Defensive Notes vs. Jacksonville
This was far from an ugly win. The Ravens throttled the Jaguars with a stunning display of 4th-quarter defense to offset the performance of an offense that was almost as inept.
Just how great was that defense in the 4th quarter?
– The Jaguars ran 17 snaps, 2 of which were negated by penalty.
– They got their only first down on an illegal use of hands penalty on Jimmy Smith.
– On their 15 non-penalty snaps, the Ravens held them to just 4 yards
– That yardage total broke down as 4 rushing plays for 1 yard and 11 passing plays for 3 yards.
– The Ravens sacked Bortles 4 times for 26 yards
– The Ravens had 4 PDs, all of which ended drives (Mosley, Jernigan, Jernigan to Young, and Webb to Orr)
The pass rush allowed Bortles Ample Time and Space (ATS) on just 4 of 13 drop backs despite the fact they used a 4-man rush on 11 of those 13 plays.
The long-awaited debut of Kamalei Correa finally came to pass. Here is a racing form review of his 6 snaps:
–(Q1, 10:42): Blocked by Marcedes Lewis, but jailbreak along line leads to Ivory RM-2
–(Q1, 8:53): Lines up at ROLB, but Ivory runs right for 2 yards.
–(Q1, 8:15): Lines up off the LoS at ROLB, reads Bortles’ short drop, tips and nearly picks him off on pass intended for Thomas.
–(Q3, 1:19): Lines up at LOLB, drops to short left zone. Pass goes left to Ivory for a gain of 9.
–(Q4, 0:32): Lines up at ROLB, rushes and is stonewalled by Joeckel, then pancaked by Yeldon’s chip block. Uggh. 4-yard completion is negated by holding call drawn by Judon.
–(Q4, 0:25): Again from ROLB, has terrific get off from rocking, 2-point stance. Picked up by Joeckel and again chipped by Yeldon on Orr’s game-sealing pick.
I’d like to say there’s something you didn’t see that was positive, but the near pick on the pass to Thomas was it. He’s definitely got some things to work on coming out of this game. It’s a good sign Pees trusted him and Judon with the pass rush responsibilities for the final 2 plays. They were fresh and the hold drawn by Judon was a get-out-of-jail-free card for any positive result on that play.
The Jaguars ran 63 offensive snaps.
Individual Notes (note all snap counts exclude penalties, kneels, and spikes and as such will be lower than other published totals)
Lawrence Guy (29 snaps) played well versus the pass and run and had 3 tackles. On 2 of the Ravens’ 4th quarter sacks, the Ravens ran a twist with the underneath player collecting the sack, and Guy had a hand in each:
–(Q4, 10:25) Jernigan moved to split the double team from LG Reed and C Shatley. He was absorbed initially, but when Guy looped by, Reed picked him up and Jernigan beat Shatley easily for an 8-yard sack. The key to the play was how much Jernigan could get Shatley’s shoulders turned and how quickly Guy could loop past to force Reed to peel off. This was textbook.
–(Q4, 3:10) On 3rd and 6, the Jaguars could have all but sealed the game with a first down. Guy engaged RG Cann with an assist from RT Parnell. Parnell peeled off to block Jernigan, but Guy had good leverage on Cann’s right shoulder and pushed past him for the 9-yard sack that set up the blocked FG.
The Ravens gave up just 2.3 yards per play with him in, lowest of anyone with at least 20 snaps.
Timmy Jernigan (45 snaps) continued his ascension as one of the most impactful interior pass rushers in the game. In addition to his contributions mentioned with the sacks under Guy (see above), he had 1 other pressure as I scored it. He also batted 2 balls at the LoS. The first (Q4, 7:38) came on a sensible disengagement from RG Cann where he then easily swatted Bortles’ pass and it was nearly intercepted by the diving Suggs. The second PD (Q4, 4:16) came on yet another twist underneath Guy when he shot his hand up while engaged with Cann to deflect Bortles’ pass to Young. The regular twisting of Jernigan/Guy took advantage of 2 big absences on the Jaguars offensive line, which is credit that should go to Pees as well.
Brandon Williams (42 snaps) made a number of impactful plays in the run game where he was credited with 4 tackles for gains of 3, 3, -1, and 0. He had another tackle wiped out by Suggs’ offsides flag and yet another wiped out by what I’ll generously call “spotty” tackle crediting by the Jags’ scorer. Watch (Q1, 10:42) and tell me how Brandon should not get a piece of the tackle on Ivory’s RM-2. He drove back C Shatley (Q2, 10:29) to help blow up Ivory’s run right for 1 yard (tackle to Orr) with the kind of penetration we saw frequently from him the last 2 seasons. I also scored him for 2 pressures on 24 pass snaps. However, because he’s lining up more frequently as a 3-technique (when on the field with Pierce), more should be expected.
Michael Pierce (25 snaps) collected another QH (Q4, 11:54). It wasn’t the same sort of outlier result he produced in the first 2 games, but he deserves a share of the credit for the Ravens holding the Jags to just 2.3 YPC. The Ravens as a team have now allowed 258 rushing yards on 68 opponent runs (3.8 YPC, including 0 kneels). They accomplished that despite allowing the longest run in team history (85 yards) which accounts for almost 1/3 of that total. This is a great rushing defense and I believe the story is unfolding similarly to the 2000 Ravens with a pair of athletic jumbos and untouched linebackers that effectively remove the run as an option. If this team only had the 2000 Ravens secondary…
Terrell Suggs (36 snaps) made a high-value, pass-rush contribution in 28 such snaps. Those included:
–(Q1, 2:06) He bulled through a double team from RT Parnell and RG Cann to force a back-foot throw by Bortles that was intercepted by Mosley.
–(Q4, 11:07) He took down Bortles with a pure pass-rusher’s sack when he bulled LT Joeckel, shed him, then dragged down Bortles as he tried to evade.
–(Q4, 4:16) He threw aside Joeckel to pressure Bortles, whose pass was deflected by Jernigan for Young’s interception.
–(Q4, 0:43) Za’Darius Smith flushed Bortles left from the pocket. Suggs chased down Bortles by the left sideline in a controlled manner that did not allow the Jaguar QB’s escape move to succeed. That forced the Jags to burn their last timeout.
What I like from Suggs so far is that he has made contributions vs. the run and pass. He won’t ever be DPOY again, but he’s a savvy football player with plus skills who continually finds ways to confound opponents by denying their expectations.
Matt Judon (17 snaps) rushed effectively with 3 pressures (on just 8 pass snaps) as I scored it in addition to another negated by the holding flag he drew on RT Parnell (Q4, 0:32). He won the right edge versus Parnell (Q4, 9:01) which forced Ivory far wide for a gain of just 1. This was his best game to date by a wide margin.
C.J. Mosley (63 snaps) continues to roam and make plays. His interception (Q1, 2:06) is the sort we might have seen early in Ray Lewis’ career. He leapt vs. the block of Yeldon to bat away Bortles’ pass and deny 3rd and 5 (Q4, 15:00). He was in first to stop Ivory (Q4, 3:17) on a run for no gain where tackle credit went to Orr. He made a sure tackle on Yeldon in the middle of the field (Q4, 1:02) which burned 19 seconds on a gain of just 6. Best of all I did not score him for any missed tackles this week.
Zach Orr (63 snaps) earned racing form treatment with a fine game. Here are my notes in order, but without time references.
–Solid underneath coverage of Robinson as Bortles throws incomplete under pressure from Weddle.
–Drives back Marcedes Lewis for quick tackle with no YAC.
–Exploits penetration by Williams and Z.Smith to take down Ivory for a gain of 1.
–Dives, but is unable to collect INT intended for Lee
–Blocked by Joeckel on Yeldon’s 9-yard run.
–Caught in coverage of Hurns for a 17-yard completion as Bortles has extended pocket time. Makes saving tackle.
–Stuffs right edge to drop Ivory for no gain.
–Gobbles up tip from Webb for game-sealing INT.
Eric Weddle (63 snaps) had another outstanding game. He pressured Bortles twice. I would say the first of those was a PD (Q1, 14:55), because it wobbled incomplete and far off target, but Bortles threw so many wobbly balls, I can’t be sure. He had a PD with a big hit delivered on Hurns (Q2, 9:02) which dislodged a 17-yard completion. He also stepped in front of Hurns to knock down a potential TD pass (Q2, 4:05). He penetrated the backfield to force Yeldon inside for a loss of 1 (Q3, 6:24). That was a play where Suggs and McClendon probably deserved tackle credit.
Shareece Wright (63 snaps) continues to be the most frequent target for opposing quarterbacks. While the plays were difficult to defend, both of the Jaguars TDs were thrown to Robinson with Wright in coverage (Q2, 2:00 and Q3, 5:09). He never turned back to find the football on the 14-yard conversion to Robinson on 3rd-and-2 (Q1, 2:35). He tried but failed for a 3rd-and-2 interception (Q2, 4:38) that ended up a 12-yard conversion to Robinson. During the 4th quarter, he did not surrender a completion, but made 2 tackles to hold a run play to 1 yard and a pass play to 4 yards, respectively.
Tavon Young (13 snaps) has quietly become one of the key players on the defense. After he took Hawkins out of the game a week ago, he was again not targeted versus the Jags. He did, however, come up with a pretty tip-drill interception (Q4, 4:16) off Jernigan’s batted pass.
A few team notes:
–The Ravens had 2 tip drill interceptions (Jernigan to Young and Webb to Orr), which is 2 more than they had all of last season.
–The Jaguars gained just 3.4 yards per play on their 63 offensive snaps.
–The Jaguars did not have a single play longer than 20 yards and their longest run was 9 yards.
–Unlike the game against the Browns, there were no long 3rd downs conversions allowed. The Jaguars’ 6 conversions came with distances of 1, 2, 2, 4, 5, and 2 yards respectively.
–Despite playing without Elvis Dumervil, the Ravens had 4 sacks and 2 turnovers among the 29 times they rushed 4.
–The Ravens have now sacked Bortles 15 times and knocked him down 28 times in their 3 meetings.
Through 3 games, here is how I see the defensive awards:
Best Lineman: Jernigan, despite quality performances from Guy, Pierce, and Williams.
Best Linebacker: Mosley for playmaking at a high level. Suggs and Orr also merit consideration in a deep group.
Best Defensive Back: Weddle, no contest. The 2nd biggest contribution may have come from Young.
Best Rookie: Pierce and Young, tie. They’ve both looked great with Young playing fewer, but higher leverage snaps.
MVP: Weddle over Jernigan. This would also be my choice for team MVP.