Following Sunday’s game against the Bills the first question asked of Joe Flacco focused upon how it feels to have playmakers on the outside like WR Breshad Perriman and WR Mike Wallace.
His response?
“Yeah, we had two big plays with them, it was a good start. You can see what Mike [Wallace] can do. They played ‘cover zero’ a handful of times, and we only really took advantage of it on that one play.”
Why?
Why not keep going after it until they prove they can stop it?
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It was however the first game and with a few important pieces of the offense just now beginning to play together, it may take a little time but that doesn’t efficiently address why Marc Trestman didn’t take more shots downfield, spread the Bills out and then take advantage of the spacing.
But that didn’t happen. Maybe Trestman didn’t want to put Joe at risk with 7-step drops. Maybe the playbook wasn’t fully in play because of Joe’s obvious hesitancy to move around. But by not moving around don’t they risk the injury they fear in a different way?
Many fans in town want Trestman’s head on a stick in a Game of Thrones kind of way. But that would be a mistake. Let’s give the offense some time to gel. And don’t be so quick to judge Trestman on last year’s offense. He never had a vertical threat and that allowed teams to defend with 8 in the box. And he lost his quarterback, top running back and top receiver by the 10th game.
Not many coordinators can produce positive results when faced with such adversity. Let’s give this a little time to gain some traction.
On the other side of the ball is defensive coordinator Dean Pees. Pees put together an excellent game plan to thwart the respective skill sets of Tyrod Taylor, LeSean McCoy and Sammy Watkins. The Ravens played faster and at least for one game they were able to get off the field on third down, limiting the Bills to a 23% conversion rate.
But it is just one game, so let’s not get too excited. The Ravens have had months to put together a game plan for Greg Roman’s offense. Now they’ll have a week to plan for the Browns who will be led by Josh McCown now that RG3 has been placed on IR. And let’s not forget that McCown has had success when facing Dean Pees’ defenses. He’s 2-1 over the last 3 games against Pees with nearly 900 yards passing, a passer rating of 96.7 and 4TD’s against 0 interceptions.
Zero interceptions.
That’s a regular theme for Pees’ defenses. Over the course of the last 17 games they have only 6 and that in part is a byproduct of not pressuring the quarterback. Controlled pressure was in order v. the Bills because of Taylor’s mobility. Let’s see what Pees dials up for McCown. He’ll have to make him uncomfortable something Pees has failed to do the last 3 times he’s faced McCown.