[News] Joe Flacco Defends Play Calling On Last Drive

[BR News]

The Ravens ran down the clock on the final possession instead of trying for a first down.

View the full article

[The Greek]

patriots would have not taken the foot off of the gas on that drive. offense did not score in the 1st and 3rd qtr.. too inconsistent.

[johnmike72]

Ryan Mink was just on MASN doing a phone call interview with Rob Long, all I can say is, SOUR GRAPES. it`s OK Ryan, you won`t get fired for saying the obvious, the Ravens are not a good team.

[FlocksGottaFeed]

Melt the clock. That type of mind-set rarely gets it done.

[Purple Dawg 96]

Now they run!Smh this is what they should have done against the pats instead of that very very very bad pass! "Situational Football" is way off in Bmore!

[riseNConquer81]

we dont have nearly enough receiver talent to milk a clock with an aerial attack, no sane person should be questioning anything that happened on that drive.

[KidNme]

No problem with "what" they played, just how they played it.

[alexbayrobin]

Joe has always been cool. Nothing seemed to bother him. I think that is changing he's still Joe cool but all these games that could have been won but weren't seem to be getting to him. He just needs to win a few of these games.

[ravs4me]

When your defense is giving up late game-winning drives, and your offense is moving the football, why stop? You get a chance to win the game, then win the darn game! Stop playing around. That's why you lose games and we will continue to lose games when we lose our aggressiveness.

[GangofRavens]

You play. To win. The game.

Herm Edwards

[GangofRavens]

In case you can't decipher my message, I'm saying the Ravens should have been more aggressive on offense on that series. When are we going to learn that turning it over to the defense is dangerous.

[Flamengo1265]

When the Ravens play prevent defense.....it doesn't work. When they play prevent offense..... it doesn't work either. So let's play aggressive and see what happens.

[Barry S]

One more first down would have been all that was needed, throw to the tightends he's got three big studs or the fullback Kyle Juszczyk. They could have made it if they wanted it bad enough!!

[bmoraven]

Run time off ONLY when your up by 8 points, if not, play for the first down and eliminate the doubt.

[jravens13]

You can't put it in the refs/or our defense's hands. We knew that was a possibility if we didn't throw the ball for a 1st down. Play to win, instead of playing not to lose. MAJOR changes should be made to this team. Get more guys with guts.

[llxxGrimxxll]

i think one of the "major changes" is getting a QB that's good in the first 16 games so flacco can do his thing in the post-season.. you know.. the only time he is actually good.

[WordProphet]

This game is about wins and loses we are now 2-7 how do we get out of this rut???

[Zeus]

We have a high draft pick comb to us, that's the good news.mthe bad news is that Oz will find a way to trade it away or pick a player that will for sure be a bust

[Zeus]

Hey Harbs, still believe we can win out?

Edited November 17, 2015 by Zeus

[Crusader]

Two years from now Ravens could dominate AFC if they play there cards right but Ozzie has lost it and John is dillusional.

[ravenstime]

I think Flacco means, 'When you lose like that, it's EASY to question what we did.'

Anyways, I know, now, that we should have done it differently. Some of these guys are taking the company line and not being controversial, which I understans, but they say hind-sight is 20.20. Well, if you use his logic, then we're no better off even in hind-sight. We're not going to change or learn anything if you don't admit it was the wrong choice to not go all out for a 1st down. The only time I want to be in the use the clock mode is when we're in the Victory Formation and running ALL of the clock out to end the game.

We lost, so, that means to me, we should have went for another Touchdown at the end to win. We were afraid to win and were playing not to lose. In my opinion that cost us the game the most; it shouldn't have been in Jax.'s hands to get the win. We need to be aggressive all-the-way into the Victory Formation next time, period.

[RaRaRavens]

OC is a joke. If we have the same personnel but no running game compared to last season, the problem is OC.

[LCB22]

Sorry Joe! You don't pass for 4 yards when you need 7!

[DBsRAVENS]

we dont have nearly enough receiver talent to milk a clock with an aerial attack, no sane person should be questioning anything that happened on that drive.

We have three TEs though! And playing not to loose instead of playing to win is a disaster every time.  

[DBsRAVENS]

If that is Flacco's mind set for closing out a game...help the Ravens! This team is soft from the Head Coach to the Coordinators to the Quarterback! SMH!

[callahan09]

Sorry Joe! You don't pass for 4 yards when you need 7!

Quarterbacks do it *regularly* in the NFL. Last night Andy Dalton threw a 3 yard pass to Giovani Bernard on 3rd and 10, and he got some good blocking and made a shifty move and made guys miss their tackles and wound up taking it 14 yards. The bread & butter of today's NFL offenses across the league are short, high percentage completions and yards after the catch.  The problem is that those plays don't seem to be working for the Ravens this year.  Our guys aren't shifty enough, tough enough, or fast enough to make guys miss tackles, and the playmakers aren't good enough at blocking either.  So in that sense, perhaps I agree with you haha.  We keep trying to do what other NFL teams are succeeding at with the short field and backfield stuff and trying to get yards after the catch, but it's quote clear that we don't have the horses to run those plays, they just aren't getting it done.  So maybe we do need to move away from that stuff as long as it is consistently failing to get us YAC.

[Bob21043]

Use the TEs - they were ballin' all game. Gilmore could have dragged defenders for 4 extra yards. All we needed was a FG to seal the game; knew we were in trouble when we had to turn it over. Each week it's a game to see how we can creatively lose the game again. Dropped INT and a facemask in the last drive to end the game to allow the winning FG is a new one.

[Puddinhead]

Hey Joe: How about not holding the ball like a loaf of bread and giving other team (Jaguars) the gift ! Do you think you could try holding onto the ball Joe when pocket closes ? Maybe fall down like Dalton does ? When you say the Ravens are not that good, your not that good too Joe; you make over 10mill and you cannot just fall down (and hold onto the freaking ball).

[riseNConquer81]

We have three TEs though! And playing not to loose instead of playing to win is a disaster every time.

when i said "receivers," i meant ANYbody that catches a ball, including tight ends.

They have posluszny and tevon Smith, what's your point?

Tight ends arent that hard to cover, thats why there arent that many of them on the field to begin with. you cant run an offense with all TEs.

and can we please stop with all the cliche jock platitudes that NEVER made any sesne? why do people insist on talking like this? its ridiculous.

playing not to lose and playing to win are the same thing.

there's only two options here: win or lose. Not losing necessarily means that you win. There's a tie in the NFL once every other blue moon and that is STILL better than losing anyway, so can we just not skip down that road?

burning the clock when you have a lead at the end of the game is common sense that actually works pretty well most of the time, which is why EVERY team in the league does it. Throwing the ball despite the fact that the receivers are the weakest part of your team, stopping the clock, and giving the other team time to beat you is a disaster every time.

Edited November 18, 2015 by riseNConquer81