Ravens weaknesses

[callahan09]

Just one thing I believe the Ravens must clean up are the penalties! Right now, I'll say the offense particularly needs to clean it up and stop putting itself into a hold. This team actually averaged more than 10 yards to go on first downs this season (10.13 to be exact). We were third worst in the league in that particular area. Average in the NFL was 9.96 yards to go on first downs. Denver averaged 9.79 yards to go on first downs this season. Atlanta was best in the NFL with an average of 9.64 yards to go on first downs.

Not committing stupid penalties like false starts, holding, personal fouls, etc. will help us not have to go long right at the start of a set of downs.

[i]We had [b]27[/b] first downs where we had 11 or more to go this season (average of 16.93 to go on those 27 plays)[/i]. That's inexcusable. Worst in the NFL by 5 (Dallas had 22). Denver only had 12. Atlanta led in this category too (goes hand in hand with the previous); they only had 7.

It makes it a lot harder to sustain drives, build rhythm, gather momentum, and perform effectively on offense when you so frequently have to gain extra yardage for your next first down.

[Ravenseconbeast]

#1. Time of possession of the ball (offense)

#2. TACKLE.

#3. 3rd down pass protection

#4. DUMB PENALTIES.

[PeRK82]

[quote name='BMORE_96' timestamp='1357590474' post='1296992']
This has been discussed in other threads but it deserved its own thread. The ravens are not perfect and this is evident . What must improve? For starters, oher and whoever plays nose tackle.
[/quote]

Getting Rid of Oher would be a great improvement. Keeping J.Smith out of the Play offs greatly improves our Chances.

[PeRK82]

[quote name='Ravenseconbeast' timestamp='1357674184' post='1298385']

[/quote]

Number 1 should be taking advantage of the Missed oppor[quote name='pgk' timestamp='1357610754' post='1297516']
I love how people keep echoing the term 'soft zone' without really understanding what is being done within the scheme. Do you think that any DC in the league, albeit one with a track record of success, really goes into a season with a plan of running a 'soft zone' sceme?

Our sceme is based purely on the strengths / weaknesses / and capabilities of the players that we currently have to work with. If you know what you are looking at, you would realize that we actually run man coverage quite often. Most of the time, however, we actually run a hybrid sceme of both man and zone at the same time. Sometimes it is where one side of the field is in man and the other is zone, and other times it is where certain players are in zone and others are in man. The link below contains some insightful game commentary from the Indy game and shows a good example of how man and zone are being combined.

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NB4qo2qqrjE[/media]

Not enough credit is given to just how creative the schemes / game plans have been, especially over the second half of the season. This creativity and the scheme that some people have been knocking is what has kept the defense even remotely competitive despite all of the injuries, poor DL play, and the departure of key players from last season (JJ and Redding). With the personel that Pees currently has to work with we are not able to just line up and play man to man all game, we would get torched. We are also not able to get consistent pressure with our DL/OLB if we ask them to just win one on one battles. The success we have had over the second half of the season had been manufactured. We mix up coverages, we send blitzes from every position on the D, we constantly change up the front 7 looks, and create enough confusion for QB's to provide that little bit of extra time needed for our guys to get pressure.

Long story short, I agree that DL (NT in particular), and coverage abilities are currently (Defensive) weeknesses, but I strongly disagree that Pees' scheme is a weekness at this point.
[/quote]

Your right, the Zone is usually on the Weak side. i was loving it Sat. But this was the First game where we were actually pressing more. LOL, I can honestly say i was dumbfounded when i saw us pressing. lol, I had the biggest Smile watching. All i said was " FINALLY " And it worked pretty dam well.

[PeRK82]

[quote name='Cville-Raven' timestamp='1357607155' post='1297415']
Funny that you find Flacco to be our biggest problem and do not even acknowledge any other problems such pass pro, awful tackling, and Ray Rice's mistakes.
[/quote]

Agreed and that pic is actually when he Threw that Pick 6 against the BRONCOs. I was impressed that Flacco caught up to him (Flacco is FAST). Also he would have actually stopped him had it not been for i think another DB that got nudge on him 15 -20yds prior to the other DB going into the endzone

[izvoodoo]

Ray Rice fumbling and failing to break tackles should be on there. He's worn down over the season.

[marylandmike12]

[quote name='rlh445' timestamp='1357592543' post='1297057']
Haven't you heard? Everything.
[/quote]Not Justin Tucker. He hasn't missed 5 FG yet. How could I forget not LLLLEEEEAAAACCCCHHHHH

[52liveforever]

by far the weakest position on this team is DT. kemo and cody are terrible.

[The Raven]

Oher has been suspect lately, but some people act like he's Oniel Cousins. He's really not that terrible...

[Militant X 1]

how many times are we going to keep going over these same old topics that pick the Ravens apart week after week and yet, they are still balling.....they are in the divisional round on saturday and they are 1 of the remaining 8 teams (of 32) left standing in the playoffs and still contending for the Superbowl? and yet, we want to keep rippin'em a new one? c'mon now! smh!

~Mili