Predicting the rankings in our division

[BmoreBird22]

1 hour ago, Ravens4Real said:

Didn't the Bengals lose Dalton and the Steelers lose Bell and Big Ben? And they still made the playoffs? The injury excuse can only get a team so far. And before you bring up all the other injuries we had, every team has a ton of injuries. It's the NFL. And by the time Flacco went out for the year, our season was already in the tubes.

I believe the Ravens set the record for most players on IR and had, by far, the most cap tied up to IR, so every team may deal with them, but this was historic.

[Ravens4Real]

23 minutes ago, BmoreBird22 said:

I believe the Ravens set the record for most players on IR and had, by far, the most cap tied up to IR, so every team may deal with them, but this was historic.

Yes, the Ravens did set a record for players being on IR. But I will go out on a limb and say most of them were after our season turned into a dumpster fire. And then add on the amount that happened towards the end of the year because we had nothing to play for. Even the littlest of injuries sent some of our guys to the IR.

[ludy51]

1 hour ago, Ravens4Real said:

Didn't the Bengals lose Dalton and the Steelers lose Bell and Big Ben? And they still made the playoffs? The injury excuse can only get a team so far. And before you bring up all the other injuries we had, every team has a ton of injuries. It's the NFL. And by the time Flacco went out for the year, our season was already in the tubes.

Pretty sure the Bengals were already a lock for the playoffs when Dalton went down

[BOLDnPurPnBlacK]

4 hours ago, Ravens4Real said:

I feel like I'm arguing with two children. Where/when have I made my argument out to be a Steelers against Ravens??

I don't know why you continuously bring up all the Ravens are coming back like I have said that the Ravens can't hold the Steelers jockstrap. The argument is me simply stating that the Steelers still have a shot at the playoffs. You are writing them off like the won't win a game. 

Our problem, well recently, has not been with beating the Steelers. It has been with beating the rest of the NFL. We could sweep the Steelers every year and go 2-14. 

And yes, adding all of that POTENTIAL is nice. But every single team has just as many guys that have that POTENTIAL. I'm sorry I'm not anointing this team as Super Bowl champions. I know you and JoeyFLEX will sleep better tonight.

This whole conversation is about divisional rankings. right? Are you comprehending?

You said we were Purple Shade wearing homers for stating our opinion that the Ravens have a better roster than the Steelers. Youre stating it as if its fact. We're offering the returns of players and other additions as evidence that, the team that beat the Steelers twice last year is going to be vastly improved, while the Steelers havent done much to improve other than what every team does by drafting rookies... and have in fact lost several key pieces.

I dont think either of us have disputed that the Steelers will be in playoff contention. Theyll be a pretty good team. We're refuting the notion that theyre this explosive offense thats going to take the league by storm and mask all their deficiencies on defense.

 

You keep coming back to reading comprehension and calling us children... pretty funny considering in your post to @JoeyFlex5 you said something along the lines of... i dont get why you keep stating that im putting the steelers in the SB when ive never said that.... when in the post you were quoting he actually stated, im not saying youre claiming the steelers to be SB champs, but you seem to be going along with the national narrative that theyre a powerhouse.

Yea, but we can't comprehend.

 

If youre going to call someone a Purple Shades wearing homer for saying the Ravens will be better than the Steelers, then yes - you are contributing to making a Steelers vs Ravens conversation. 

Btw, pass rusher with the most upside means.... while he may not have been the most productive last year, hes the most talented edge rusher thats still ascending. Harrison might have been better last year, but hes declining and might not have much left and probably cant be that go to guy for much longer if at all. So losing the guy whos expected to pick up that slack is kind of a big deal.

We have to define upside... but our comprehension is lacking?

And, just so we're clear.... DT's are not edge rushers. They can pass rush, but Joey has specified edge rusher the whole time. Unless your DT is Aaron Donald, if youre banking on him to be your premier pass rusher, your pass rush is going to be lacking severely. Bootlegs and rollouts all day can negate that effect completely.

 

The point is... (the point of the thread... so what we're discussing. if youre not discussing the ravens in comparison to the steelers and cinci - well i dont know what you thought this thread was about) neither the Steelers or Cinci were all that much better than us last year. Record wise, yea. But a couple plays here and there flips more than half our losses. Head to head we swept the steelers. We played Cinci very close with nobodies. And is it very reasonable, whether you agree or not, that players like SSS, Flacco, Forsett, Suggs, Doom, Stanley, Dixon, West, Perriman, Moore, Wallace, Pitta, Weddle, Powers, Judon, Levine, Young, etc... could maybe make a few more plays than last years squad?? 

But you have to be wearing Purple Shades if you provide sound reasoning as to why the Ravens will be better than the Steelers and Bengals?

 

And at least provide reasoning as to why you think the Steelers will be improved. I dont think either of us have refuted they wont be a good team. Just that theyll be stagnant or decline a bit.

Reasoning - who's offsetting the loss of Bryant? Who's supplementing their pass rush? Who is going to improve the secondary drastically? What's going to offset the loss of Bell for the 1st 3 games? Who have they brought in thats a better tackle than Beachum? What improvements were made anywhere that offsets the blatantly obvious losses other than maybe TE Green, who hasnt been able to stay on the field?

For Cinci, who's offsetting the losses of Marvin Jones and Sanu? Who's picking up Eifert's slack til hes back? What suggests Dalton will play anywhere near the level he did last year without Hue, and 2 of his top 5 targets? What's offsetting the losses in the secondary? What young playmakers are expected to step up? Who's stepping up at RT? Can the D maintain its level without Burfict to start the season? Is the new OC anywhere near the wizard that Hue was? And if not, whats offsetting that loss?

 

And who for either squad is going to provide the positive impact that the return of Flacco brings? The return of SSS? Suggs? Perriman? Pitta? A healthy Jimmy? The arrivals of Wallace and Weddle? What draft pick for either looks anywhere near as good as Stanley? 

What losses have we suffered from last years squad that suggest we'll be weaker anywhere than we were last year?

Ok, so i hope this illustrates the point. Our ?'s are can really great players return to 85% of their previous form. Sure its a question, but a lot more dependable than wondering if a rookie with no track record can provide the same production as established, key veterans our division rivals have lost. And neither has a player returning from injury or a FA addition that would rank even in our Top 10.

You dont have to agree - but its legitimate enough reason to believe we leap frog them.

[BOLDnPurPnBlacK]

4 hours ago, Ravens4Real said:

Yes, the Ravens did set a record for players being on IR. But I will go out on a limb and say most of them were after our season turned into a dumpster fire. And then add on the amount that happened towards the end of the year because we had nothing to play for. Even the littlest of injuries sent some of our guys to the IR.

We were beating the SB Champs before Suggs went down. When a young D loses its leader, its swagger and arguably most productive player thats tough to over come. They werent prepared to overcome that loss. The pass rush suffered a horrible domino effect, which made all subsequent players less effective and made an underwhelming secondary worse. Which then forced a 1st year OC running an offense not his to play come from behind, one dimensional football that didnt suit our strengths especially since we had no explosive deep threat.

We then went on to lose more and more important playmakers almost every week from then on. Yet, the team got better as the season wore on. The defense was always going to have to stabilize the team early in the season as Flacco and O learned Trestman, and Trestman learned them and Kubes offense/players strengths. that went out the window after 2 1/2 quarters of football, where the plan was working against the best team in the NFL.

And as pointed out Dalton only missed a couple games at the end. They were already a lock. Ben missed a few games, mid season with plenty of time left to recover and save the season. Bell missed the playoffs.... and they lost. The Steelers struggled without Ben, and early/late without Bell. Fortunately for them their guys werent lost for the season and were able to recover, or withstand the brunt to sneak in to the playoffs.

And it only serves my point more. When Dalton was there the Bengals did enough in 12-14 games to be playoff locks. A couple games wihtout him and they couldnt keep it going.

Without Ben the Steelers are nothing, when he returned they once again became a playoff contender.

 

We're not only getting our equivalent to returning Dalton or Ben with Flacco.... we're returning about 10 other of our most talented, veteran leaders... which logically should return us to -------- you guessed it ----- playoff contention. Right where we were before the losses started. 

Edited September 8, 2016 by BOLDnPurPnBlacK

[Rav'n Maniac]

41 minutes ago, BOLDnPurPnBlacK said:

We were beating the SB Champs before Suggs went down. When a young D loses its leader, its swagger and arguably most productive player thats tough to over come. They werent prepared to overcome that loss. The pass rush suffered a horrible domino effect, which made all subsequent players less effective and made an underwhelming secondary worse. Which then forced a 1st year OC running an offense not his to play come from behind, one dimensional football that didnt suit our strengths especially since we had no explosive deep threat.

We then went on to lose more and more important playmakers almost every week from then on. Yet, the team got better as the season wore on. The defense was always going to have to stabilize the team early in the season as Flacco and O learned Trestman, and Trestman learned them and Kubes offense/players strengths. that went out the window after 2 1/2 quarters of football, where the plan was working against the best team in the NFL.

And as pointed out Dalton only missed a couple games at the end. They were already a lock. Ben missed a few games, mid season with plenty of time left to recover and save the season. Bell missed the playoffs.... and they lost. The Steelers struggled without Ben, and early/late without Bell. Fortunately for them their guys werent lost for the season and were able to recover, or withstand the brunt to sneak in to the playoffs.

And it only serves my point more. When Dalton was there the Bengals did enough in 12-14 games to be playoff locks. A couple games wihtout him and they couldnt keep it going.

Without Ben the Steelers are nothing, when he returned they once again became a playoff contender.

 

We're not only getting our equivalent to returning Dalton or Ben with Flacco.... we're returning about 10 other of our most talented, veteran leaders... which logically should return us to -------- you guessed it ----- playoff contention. Right where we were before the losses started. 

Man... do you realize you took up 1.5 pages of this thread just today, lol. Kidding aside, we all should be wearing purple shades this time of year. Just some need to clean theirs to see a little clearer.

[Ravens4Real]

2 hours ago, BOLDnPurPnBlacK said:

We were beating the SB Champs before Suggs went down. When a young D loses its leader, its swagger and arguably most productive player thats tough to over come. They werent prepared to overcome that loss. The pass rush suffered a horrible domino effect, which made all subsequent players less effective and made an underwhelming secondary worse. Which then forced a 1st year OC running an offense not his to play come from behind, one dimensional football that didnt suit our strengths especially since we had no explosive deep threat.

We then went on to lose more and more important playmakers almost every week from then on. Yet, the team got better as the season wore on. The defense was always going to have to stabilize the team early in the season as Flacco and O learned Trestman, and Trestman learned them and Kubes offense/players strengths. that went out the window after 2 1/2 quarters of football, where the plan was working against the best team in the NFL.

And as pointed out Dalton only missed a couple games at the end. They were already a lock. Ben missed a few games, mid season with plenty of time left to recover and save the season. Bell missed the playoffs.... and they lost. The Steelers struggled without Ben, and early/late without Bell. Fortunately for them their guys werent lost for the season and were able to recover, or withstand the brunt to sneak in to the playoffs.

And it only serves my point more. When Dalton was there the Bengals did enough in 12-14 games to be playoff locks. A couple games wihtout him and they couldnt keep it going.

Without Ben the Steelers are nothing, when he returned they once again became a playoff contender.

 

We're not only getting our equivalent to returning Dalton or Ben with Flacco.... we're returning about 10 other of our most talented, veteran leaders... which logically should return us to -------- you guessed it ----- playoff contention. Right where we were before the losses started. 

Yes, they only lost their QB's for a couple games. But they bother were able to go 2-2 without them there. With Flacco, we were 3-7. So we were already done by the time he was injured. 

Every team has injuries. Yes, losing Suggs hurt but I'm sure some other teams that made the playoffs probably had just as many injuries. 

Once Flacco went down though, that's when the Ravens started putting basically anyone on the injured reserve. That is why we had so many on there.

[trevorsteadman]

Pittsburgh Steelers - 10-6 Division Winner

I think people need to stop wearing the rose colored glasses with Pittsburgh's defense. It has obvious holes. Also the loss of Martavis Bryant and Lardarius Green's injury will take the offense a step back. As we showed last season if you can limit Antonio Brown you can easily keep up with Pittsburgh.

Baltimore Ravens - 10-6 Wild Card

Key players returning and upgrades on offense and defense will thrust the Ravens back to the play offs with a favorable schedule. Plus law of averages say that the 9 losses of last season of 1 score or less should fall in favor of the Ravens this year right?

Cincinnati Bengals 8-8

I want to say the Bengals make it to the play offs because I know how big their play makers are but they lost so much on offense coaching wise and talent wise. Also lost a few key players on defense. This squad takes a step back but still a strong overall team.

Cleveland Browns 4-12

Rebuilding time for the Browns.

[FlocksGottaFeed]

• Ravens 11-5 (4-2 in division) (7-3 against other divisions)
• Bengals 10-6 (4-2 in division) (6-4 against other divisions)
• Steelers 9-7 (3-3 in division) (6-4 against other divisions)
• Browns 7-9 (2-4 in division) (5-5 against other divisions)

Just based on the history of Conference Match-ups for the last decade (AFC North is the 'winning-est' division).

Edited September 10, 2016 by jkm5bmore
AFC

[wizard1]

I have seen the future and it is not pretty here in Baltimore. As with all preseason hopes and hype the truth is always hard to swallow or any less easy to announce but here we go:

1. Cincinnati Bengals 11-5

2. Pittsburgh Steelers 10-6

3. Cleveland Browns 8-8

4. Baltimore Ravens 5-11

Cincinnati doesn't miss a beat while losing their 2 top receivers by drafting Tyler Boyd  and having great depth at WR. The Steelers have a potential to be an offensive juggernaut but have big issues on the defensive side of the ball and they miss out on a wild-card berth on the last day of the season.Cleveland is much more competitive this year and shows promise on offense under new coach Hue Jackson and is clearly on the upswing. While here in Baltimore the Ravens continue to languish in mediocrity. Even though an easy early season schedule we still can only manage a 3-5 record at the beak and it is not enough to make us competitive in a rough division marred by brutal hits by the likes of Vontaze Burflict,, Ryan Shazier and and Lawrence Timmons.  The appalling lack of depth on a team already marred by injuries and myriad question marks at TE, WR, and RB leaves us on the outside looking in.

 

[Steve0x]

Hey Wizard you must be from D,C right? 

[JoeyFlex5]

There's already a thread for this.

[redrum52]

We never got your game by getting win/loss predictions.  How disappointing...

[FlocksGottaFeed]

Who is that dude behind the curtain? I've seen this movie before.

[GrimCoconut]

Hmmm. 5-11? Hey, it could happen. We'll end up with Myles Garrett, but I think we will do better than that so yeah, OK. 

[LosT_in_TranSlatioN]

3 minutes ago, jkm5bmore said:

Who is that dude behind the curtain? I've seen this movie before.

It's the movie Troll 3. Don't feed it

[LosT_in_TranSlatioN]

1 hour ago, wizard1 said:

I have seen the future and it is not pretty here in Baltimore.

Great. Can you give me tomorrow's lottery #s? I mean I just won a TV in raffle and I want to test my luck. I just want to make sure that they're right. 

 

LOL. No way in hell we finish below Cleveland. Outside of Coleman their draft is terrible, and I am not afraid of Cody Kessler or RGKnee

[FlocksGottaFeed]

18 minutes ago, LosT_in_TranSlatioN said:

It's the movie Troll 3. Don't feed it

Wouldn't dare. This is a duplicate subject. The mods will handle it.

[Deflated Football]

This is actually really generous of you 

[K-Dog]

I don't even know why I clicked. 

[Sami84]

2 hours ago, wizard1 said:

I have seen the future and it is not pretty here in Baltimore. As with all preseason hopes and hype the truth is always hard to swallow or any less easy to announce but here we go:

1. Cincinnati Bengals 11-5

2. Pittsburgh Steelers 10-6

3. Cleveland Browns 8-8

4. Baltimore Ravens 5-11

Cincinnati doesn't miss a beat while losing their 2 top receivers by drafting Tyler Boyd  and having great depth at WR. The Steelers have a potential to be an offensive juggernaut but have big issues on the defensive side of the ball and they miss out on a wild-card berth on the last day of the season.Cleveland is much more competitive this year and shows promise on offense under new coach Hue Jackson and is clearly on the upswing. While here in Baltimore the Ravens continue to languish in mediocrity. Even though an easy early season schedule we still can only manage a 3-5 record at the beak and it is not enough to make us competitive in a rough division marred by brutal hits by the likes of Vontaze Burflict,, Ryan Shazier and and Lawrence Timmons.  The appalling lack of depth on a team already marred by injuries and myriad question marks at TE, WR, and RB leaves us on the outside looking in.

 

 

 im not a fan of tyler boyd..eifert is out for a few weeks..

its aj green and who?

 

cleveland have improved..but 8 wins  you're a troll but i have to admit you do a good job at it..you make it sound so honest..

[Sami84]

i will say this though, after this forum went into troll mode about the steelers picking shazier over mosely in 2014 and with shazier being far better last year its clear CJ has to improve..he cant just be ''ok''..or ''solid''. he needs to reach his ceiling ( which is like timmons ).

[Sami84]

but i will say this..if we are below 500 i hope its 1 win.

 

im dead serious...We need Myles Garrett in baltimore. We need that supertar HOF potential player..

[Tank 92]

Time to kill this one. Dude is running out of bait.    lol

Edited September 10, 2016 by Tank 92

[JoeyFlex5]

2 hours ago, Sami84 said:

but i will say this..if we are below 500 i hope its 1 win.

 

im dead serious...We need Myles Garrett in baltimore. We need that supertar HOF potential player..

i.... kinda feel this way myself.... 

although we could see a big emergence with judon and zds and potentially correa this year and make us forget all about our lack of edge rush, meanwhile the DL and overall toughness regresses, in which case... jonathan allen.

[Moderator 3]

10 hours ago, JoeyFlex5 said:

There's already a thread for this.

 

9 hours ago, jkm5bmore said:

Who is that dude behind the curtain? I've seen this movie before.

 

9 hours ago, jkm5bmore said:

Wouldn't dare. This is a duplicate subject. The mods will handle it.

Merged.  Some people just feel the need to start their own thread.  

[stampedehero]

These are fantasy predictions   If we come back to this topic at mid season then a concise clear picture would be seen

 

[Space11jams]

On 9/6/2016 at 3:53 PM, usmccharles said:

^{I don't see it as a slap in the face at all.  We were a 5 win team last year, we have a lot of unproven players.  I see us winning more than 5 games, but have no issue being placed 3rd in our division as the Steeleres offense is stacked and the Bengals have a very well balanced team.  I see the Bengals having a down year but right now I see us as a 7-9 team.  You said you see our division as a toss-up, so why is it a slap in the face that we finish 3rd?} 

Only because of the record and placement. I see it being a toss up between us and the Steelers only because of their offense. 

[usmccharles]

15 minutes ago, Space11jams said:

Only because of the record and placement. I see it being a toss up between us and the Steelers only because of their offense. 

Considering how close the top three teams normally are in our division, it just doesn't make sense to say otherwise.  

[Cillmatic]

looks like the forum crashed, lol