Ravens Game

Ok.....take your shots. I have my admittedly anecdotal take on last night's game. Following are some observations that are not reinforced with actual stats or deep analysis.

first...the Skins:

- RGIII is not seeing the field consistently. I have no idea if it is the speed of the game, new offense, so called "instinct"....but there is an established pattern now (really going back to last season) of throwing into tight coverage..often leading to picks. Don't forget the pick that happened early in the game that was nullified by a penalty. Per previous posts, to me, he looks a second behind what is evolving on the field. how he executes just doesn't look "crisp" to me. Yes, that is not a scientific term. To my mind, he is executing with the efficiency of a Brown's QB and not...say.....a Wilson, Kapernick and certainly not a Luck. He just doesn't seem to be seeing the opportunities, seeing them quickly, making the right decision, and executing inside the what I would term the "success envelope". he's taking too much damn time to understand what is going on and making the right decision inside the window of opportunity. He is hurting his team presently.

- this offensive line is a liability...IMO. Trent yes....he's fine. but the rest of the line? at the point-of-attack and in pass pro (even mano y mano running) they are consistently being overmatched physically. While the passing game is a mix of QB and line issues, I'm not seeing those moments like the Brady's and Mannings where the QB has a lot of time to make a decision. they're there...just not a lot. it seems all too often that pocket is collapsing way too fast.

- I thought the RBs weren't as crisp last night. too much lateral stretching and not enough single cut and head downfield. may have been blocking. don't know. running game is still gonna be a strong plus...and we played an upper tier defense with a stout line and good LBs....but it was bottled up at times.

- receivers are getting open. the offense is just totally out of synch right now. it better get its act together or TX is going to embarrass this team.

- on the flip side...so far we haven't done much "sexy" stuff on offense - play calling wise. don't know if that is because the coaches are just trying to install the basic packages and foundation plays...or because the offense is behind enough that there's no point calling the more complex plays.

- defense surprised me last night. this could be a very good D. on the other hand, and Harbaugh mentioned this at the first half break, Haz was throwing everything but the kitchen sink at B-More. so we don't know how much of the defense's success was due to pre-season complexity the other team hasn't prepared for and how much is bona fide talent. but to my untrained eyes....it looked good. some takeaways:

. these guys swarm to the ball. there always seem to be 2-3 guys converging. many fewer YACs than last season

. the run defense looks good. it has its lapses, but overall it looked good to me. players are keeping to their assigned gaps, trail pursuit is working as designed, we are stopping a good percentage of running plays in the backfield....all bodes well.

. Couldn't see it on TV but the secondary....by inference...must be playing better. Flacco had time at junctures last night but went down just the same to what I imagine would be logged as coverage sacks.

. the tackling is so much better than last season. only qualification is that there does seem to be a pattern..at times....of tackling with shoulder hits rather than wrapping the receiver. don't know if that is what they are being taught, a deliberate effort to cause fumbles or a response to the penalty flag orgy that is now NFL football.

. Keenan Robinson is impressing. this guy is all over the field making plays. Clark is turning out to be more valuable than I first thought he would be. Amerson is playing smart football. Breeland is gonna be a quality member of this secondary. for a rook...that cat always seems to be around the ball and he knows how to tackle. great draft pick. Murphy is making plays also. This is not going to be a dominant defense....but it's going to be top 15 and possibly top 10....IMO......it it continues to progress as a team. I wouldn't worry about Merriweather. based on what I saw on replays and what he said after the game....I think he is adjusting his style of play enough to accommodate the refs. you can see he's not launching head to head but using the shoulders more.....TV pundits are saying his problem is that he lowers his head and therefore loses is positional reference too early as he initiates a tackle. I guess my main take-away is that he is not out there just trying to unload as as an unguided missile. work to be done...just not as much as some think.

- special teams look great to me. you can see..almost every play now....how the players are executing the concepts they are being taught. Roberts is looking good. just not sure if you risk an important starter like that in return roles. not sure where they go with the kickers. looks neck & neck to me.

Ravens have issues IMO:

- this is not a superbowl quality team IMO. MD must be a funny tabaccy legal state if they believe that in B-More.

- yea...Ray Rice didn't play. just the same...the running game didn't look all that dominating to me. aside from back-up issues....I thought the Skins front seven won the battle at the line of scimmage when it cmoes to the run game. Ravens say the run game is the lynchpin to the offense...well.....I'd be concerned were I them.

- I didn't see a dominant passing game either. I saw Steve Smith winning battles out of shere will and skill.

- I saw the Skins bottle up some of your more deceptive plays (e.g., the end around).

Misc Thoughts

- Could be just me...but I don't see Griffin getting angry/pissed at the appropriate times on the sidelines. when I watch interviews...he seems to be saying "yea...we aren't clicking...but it's there....it happened in OTAs and training camp." he knows better than me....but I'm not buying it. I think there are real execution problems and a QB who may be deceiving himself into thinking he is further along than the facts merit. two themes in this post: Griffin's self-realization...and his reaction to bad play. really ties into a previous theme on "presence". when I see QBs in control react after bad play...they are agitated on the sidelines letting others know what is expected and mad with themselves- cuz they know what SHOULD be happening. I can't tell if RGIII is operating in this self-generated fantasy land built around twitter sphere and all the other media distractions that keep him from seeing real, hard, cold facts. put another way...enough with the friggin excuses. EXECUTE.

- the first team offense has accomplished very little so far. they have been bottled up by good defenses....who are not throwing intricate blitzes at the QB far as I can tell. heck...NE went pure vanilla and B-More had 3 CBs out of the game recovering from injuries. the Brown's physically outplayed the offense at times.

- new coach, new system, and all that. we may have to temper expectations. it could take longer for this offense to integrate and achieve some degree of efficiency...especially at the QB position.

I believe you've summed it very well. I would add that a few players deserve some extra mention. Amerson looks great. He was first class on that one series near our own 10 yard line. And our D-line and LBs also deserve praise for stopping several fourth down plays.

As for our biggest hurdle to overcome? They say a picture is worth a thousand words.

Yeah, when they showed ground level behind our line on that play even I saw that .... definitely a WTF moment
Have no idea what Griff was looking at........ must've been one of those 'I must check down, I must check down' things.

You hit the nail on the head in most of the points. Two years ago I didnt get nervous when it came to the offense on the field because I knew we could have a scoring drive most of the time. Now im scared of our offense as turnovers are happening all over the place. Its hard to place blame. O-line? QB? Opponents defense? So many problems in the offense I cant put one blame on one person, but all the persons.

The defense is starting to look like the #5 defense we had a few years ago. I like that. I can live with winning with only two touchdowns, but not allowing the other team to score more than threes. I could use more pass rushing, but seems we are doing enough to make the QBs having to rush some of their throws (ex: Johnny Manzel).

The special teams is better. Anything is better than the worst in the league. Am I right? They are getting to the ball, our punter can kick it further than 20 feet and enough hang time to get the boys down there, a few forced fumbles, and defense when guarding the kickers.

I dont have much else to say since you hit everything else. I hope this was just a bad night and can put this off when the regular season starts. Pull the wool over my eyes, im ready for football.

McD5 said:

As for our biggest hurdle to overcome? They say a picture is worth a thousand words.

Click to expand...

Why do I get the feeling Cousins would have nailed Reed on that pass play, without even a blink of hesitation ?

IMO an excellent breakdown fansince. A couple of takes I have-it looks to me like RG3 is playing outside of the instinctive automatic "not having to consciously think about what you're doing" decision making mode one would normally expect from a top-tier QB. The reasons for this could be, and in my judgement are, numerous. This dovetails into something I mentioned last night in the chatroom and to which you made a brief reference in your post.

Number one, you have a first year NFL head coach who is in a fast track learning curve of his own trying to install a brand new system , secondly you have a team which has finally extricated itself from a bad coaching situation which itself messed RG3 up in a major way. Third, the team is now younger, with a greater number of new-to-the-team players all trying to mesh together with the previous factors all operating and fourth, RG3 isn't helping matters any with his online psychological bravado motivational poster-type inspirational social media involvement-his ego gets the better of him there, I think. It seems to me he's trying to convince himself or "talk himself up" as much as anybody reading them. I think he's playing scared-scared to make a mistake, scared to waver from what he's now being coached to do which is completely different from what had been his normal "not having to consciously having to think about what you're doing" QB mode. Shanahan tried do do something like this last season but with his ego clashing with Robert's and thus creating, IMO a hostile coach-QB relationship it failed miserably. Now Jay Gruden, refreshing breeze that he seems to be, is installing a new system emphasizing pocket passing and Robert is trying to adjust-and trying too hard and as a result he's thinking about what he's supposed to do every snap. His instincts are still in there but he's consciously trying to fight them forcing him to think about what he's doing. Couple this with an OL that still can't maintain a pocket long enough even for a QB who has transitioned from having to think to one operating instinctively and you have what we saw last night. Again, just my take and opinion.

I agree, BTW, on the ST looking much better and the defense a surprising amount better. One not so delightful note, our depth seemed to still not quite match-up with the depth a team like Baltimore has.

Both Tim Jernigan and Terrance Brooks, recently of FSU, were impressive rookies last night for Baltimore.