[News] The Breakdown: Eisenberg's Five Thoughts vs. Browns

[mhabeeb]

great defensive coordinators work with the players they have and develop schemes that put pressure on a QB, limit wide receivers and tight ends, etc. can't put all the blame on the players. look at rex ryan and the bills, jets. pees needs to go, period. having said that, our secondary also needs an overhaul.

[Puntit]

1. Don't bother firing Pees. Its only partly 20% on him, and 80% on lack of execution. we can replace him in the offseason but frankly he's not the reason our secondary is playing like they don't care and are just happy to get paid to play a game. Attitude change is what's needed.

2. Right now we are playing bad enough to get the first pick in next years draft, so maybe we don't want to change anything. I'm not so sure the Jags or SF are going look any different than Cleveland against us.

3. If we aren't going to be able to keep both KO and Yanda next year, maybe we should trade one to a contender as we get close to the trading deadline. Same with Steve Smith Sr actually -- let's get him that ring. We are in a rebuilding year and more draft picks Ozzie can package abd move up in the mid rounds might be huge. We will be rebuilding out defense big time this draft. the bright side -- we have some good young offensive linemen, tight ends, Flacco, Mosley, William, Davis, Jimmy Smith and hopefully Tucker to build around. That's a good core. Upgrade a few rookies around them and we can be in business.

[Puntit]

@crusader - we let Pollard go because he reportedly challenged the coaching staff, not because he was vocal. Plus he was too slow to cover speedy WRs and with the league fining the heck out if certain types of hits he was becoming a liability. Ray Lewis, Steve Smith are the kind of fired up vocal types the team has never had much of a problem with. I recall them trying to get guys like Ngata and Canty (and Flacco) to become more vocal leaders, to no avail.

[law215]

The biggest problem is the defense. I read a few post where fans mention a silver lining of having higher draft picks if Ravens continue to lose. Other fans believe firing Pees would help. The solution may be to have both. My concern is there are too many 1-3 round draft picks on that defense to play like they have over the past few years. So would a higher draft position help if OZ is missing on talent. If I watched them without knowing where they were drafted Jimmy looks like a flat footed CB, Elam played like an undrafted guy, none of the LBs can cover which I believe should be a requirement in the first 2 rounds unless they are a beast pass rusher, Upshaw is only good for run defense, Jernigan doesn't consistently push the pocket and is often injured. Drafting defense use to be a strength, what fans could count on. Ravens FO need to revamp their scouting department, make better personnel decisions, get proven coordinator. You can't next man up with coordinators and position coaches. The out of position and stupid penalties every week means they are not listening to the coaches. Bring in new blood.

[Barry S]

My one thought is, how in the hell do you have the ball at the 9 yard line first and goal, at the end of the game at home with plenty of time on the clock and settle for a field goal. People say the offense did enough to win, I don't understand!!!!!!!! Both offense and defense need a overhaul.

[UnitasWeStand19]

My God im so sick of everyone putting this on Pees. THE NFL IS ABOUT MATCHUPS! Its about beating the man lined up accross from you and the Ravens dont win enough of their one on one matchups. I love how people think someone else is going to come in with a magic wand and just because they run a different scheme, the Ravens poor talent will suddenly be able to function like pro-bowlers. The NFL is such a copycat league that most teams make similar calls just from different schemes. Its about the players. Is Dean Pees out there missing tackles looking like Pop Warner children? Is Dean Pees the one who can't play the ball in the air? Is Dean Pees the one that's so afraid of getting beat deep that they're playing 10-15 yards "off coverage" (by the way - that's on the individual player 9 times out of 10 player weather he wants to play off or tight)? Is Dean Pees the one with such fragile confidence and psyche that impending doom sets in in the 4th quarter and the players don't exhibit the ability to effectively play the game anymore? No, that's all on the players. I want to know at what point of witnessing some of the worst defensive football this organization has ever seen will fans finally start assigning blame where it belongs - on the players. Isn't funny how terrible of a defensive Coordinator Marvin Lewis was in 1996 when the Ravens defensive cupboard was completely bare. Yet after years of drafting future pro-bowlers, all-pros & hall of famers, he presided over one of the best defense's of all time. Did Marvin really become THAT much better of a coordinator or did the team just have way more talent and better players? Yes Marvin is a really good coach but it was the players who made the real difference. The Ravens need to acquire more talent. Then this defense will start playing better. They don't have nearly enough talented players to play the kind of dominant defense we've come to expect here in Baltimore. Unfortunately the only fix is to sit and be patient, watch bad football from our Ravens and wait for them to weave some new magic as they will have a better chance to restock the shelves now that their draft position will improve. And it prob cant ALL be accomplished in one draft. Its prob going to take 2 or 3 drafts. That's just the way the NFL works and i still believe we have one the best in the business in Ozzie. They had a great run, appreciate all the great football we were able to witness over the last 7 years since Harbaugh and Joe came in and the last 15 years overall with Ray & Ed. But now is the time to be patient and give our top notch front office the time it takes to rebuild...

[law215]

My one thought is, how in the hell do you have the ball at the 9 yard line first and goal, at the end of the game at home with plenty of time on the clock and settle for a field goal. People say the offense did enough to win, I don't understand!!!!!!!! Both offense and defense need a overhaul.

If the offense had scored a touchdown, what makes you believe Cleveland would not have marched down the field again? At some point, the defense needs to get stops in the 4th quarter. Even Harbs says they haven't done that in years.

[WNC-Raven]

I think Harbs is one of the better coaches in the league but we may be about to find out if he has been a product of our system and of our players. Just look at how many DC's became head coaches as a direct result of Ray Lewis and Ed Reed. Of course Suggs and Ngata too but Ed and Ray have made many a DC look better then they were. Is Harbs on that list too?

[Ravens Raver]

On the bright side, the Super Bowl rematch next week has a whole new excitement...which of these two suddenly crappy ex-contenders will prove to be the biggest loser?

[sofgman]

Things Raven need to do right away :

1/ Fire Dean Pees.

2/ Get rid off Jason Babin

3/ Restructured Contract For Joe Flacco

4/ Tell Ozzie Newsome stop running arround to collect trash.

5/ Give John Harbaugh just one more year to improve.

6/ Try to reach record 1-15 so Raven can get some benefits next season

7/ And finally fans should stop showing at stadium so the front office can feel something.

[WNC-Raven]

My God im so sick of everyone putting this on Pees. THE NFL IS ABOUT MATCHUPS! Its about beating the man lined up accross from you and the Ravens dont win enough of their one on one matchups. I love how people think someone else is going to come in with a magic wand and just because they run a different scheme, the Ravens poor talent will suddenly be able to function like pro-bowlers. The NFL is such a copycat league that most teams make similar calls just from different schemes. Its about the players. Is Dean Pees out there missing tackles looking like Pop Warner children? Is Dean Pees the one who can't play the ball in the air? Is Dean Pees the one that's so afraid of getting beat deep that they're playing 10-15 yards "off coverage" (by the way - that's on the individual player 9 times out of 10 player weather he wants to play off or tight)? Is Dean Pees the one with such fragile confidence and psyche that impending doom sets in in the 4th quarter and the players don't exhibit the ability to effectively play the game anymore? No, that's all on the players. I want to know at what point of witnessing some of the worst defensive football this organization has ever seen will fans finally start assigning blame where it belongs - on the players. Isn't funny how terrible of a defensive Coordinator Marvin Lewis was in 1996 when the Ravens defensive cupboard was completely bare. Yet after years of drafting future pro-bowlers, all-pros & hall of famers, he presided over one of the best defense's of all time. Did Marvin really become THAT much better of a coordinator or did the team just have way more talent and better players? Yes Marvin is a really good coach but it was the players who made the real difference. The Ravens need to acquire more talent. Then this defense will start playing better. They don't have nearly enough talented players to play the kind of dominant defense we've come to expect here in Baltimore. Unfortunately the only fix is to sit and be patient, watch bad football from our Ravens and wait for them to weave some new magic as they will have a better chance to restock the shelves now that their draft position will improve. And it prob cant ALL be accomplished in one draft. Its prob going to take 2 or 3 drafts. That's just the way the NFL works and i still believe we have one the best in the business in Ozzie. They had a great run, appreciate all the great football we were able to witness over the last 7 years since Harbaugh and Joe came in and the last 15 years overall with Ray & Ed. But now is the time to be patient and give our top notch front office the time it takes to rebuild...

The answer to all of your questions is YES. YES it is the coaches/coordinators job to teach the players how to do all of the things you listed. What do you think they do there? And YES a coordinator does have the power to plan a good scheme to make up for the vaunerbailities his players may have. You can see an example of it every year in this league. Rex, Pagano, ect..

[Drew P]

i am so sick of the "fire pees" brigade.

none of you guys make any sense. Its not Pees' fault our defense plays like trash.

you make all this noise about how the play calling is supposely bad, yet i doubt you can even identify any of the plays the defense has run all year, even if only by concept.

you wanna know why you cant find a "weak link" on the defense? 2 reasons:

1) when a defense plays bad, it is NEVER a single players fault...so that reasoning combined with the idea that a top tier defense somehow stays top tier after you rip all the stars out of it, was flawed from the start.

2) the whole thing is lack luster.

Albert McClellan belongs no where but on special teams, Zadarius Smith is a rookie. Carl Davis is a rookie. Kyle Arrignton has never been that great. None of us even really knows what a Will Davis is. Webb just aint the same cat after tearing every ACL in a 50 mile radius. Babin is old and pointless, still dont know why he's even here. Lawrence Guy is a carer back up.

We have Mosley, Brandon Williams, Jimmy Smith, and Will Hill. That's really about it. The rest is just trying to keep its head above water.

 

I agree about Babin he's useless but Guy, besides the penalty, is a better option than Canty. Hill has done zero to this point. Mosley was awful yesterday the Browns targeted him multiple times and won that contest convincingly

[bioLarzen]

Bio...  while I would agree...  with the injured players on the field, we definitely ARE a playoff team.    Just sayin!

 

Maybe we would be. Maybe we still wouldn't - no way of knowing either way.

 

I still suspect if we had all the players we don't due to injury, the problems would still exist: no quality depth, for example. And a good franchise MUST plan and prepare for tough losses due to injury - seems we haven't.

[UnitasWeStand19]

The point i was making was that the DC cant play the game for the players. At some point the players have to make plays and we dont have the personel. How do you place all the ridiculous missed tackles on the DC? I mean there has to be a point where the rubber meets the road where the player has to be accountable. There is only so much the DC & position coaches can do. Do you really think that these guys arent trying to coach these guys up? Of course they are. The problem is the players suck and until they improve their personel, these are going to be the results. Its about the Jimmy's and the Joe's not the X's & the O's. They dont have the talent, period.

[The Mom Gene]

The point i was making was that the DC cant play the game for the players. At some point the players have to make plays and we dont have the personel. How do you place all the ridiculous missed tackles on the DC? I mean there has to be a point where the rubber meets the road where the player has to be accountable. There is only so much the DC & position coaches can do. Do you really think that these guys arent trying to coach these guys up? Of course they are. The problem is the players suck and until they improve their personel, these are going to be the results. Its about the Jimmy's and the Joe's not the X's & the O's. They dont have the talent, period.

And what is really sad is that the guys like the Jimmy's and the Joe's and the C.J.'s etc...  They are good, and they play their hearts out...  to no avail.

 

I liked Cobrajet's idea of allowing some of the young guys play now.  Spend this time building them into what they "can be".  Like your Art, and Givens, and some of the new guys...  get them to where they need to be...  Who the heck knows, maybe we'll win a game or two.

[Puntit]

Putting the blame on Pees is wishful thinking -- one move and you can fix the organization. Unfortunately he's just a symbol people can rally against. Wed all love it to be a single move quick fix, but I don't think that's reflective of what we saw on the field which was mostly failure of execution. Poor tackling, lax coverage, inability to beat your man. None of this is on Pees -- the guys weren't executing. This wasn't a case of an AJ Green or Megatron beating them, or a Tom Brady or Aaron Rogers making pinpoint precision throws. This was a journeyman QB throwing to guys like Benjamin, Hawkins and Bainbridge were beating our secondary consistently. McCown threw for 457 yards, dwarfing franchise records set by Bernie Kosar. Could Pees have schemed differently, and sent out different coverage packages and in retrospect limited the guy to, say 350 yards? Maybe. But bad execution is what killed us all day. Bad tackling, giving players too much room to make plays and an inability to pressure the QB even on blitz packages.

All you accomplish by firing Pees is giving us someone else to complain about for the rest of the season, I'd probably keep him, and let him go at the end of the season, when we earn that top draft choice. And use the rest of the season to get some snaps to our less experienced players, and see who actually wants to be here next year.

[bozo]

yes the ravens season is over, no way they go 9-2 over the next 11 games, really start looking at players now to set it up for next season. anyone who thinks they have a shot are really naïve. 9-7 mostly likely won't get u in unless u win your division with a 9-7 and with cincy playin the way they r no way.

[budkretz]

The Ravens defense has no identity, looks lost and has no leader. It's been that way since Pees took over as DC. We don't win the Super Bowl without Ray Lewis and Ed Reed. In the past during the last drive by Cleveland the Ravens would have been clawing for the ball forcing a turnover. Again the Ravens D plays too soft - trying not to lose rather than take control! We need a jolt, something to rally for. Pees will not do it! If he stays for the remainder of the year the Ravens will be lucky to be 8-8. If Jim Schwartz is available bring him in now!!! He's been with the Ravens, lives/was from Arbutus, knows defense and within a couple weeks you'll see the team playing like they care. It sometimes seems the players are just happy to be on a pro squad earning at least 1/2 million. The offense has put 30 points on the bard twice and we've lost both games. Not acceptable and someone has to pay.

[MadStorkSociety]

Bio...  while I would agree...  with the injured players on the field, we definitely ARE a playoff team.    Just sayin!

 

With the injured players on the field on the offensive side, we would be be better. In spite of injuries the offense has held up its end. But injuries does not explain our defense. The defense has not made adjustments. The same players make the same mistakes. The penalties continue to add up. Something way wrong with that defense.

[The Mom Gene]

With the injured players on the field on the offensive side, we would be be better. In spite of injuries the offense has held up its end. But injuries does not explain our defense. The defense has not made adjustments. The same players make the same mistakes. The penalties continue to add up. Something way wrong with that defense.

 

Oh absolutely...  It's past time to make some changes.

[82coltintern]

The problem with this team is an organizational breakdown that starts at the top. This team lives and dies by the draft. We don't sign top tier free agents to fill holes nor do we sign our own free agents if they demand top money. That's not a problem if you draft well ever year or at least most years. Unfortunately we have not. Players entering their 4th, 5th, or 6th years are considered in the prime of their careers. This is the current problem with this team. Go back and look at our draft picks from 2009 to 2012 and you'll find the only players currently on the active roster are:

2009- Lardarius Webb

2010- NONE

2011-Jimmy Smith

2012-Courtney Upshaw

Kelechi Osemele

Asa Jackson

That's five players and I don't think any are Pro Bowl worthy at this time. Our current roster is filled with young Players who have not had time to reach their full potential, and a lot of mid to lower tier free agents along with a few players nearing the end of their careers. This situation leads you to a 1 and 4 Start to the 2015 season.

[Jon Saboe]

Article neglects to mention the interception that was called back because of a stupid, blatant, no-excuse, "roughing the passer" penalty.

[Drew P]

Leonard Fournette will look great in Purp next year!

 

He isnt eligible. Laquan Treadwell now..

[BallSoHard_University]

Actually what we'll end up doing is trading back in the draft, and probably get another DL because we draft "BPA" and then in 3-4 years decide not to pay the guy and go back to square 1 again

[ellicottraven]

If the Browns can come to M&T and beat us, we aren't safe against any other NFL team. Now, it is only luck that can get us wins, not talent or coaching. We are truly one of the worst teams in NFL. How a few weeks can change even an ardent fan's perception of his own team...

[ASwanson]

So . . . When's the Draft?

[riseNConquer81]

I agree about Babin he's useless but Guy, besides the penalty, is a better option than Canty. Hill has done zero to this point. Mosley was awful yesterday the Browns targeted him multiple times and won that contest convincingly

he is, but neiter Guy or Canty were top tier talent in the first place. Nobody's scared of them. 

Mosley is second year, Barnidge has had 7 to figure it out and something has apparently clicked with him recently. that's whatever. anyway, the lack of pass rush doesnt help that at all, and playing zone against an entire corps of Wes Welker clones is hardly a better idea. not much you can do. 

[riseNConquer81]

With the injured players on the field on the offensive side, we would be be better. In spite of injuries the offense has held up its end. But injuries does not explain our defense. The defense has not made adjustments. The same players make the same mistakes. The penalties continue to add up. Something way wrong with that defense.

you're giving them way too much credit. 

We drew the last ranked pass defense, last ranked run defense, and the steelers with no roethlisberger or Suisham. The offense hasnt held up its end so much as its just gotten lucky they ran into people that actually suck worse than they do somehow. 

[ellicottraven]

How did you come up with 5 thoughts Eisenberg? I could only think of one - how terrible we are as a whole unit - offense, defense, special teams and coaching.

[btfan2]

I read all these posts and you can feel the underlying hurt. I believe part of the problem is many fans believe the garbage the purple Kool-Aid machine spews. This was not a good team last year and it is not a good team this year.

If you were paying attention you could see the gradual demise of a good organization. Way to many bad, very bad decisions from the front office. A mediocre head coach floating on the strength of the organization and it's great players and leaders. A head coach that worked very hard to get rid of anyone who questions his questionable coaching. Remove the fire breathers and he would have a nice disciplined bunch of gentlemen. Except there is no heart, no fire, fight Hold on give me a sec while I hurl

there are to many problems to get a quick fix by firing Pee's. Yes Pee's is a problem but; firing him right now is not the answer. Making multiple changes without considering there impact is one of the biggest reasons we're coming apart at the seams

management got cocky and started to live and breathe the garbage in their press releases. Surprise they were wrong

It's time to face the truth and start to systematically fix things, so next year we are turning it around. Also pray that the Steelers, Cinci and the Dawgs have a serious losing streak. There are a lot of positive possibilities to look for this season. OH ps winning the super bowl isn't one of them...