QB: C +. Not a good year- threw a lot of interceptions and way too many check downs.despite that he put us into position to win alot of games- he gave us the lead late in several games only for our defense to falter and give it up. Gotta take into account he was coming off a torn ACL..and once again was forced to work with a new coordinator midseason- yet he still set a new franchise record in yards. Don't think he was utilized properly and you could see his frustration. His receivers didnt make many plays for him- alot of dropped balls and no YAC. Still displayed the bad habit of throwing off his backfoot and failing to step up in the pocket. He improved over the year though as i believe he got more comfortable with his leg. So overall I give him a slightly above average grade .
RB: B - hard to evaluate this position. I think we all were surprised by West bursting into the scene and becoming the number 1. Not sure why they seemed to basically give up on Allen. Forsett was a disappointment but Dixon showed major flashes and could be a real stud. Quite simply though they were underutilized... Didn't get nearly enough carries- and that's no fault of their own. Strictly going off of their body of work I'd say it was good - plenty of room for improvement...particularly in pass protection. But a lot of that is on the coaches.
TE: D+ Major let down here. What was supposed to be the most stacked position and " the best group in the NFL " basically fell apart. Watson went down in preseason- Crock stayed hurt - Maxx showed zero improvement and also stayed hurt- Boyle got suspended and Pitta couldn't block a fly. Waller showed some positive signs and make big strides- esp making the conversion from WR. There were so many plans and all this big talk about double and triple tight end sets- and if not for Pitta bailing this group out and leading the team in receptions I would've givin them a big ole F.
WR: C. Wallace started off hot but tapered off big time in the second half of the season.still put up 1000. Steve showed he still had gas in the tank and showed some explosiveness even after coming off the injury at 37. Perriman did pretty much what I expected from him his first real year. Started slowly but as he got comfortable he showed some real flashes. I don't think he was targeted enough though. A few concentration drops but came out the gate making the plays that came his way and made countless impressive catches. Moore was a complete bust. Finished with under 75 yards I believe. Several key drops. Made plays on ST but major disappointment for a guy many of us had high hopes for. Hard to get a gauge on Aiken. He was obviously pushed back in the pecking order due to Wallace and steve- plus we had to attempt to develop Perriman. He would dissapear for awhile and then come up with huge catches very randomly...but overall he underachieved this year. Tough call on whether to bring him back. Wide receivers as a whole were a very average group who failed to make many big plays or get significant YAC. Once again- a lot has to do with the lack of a running attack- becoming 1 dimensional and the play calling..but still, very average.
O-Line: B+ a lot to be excited about here for the future. Stanley had a great rookie campaign along with lewis. Yanda was the mauler he always was and even played hurt and switched positions. Wagner played well. Ducasse was up and down and caused a lot of penalties. Hurst is no better though. The only one who really underachieved and prevented this group from getting an A was Zuttah. He pretty much sucked it up and was a liability all year long. Overall this group did well and kept Joe clean for the most part. And that's saying alot when we started two rookies on Joe's left side. Upgrade the center position and retain Wagner and we're in very good shape here.
D-Line: C +. Another one that was tough to guage. Started off the year red hot and it looked like nobody was getting an inch through the running game. Then in the last quarter of the season they just ran out of gas and collapsed. I don't know if they got out schemed or if they just got tired ..but it hurt to see them finish like that. Didn't get much qb pressure from them either so again- average.
LB: A- The only A on the team . Mosley got past that little sophomore slump and returned to top form. He also got much better in coverage as seen by his interceptions. The UDFA Orr also bursted onto the scene and led the team in tackles. Doom was obviously playing hurt and disappointed- but Suggs showed that he still had it, even after tearing his bicep. He slowed over the course of the year ,but after all he is on the back 9, and like I said he had a freakin torn bicep. A lot of what he does doesn't show up in the stats. ZSmith was a major letdown( hopefully a sophomore slump) but the addition of Judon kind of offset that. I was kind of upset to not see Levine used here hardly at all..BC I thought he would've done well there..but the play of Orr may have made that hard to do. More pass rushers are needed- and I almost split the grades between ILB and OLB..BC obviously one is lacking more than the other- but as a whole I'm gonna still give this group an A-
CB: C+ could've been a great group if Jimmy had stayed healthy, but the dropoff when he doesn't play is far too evident. Shareece failed to live up to expectations after a huge first game teasing us lol..but Tavon Young atleast played so well that he showed he could even play on the outside. Powers was up and down- but as much as he was raved about during camp he didn't live up to that.
S: B+ Weddle was a HUGE addition. Not only from his play but his leadership was key. His positive attitude was contagious and rubbed off on the entire team. He didn't play perfectly and gave up 2 or 3 big plays- but the improvement here cannot be overstated and he was snubbed from the pro bowl. Webb also did a good job...he's taken a lot of flack but overall I saw him have a pretty solid year. Him and Webb looked good back there and were a solid duo...they didn't give up many big splash plays and they made a lot of tackles. Was hoping Elam could've made an impact in his return but he didn't really do anything, and Levine didn't really get any playing time. Kendrick Lewis probably shouldn't have made the roster in hindsight, and is an obvious cut this off season.. Webb also has a pretty high cap number but we will see what happens. As far as play on the feild the year- they did very well.
OC: F - What an atrocity. From trestman to Marty , it got no better. The things we thought Marc got fired for- Marty did the exact same if not MORE. made no sense. Zero commitment to running game and nothing but excuses. They kept saying every game is different and the flow of the game dictates the run/pass ratio yet every single game no matter the situation we just kept on passing. First and goal from the 2. Pass. 3rd and 12- check down. Just completely backwards- constantly throwing short of the sticks. You can blame this on Joe if you want- but when you become one dimensional its hard for receivers to get open- and we've seen what Joe can do with a successful running game with balance. The play action was completely ineffective and it was just like both OCs were completely oblivious. Total failure and the downfall of this team IMO.
DC: C. Being top 5 in the league in several categories means your obviously doing something right. But when things went array and not according to plan it seems like pees never had a plan B and just has trouble making in game adjustments. The breakdowns at the end of games and that damn prevent defense was the death of us. The offense gave us the lead late in the fourth in 4 or 5 games I can remember and instead of staying aggressive we played to not lose instead of playing to win. The defense collapsed and cost us at the very least 3 games. And IMO it was the soft playcalling. We did manage to get a ton more turnovers this year- but I think that obviously had more to do with Leslie Frazier than it did pees- whom is a good potential in-house candidate to precede pees. Yet again- average.
HC: B- Harbaugh always does a good job getting the guys ready to go and inspiring his team. He didn't get much help from his staff this year and they let him down and made him look bad alot- yet he still took responsibility.. As he should. He made a lot of aggressive decisions that paid off. Many of them got overlooked in all the chaos of winning or losing...but a few of them backfired and ofcourse went under the microscope. The main thing that continues to plague him and he's failed to correct is the clock management. Been an issue for quite some time and they keep saying it will get fixed and it never does. No urgency whatsoever ( a lot of that is on the players as well ) but they always seem to have trouble getting the plays called in situations where time is of essence. Instead of just letting Joe do his thing( which seems to work best) they keep a leash on him and just lackadaisically move along. ( sometimes this is also on the OC) ..we could be down 10 points with 5 minutes left and we're just taking our good ole time like it's all good. And often we come up just a few seconds or few yards short. We take timeouts at inopportune times and dont seem to value them. Once again we just overall need to manage the clock better. Harbaugh is a great leader and he's not the problem here - but he DOES need to do more to fix things.
Overall - C average team with an average record. Showed glimpses of greatness and had the ability to go on a run and hang with any team in the league.. But we always came up just short..literally by inches. We could've been 12-4 and we could've been 6-10.. Just another one of them years where nearly every game came down to 1 or 2 plays..and we lacked the playmakers to make them. We had several games within grasp and we just let them slip away. We were undisciplined and highly penalized..but I think its pretty easy to see that most of the blame can be placed on the coordinators on both sides of the ball. Players have to execute..but coaches have to put them in position to win ..and the play calling was atrocious. We played to not lose instead of playing to win..when we were able to finish we got off to too slow of a start and when we started fast we weren't able to finish. Typical Ravens. An improvement from last year- but nowhere near up to our standards. Almost doesn't cut it , and a .500 record is indicative of exactly what we were- AVERAGE.