plan for this type of defense, and slow play when we needed hustle at the end. I wouldn't be surprised if Earwig was trying to make Joe look bad because the impression from last week was Joe looks good when they use his suggestions. Marty is not the OC for this job.

That view of our WRs in the Tony Massarotti tweet shows exactly what ive been talking about since game one. The WRs are all at the same level on the same yard line. That's the easiest thing in the world to defend. We need some deep, some shallow, some crossing. At least make it a challenge.

Also I should say that That show is tremendously better than the Baltimore shows on a certain station, who leading up to the Miami game when I tuned in to get some local color the broadcasters were just pathetic cutting down Harbs without saying his name and saying how great Adam Gase was wand his players all said they loved him and playing for him and you didn't hear that about "some coaches" yuk yuk yuk, "I think I know who you are talking about" yuk yuk yuk. Despicable. They should be FIRED for that during pregame for the home team. I'll never listen to that station again. Only WNST now. Horrible of that station. I just want to say to those guys, Who won the BAL-MIA game? Huh? You two broadcasters should be fired before the next day sun rises.

That view of our WRs in the Tony Massarotti tweet shows exactly what ive been talking about since game one. The WRs are all at the same level on the same yard line. That's the easiest thing in the world to defend. We need some deep, some shallow, some crossing. At least make it a challenge.

They explain during the show how pathetic Mornerwig's offense is and how he is the one causing the terrible clock management issues. Straight from the Andy Reid school of terrible clock management. I don't think it is Joe I think it is Marty.

It is a decent assessment of the Ravens issues from outside the club's and fans perspective, if you can stop throwing up from the nauseating self congratulatory Patriots fawning.

  3 hours ago, descent into the maelstrom said:

I wonder if the Patriots pick him up. He's clearly better than what they have.

The Ravens sure can't coach people. The Patriots get production fro their young players, why can't the Ravens?

I hope the Pats waste a spot on Hester, they won't Ihope they do. Just like Melvin all over again trying to spite us.

Second best release of the season, followed only by the canning of Mark Trestman....can anyone out there tell me how he was ever even considered for the OC position? If you cite his record in Chicago or in the CFL, those are Not good sources to validate his credibility or prowess.  In my opinion, He cost our team more than a losing season last year he almost knocked us down into a hole this season that we nearly didn't climb out of.  Some of his old tendencies are still infecting the team's Offensive potential i.e., run-pass balance.  Run the ball, even if it's only getting you 1 or 2 yards...keep the defense honest. Best thing to do at a defense coming at you relentlessly...run right at them, chances are you'll eventually run right past them.  We are just way too predictable with this dink and dunk pass scheme.         

We are literally following the same path the niners took after Montana with Trestman and then earwig. The time management issues are from the Andy Reid coaching tree. Straight from the incompetent time management school. Joe looks lethargic because earwig is running it, not Joe.

  1 hour ago, Raven552 said:

This was a good move, Hester hasn't done anything but waive for a fair catch or run away from the ball.  I only remember one decent return from him, and even that wasn't great. 

Hester was there for the pay check. He was a has been when the Ravens signed. There have been too many bad decisions by the front office, Ozzie is loosing his touch.

Not even close. He was just like Jacoby with the steelers, done but didn't know it.

Hester wasn't there just for the check, he was like many great players that lose it and just can't realize it. What made it difficult is he was still dangerous on kickoffs where he had room to assess. But his fear on close ones made him start pressing and compromised his overall judgements. He was truly great and was robbed of the best kick return ever in Chicago by incompetent refs which were also fooled by his moves. This was a month or more overdue.

Sorry it didn't work DH, you got a lot longer than most would have to work things out. I've enjoyed watching you for a very very long time. I feel like my parents just had to put my 21 year old cat to sleep. The one that never did anything wrong to anyone, but his kidneys were shot, he had no teeth, and walked only a few feet a day, and stopped eating despite trying. Sad, sad, sad day, even though we were ending his suffering. But Devin isn't a cat, he is the greatest return man in NFL history. Peace.

1. NE was the more desperate team. NE had to throw the kitchen sink at us to win. First use of no huddle by NE outside 2 minutes with Brady this year, trick plays, brand new defensive game plan, and ST tricks. We couldn’t handle it this time, if we make it in and play NE again, they will wish they held something back because we will end them.

2. What did West do to get in the doghouse? Dixon is not ready to be the feature back despite second half running. Dropping passes and taking the safety in the first half was terrible. Whoever decided to move away from West –this year- should be fired. Nothing more needs to be said, Dixon may be OK down the road, but not this year, and he is no power rusher, great after contact, but not a power back like West.

3. Hester is afraid. Despite the blocked FG, ST for the Ravens is still excellent. The “score not being as close as it was” is a false narrative, the first was a fluke yes, but our ST caused the second fumble, there was no garbage time scoring. This is the worst reasoning and shows poor ability to break the game down, just lazy commenting. If people make this claim, they are deluding themselves and may as well say the Ravens let the Patriots into it in the first place and then hang around because of Devin Hester alone. If teams can cover Hester immediately, he is worse than a liability, if he has room to move, he is still an OK returner.

4. Harbs and crew are protecting Elam for some reason.

5. Receivers didn’t help Joe out, and neither did Mornearwig with the game plan and adaptions. Wallace’s complete whiff on the interception is intolerable and the announcers should have pointed it out.

Extra Credit – Belichick blames Harbaugh for deflategate and they are no longer friends. The end game ”handshake” said it all. Belichick hates Harbaugh.

Also they are lying. It not being Elam's fault is as silly as it not being Cundiff's fault, meaning only that Evans should have made the catch and not put Cundiff in the position to lose it in the first place.

But the haters will place all the blame on Joe for this one, like usual. Joe isn't free of blame, but he wasn't the one who lost the game. That lies on everyone, except Weddle, Kock, and Tucker. True team loss right through the coaches.