[Blogs] Late For Work 12/9: Steelers Say Chester Targeted Harrison

[ravensheap]

I am always proud of the Ravens.. and like the article says..Harbaugh has always expressed a sincere appreciation of the fans and the part they play in a game. Some people just like to find something to [i]<complain>[/i] about. Am I disappointed losin...g the game last week.. Yes.. but am I disappointed w/ the team? no.. could some plays have gone better..yes.. People have to realize that the players are not infallible, they are human. One thing I have always been proud of with the team.. very very rarely do they make "excuses", usually.. they take ownership of any errors made.. or plays not successfully orchestrated and delivered.
Here you have the Steelers who WON.. <[i]deleled>
[/i]So.. I just want to say.... RAVENS ROCK!! And we Love you guys!!!!

[coreyadams]

Until we knock the Steelers in the jaw.
This talk will always be.

[fusuymada]

Talk shows and forums exist so that fans can express their opinion. If you can't handle the opinions and deal with them in a professional manner then you should either shut down the shows, shut down the forums, screen the calls or learn how to not alienate your fan base. Harbaugh was right, he was just not right in the way that he said it. He was obviously frustrated. If you follow the pressers (available right here on baltimoreravens.com) he had been that way all week, so it was not like this one call created the explosion, it just lit the fuse.

Having said that, I think we see Harbs as the corporate CEO image, the antithesis of Rex Ryan, and so, I think, that outburst surprised fans but should let them know just how deep his dedication and desire runs. How can you not love his ability to be a stand up guy for his coaches and defending them. Like I said, I disagree with how he said it, but we should have nothing but admiration for Harbaugh.

Why admiration? People don't realize that we are in a rebuilding phase right now. We have moved out a lot of older offensive lineman, defensive backs, defensive lineman over the past 2 or 3 years and have gotten considerably younger in those positions. Except for Birk, our O. line are two and three year guys, our corners are young, our d line, except for Gregg are getting younger. When we lose Ray and Ed, which is going to happen, we will have a lot of good young people in place, that like New England, we can be a perennial power. John did this on the fly while getting to the playoffs each and every year and was only one game from the Super Bowl in his first year.

[teamrave222]

In my opinion John seems to be satisfied with just not loosing games by alot and that to me is not going to get us anywhere. (We stayed in the game for 3 1/2 quarters so thats good enough for me) basically thats whats coming out of his mouth, then he gets mad when asked a ? about one of the coaches and he tells the fan to cheer for another team? Come on John we the fans make you, we are the ones the pay money to see our beloved Ravens play and i mean play to WIN, not to stay in the game for three quarters and loose. John was out of line by talking to the fans the way he did.

[KillaBirdTJ]

Im very dissapointed Harbaugh. Do you think Ravens fans dont know football? I have been a Ravens fan since Memorial Stadium, Micheal Jackson/Vinny Testeverde, played 8 years through out school as a first team tailback, outside linebacker and just about every kickoff and/or punt team. I have an understanding of the game.

This team is built to score 35 points per game but struggles even against the weakest competition, ranking lower offensively than LAST YEAR! That's the real issue ISN'T IT HARBAUGH??

There is no question about this talented group of football players. In fact alot of times it seems this team is too talented for the coaching staff...

Lets not confuse the issue here, we love our team but not what we are seeing from Cam. In the past our defense has always been asked to do it all! I personally have always dreamed of what we could really do with weapons on offense to match.

We are sick of the league disrespecting, and overlooking how great of a football town, and team we are... just dreaming that someday (hopefully before Ray Ray, and Ed retire!) we will make them all eat their words with that same SMASH MOUTH running game, SWARMING/HARD HITTING D, but complimented with a high powered passing attack!!! How is it this year the offense is worse??!!!

We want a superbowl here in Bmore, the talent screams superbowl but not the coaching!! So stop taking it personal, its not about you HARBS! Man up and fix this NOW!!!!!!

GO RAVENS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[ravensheap]

I don't think that is what he is saying..I can't see any coach being satisfied to not win..that's crazy... But coming out of a hard fought game and losing I think he is trying to not sound completely negative or critical. He usually makes a point where the mistakes were made but ends with trying to come out on a more positive note, probably to put that game to rest and work on mistakes made and get on with the next game.
I don't get that he is satisfied with "just getting beat". I think he is as disappointed after a loss as we are, but if you keep hanging on to the game just played the next one will not be properly prepared for. I worked for over 20 years in the horse racing industry.. If a jock thought he screwed up the race before.. and he was not letting it go.. the next race no matter what chance the horse he was on had.. he wouldn't finish anywhere, his head wasn't in that race it was in the race before.
Same theory.. move on.. work on the errors.. but get to the next game.

[teamrave222]

We are not rebuilding, this team is made to make SB runs this year and the next three years but if John only cares about not loosing by alot, I guess we the fans are in for heartbreak. John if you dont want to see your friends without jobs or the fans bashing them, please you need to put a stop to the nonsense and tell them to get their S@#$ together.

[jhonnyboy]

who cares, just win monday!!

[starkraven]

that dude jim who asked if Clarence Brooks was getting fired is a [i]<jerk>. [/i]Clarence has been phenomenal and I wouldn't trade our D Line for anything. Our DLine is respected all around the league and don't get moved. when u only rush 3 men, a good running back will find a hole. we don't have the talented lb depth we had in years past so our run d won't be the same. but this dude didn't even ask "how will you address any issues"... he wanted a dude fired. why? because a rookie doesn't know all of the nuances of the pro game? he's an idiot. and so called fans get mad when Harbs calls him on his BS? these are the same people that were wearing black and gold our 5-11 season. Real Ravens bleed purple and support their organization. as long as this organization supports this city, I have a duty to support it back.

[Free Agent]

Im with Coach Harbaugh on this one. Many of us, myself included, woke up extremely frustrated on Monday morning. Multiply that frustration ten times, and thats probably how frustrated Harbaugh was.

Yes, we can look a the problems the Ravens have and say, "Why aren't these being fixed!" But I for one am glad that we are not playing like the Bengals or even the Browns.

We are 8-4. Maybe we won't win the division, but we still have a shot at the wildcard. And I'm sure nobody needs to be reminded of how we made the playoffs our Superbowl year.

[KillaBirdTJ]

Look, its simple... The talent on this team has gotten better, (and I like our Lb's) but not the production so fans are right to voice their concerns, and naturally it's going to be directed at the coaching staff. We want at least two to three SuperBowls with this group of Ravens!

NEWS FLASH: This IS NOT a rebuilding year!

[TroySmithFan]

Man does anyone else see how big of cry babies the steelers are they cry that they are being targeted, now that we got the fines and penalties they are crying that chester was going for harrison. Did you not see ward going after Reed and Lewis trying to take them out. Stop crying!!!!!! If you wanna go cry then run to your mom.

[Arch Valor]

Yup, Jims a idiot

[starkraven]

teamrave, when Harbs mentions that we lost by a narrow margin, the fact is that we didn't get blown out. that indicates a major problem. our problem has been closing. we would've won had we closed out strong in New England, Atlanta, and here against the Squeelers. we were in control of all those games and lost in the last few minutes of the 4th quarter or OT. That doesn't suggest a meltdown in coaching. that suggests that adjustments need to be made to play 4 good quarters of football. we are in position to close out 12-4 the same regular season record as our SB year. or maybe go 11-5 at the worst (our same record when we lost the AFC Championship). What team makes all these coaching changes and is successful? maybe Washington? no? hmmm.. maybe Minnesota? no? Oakland? my point being, when you have a winning staff, you can't be so shortsighted that you position yourself for failure based on a few close games that didn't go your way.

[ravens_freak]

A team's a unit, a family. I think John Harbaugh understands and protects that. I know for a fact that some of my family is not perfect and I may be the one to speak up and talk about it, but I'd never allow anyone outside to bash them or speak about them in a derrogatory way. I stand behind John 200% and am always especially impressed that he understands how to encourage his players and boost morale. Fans should respect that and be supportive. And, besides, if everytime someone screwed up they were fired, I think we might all be jobless.

Oh, and as far as the Steelers and what they have to say about anything, shuddup.

[spiffy91]

The fact the Steelers think Chester targeted Harrison is laughable.

[Raven4Life21]

i dunno im kind of back and forth with this one... jim def asked a dumb question but i don't think harbaugh reacted in the right manner... but why did he ask about Clarence Brooks of all people??? it should be Cam Cameron on the bubble not Brooks... put our Offense with another set of coaches in the league something tells me they perform better... i dunno why but how do you have so many weapons and so little results??? its proposterous

[BirdsofPrey]

I can see if Harbs may have been taken out of context, but it seems a bit hypocritical in a sense to me. On Monday he was also down on the offsense, just like us fans. The Stealer game was a huge letdown to everyone, but it was a culmination of several huge letdowns that all spell the same thing...bad offensive and bad playcalling. Look at the Pats, Falcons, and now the Stealers...all big offensive letdowns. I love this team, and I think we are built to win now and for years to come, but something is not right about that offense. Why it takes 12 games to see this is beyond me. Yes, we are 8-4, but honestly, who here can say that they did not expect 12-0 or 11-1 at this point? On paper this is the most stacked team in the NFL on both sides of the ball, but we aren't playing like it. I can understand Harbs backing his coaches in public, but he needs to be making the adjustments behind closed doors. I don't see any improvement from week to week, just the same old conservative offense. The window is very small for Ray Lewis and some of the veteran players to get another ring, we need to capitalize now. Sorry Harbs has to take some criticism on this one, but it's not only us fans this time, it's also the players. If this is what it takes to get this team on track and to gel as a complete unit, so be it. Show me something Harbs...blow the doors off the next couple of teams and walk into the playoffs with a chip on your shoulder.

[BelAirRavensFan1]

Cam may be atop the AFC North OC's, but were in it with the browns and bengals. Also, they rank the ravens as the 12th best offense. That's not bad but with the talent we have on offense (8 pro-bowlers) we should be at least top 25% (8th or higher)

[BleedingPurple52]

I going to have to agree with Harbs, if you dont like the team running the way it is go find a different team. we out classed the steelers all day and in the 4th quarter they made a game changing play... all there is to it.. the steelers got lucky, we were still the better team.. Cam isnt to blame, its mistakes made by our players on the field... you cant point blame to any one person, be it player or coach.. its just simple luck beat us... if we had the luck Joe would have thrown the ball and against that blitz someone would have been wide open.. and yeah we have the talent to score 35 points a game, and cam is calling the right plays to do that, its just the execution isnt where it needs to be, thats on the players not the coaching staff..

[KillaBirdTJ]

@BirdsofPrey; Yes! Right on point!! @Raven4Life; Well Said! We want to party and celebrate Raven Domination, Harbs show us Superbowl effort! We got your back man, just correct this stagnant, and conservative offensive play calling and even though they look to be calling a better game, Defense too!

GO RAVENS!!!!!!

[OrganizedChaos2052]

Lol, Cam Cameron sure has some tough competition here in the AFC North, with the Browns and Bengals and Bruce Arian (who's terrible).

[DeezBirdz]

So I watched Game Plan yesterday, and Cam in not so many words admitted his strategy in the later stages of the game was just to run out the clock. He said "and if we can't do that, then we need to figure out how to move the ball down the field."

Do I really need to point out what's wrong with this picture? Is it really any wonder why every week there's a hate fest on this clown?

Yeah, Caller Jim is more than a little confused... he attacked the wrong group of coaches.

[KillaBirdTJ]

@ BleedingPurple; You really think cam called the right plays to score 35 points in that Steeler game? When we passed deep we were 4/5... The Steelers secondary is very suspect but we went away to that same passing attack that worked for us in the first half and got conservative.

We shouldv'e been up at least 17-6 at that point, effectively putting the game out of reach... that "lucky" sack/strip of Flacco shouldn't have even effected the outcome of the game.

[crawforj]

Oh so James Harrison is the only guy who can target players? Any player with the ball is targeted so why can't he be? What he needs to do is stop whining.

Impose our will, stop taking what other teams give us.

It's either Cam or Flacco, the fans still don't know. Big Steve B knows and the fans will know by the changes that are made this upcoming offseason.

Our offense is average, I'm talking doesn't break 14th in the leage in any offensive ranking. No excuse for that, there just isn't.

How long are we supposed to wait for that "signature win?" Can't get it on National TV, at home, against our biggest rival, with more talent on the field (except at QB)... waiting...

[The Voice]

Dear Mr. Harbaugh,

Us fans are sorry for having high expectations this year for our beloved Ravens. For some odd reason we thought we were Super Bowl contenders this year since we have all these pro bowl players. We will back you even if we go 0-16 with this team. I guess we need more pro bowlers because its not your staff! We are happy with the one Super Bowl we won 10 years ago even though this team is just as good. We will continue to cheer you even if we lost to the Steelers 3 times like in 2008. Even if we put up 3 points against the Colts like last years playoffs. We will cheer for you sir even if history repeats itself. We will lower our expectations just for you! Cam you are doing your best with what you have. I mean maybe if we had better running backs and receivers it would be a bit easier.

Go Ravens!
Fans,

[KillaBirdTJ]

@ crawfoj; good to know everyone isn't just a blind fan, or too worried about being unpopular to voice their frustrations and concerns! This is not even close to what this group is capable of! Either Cam of Flacco or maybe both need to step up!

[Raven4Life21]

i can see why the us fans our upset because honestly... we made all these big moves and got these great players and we have actually gotten worse on offense AND defense... don't get me wrong... i love our defense still but it's definitely ranked lower than last year and our offense with all the money and additions we have is producing much lower numbers than last year... so in what way have we improved may i ask??? the only thing is that we have a little better record at this point than last year... so honestly.. i can see why the frustration has built up so much... we have done absolutely NOTHING with our playmakers... and i LOVE my Ravens.. but you start asking yourself who we should point fingers at... at this point... it's headed towards the coaching staff... i wish it wasn't headed anywhere honestly... but i believe this is why

[KillaBirdTJ]

@ The Voice; Harbaugh really needs to read these posts...

[Ravens Beast]

I think Harrison is just paranoid. He has the mentality that everyone is after him.