A national television audience that was electrified from watching the largest comeback in NFL history was brought quickly back to earth courtesy of the Baltimore Ravens’ offense. There was some stuff out there to like in terms of playing physical on both sides of the line, but there was a lot to hold your nose about.
A lot.
You know how an ocean has a lot of water? That kind of “a lot.” That’s what we’re talking about here today.
Let’s get to the grades:
Offense: F
It’s an F. Easiest grade of the year. They produced three points against a less-than-stellar defense, to be charitable. They failed time and time again to generate points when there was something going — with failed fourth-down attempts, a red-zone pick, a fumble when a glimpse of optimism appeared, bad work with the clock… just so much ugly. And I give this grade knowing full well they rushed for 198 yards and 7.1 yards per rush. Do you know how much you have to underperform to get an “F” while rushing for 198 yards on 7.1 yards per rush?
Quarterback: F
It wasn’t Tyler Huntley’s best day, though he wasn’t the only one at fault here. He was 17-30 for 138 yards and an interception, and only produced 4.6 yards per attempt. He is a good quick passer who can hit his back foot and throw, if that read is there. If not, at least today, there was indecision, and at least two sacks that were Huntley running out of bounds behind the line of scrimmage when he could have thrown it away for harmless incompletions. I liked the 19-yarder to Andrews on third-and-nine at the end of the first half to get off a field goal attempt. There wasn’t a whole lot more to like out there.
Running Backs: A
JK Dobbins (125 yards on 13 carries) and Gus Edwards (55 yards on seven carries) were the best players on the field today. They both ran through arm tackles and busted into the secondary time and time again. Justice Hill made a nice play on a shovel pass on 3rd and 13 in the second quarter, but got flagged for a false start later. They did everything they could have done today. They should have been given more opportunities, but that wasn’t their fault.
Receivers: F
Demarcus Robinson had six catches — that’s the good news. He also had 29 yards and fumbled twice, losing one. After having good chemistry with Huntley last season, Mark Andrews just isn’t producing right now, with three catches for 31 yards today. James Proche had a difficult, but catchable, ball go through his hands on fourth down. Isaiah Likely looked decent on limited opportunities, and DeSean Jackson got out-muscled on that interception. Devin Duvernay had a nice little catch-and-run for 19, but nobody really made a big play. At all.
Offensive Line: B+
There were sometimes that Huntley got some pressure, but his three sacks were two scrambles out of bounds and another attempted scramble that got him short of the sticks. Those three sacks lost the Ravens 12 total yards. They dominated in the run game, with the interior guys all making holes. I felt like Morgan Moses was in on several big runs, including Edwards’ 25-yarder in the first quarter, and Dobbins’ big run to end the third quarter.
Ravens coach John Harbaugh on what needs to change: “We need to throw the ball better.” He said that’s the priority.
— Jamison Hensley (@jamisonhensley) December 18, 2022
[Related Article: Bold Predictions]
Defense: B
The defense was not the problem, though they had a couple opportunities to make a play, and couldn’t pull it off. They held Cleveland to one touchdown, 283 yards of offense and fared pretty well against a great running team until it looked like they ran out of gas in the fourth quarter. They again were too loose with coverage at the end of the first half (sound familiar?), and couldn’t force any turnovers, but they played good enough to win.
Defensive Line: B
Broderick Washington had another very good game, with four tackles and pushing back the Browns’ offensive line consistently. Calais Campbell again looked good, but his late injury is concerning. He has been good all year. Justin Madubuike was pretty quiet, but Brent Urban stepped up, picking up a sack and a couple tackles, to go along with a hit on Watson another play.
Linebackers: B
Roquan Smith had 11 tackles, six of them solo, and was active once again. Patrick Queen had six stops, half a sack and a hit, but was also beaten in coverage on the Browns’ touchdown. It looked like a zone read where he leaned the wrong way. Odafe Oweh combined with Queen on that sack and had another hit. Justin Houston had a huge third-down sack that would have killed a drive, but got flagged for a face-mask. The Browns continued that drive and scored their touchdown. Malik Harrison had his best game in a while, with four tackles.
Defensive Backs: B-
They weren’t bad in coverage, per se, but there were too many easy throws. That was either missing assignments or bad schematic decisions — it’s hard to tell on the broadcast view. Kyle Hamilton stood out, with seven tackles, a sack, two tackles for loss, a pass broken up in the red zone and another hit on Watson. He might have been the defensive player of the game. Marlon Humphrey had a very nice pass break up on Amari Cooper in the red zone, and Chuck Clark was in tight defense on an end zone pass in the first half. Clark also had a low-key big tackle on Chubb on a 19-yard run in the first half. That one looked dangerous.
Special Teams: D-
It was obviously not a great day for kicking out there, as both teams missed on two field goal attempts. Still, we expect Justin Tucker to be immune from that. Jordan Stout only had one punt (which is wild for a team that scored three points), but it was a nice 41-yarder inside the Browns 15. Devin Duvernay continued his mini-slump, and I didn’t like his decisions to run two balls out of the end zone.
Coaching: F
This was not a well-coached game, especially offensively. Make no mistake — the players messed up enough times to lose this game on their own this week, but the offense didn’t always make sense. Dobbins and Edwards combined for 180 yards on 20 carries, and only had 20 carries. Yes, they got behind, but they seemed to overthink things every time the run game would get the offense moving, only to put it back in the air and do something to screw up the drive. I liked the shovel pass to Hill, because if it failed it would have been an incompletion. The jet sweep to Duvernay, however, resulted in a loss because there was a fumble. That didn’t make sense. I felt like they should have taken the points on that opening possession, particularly in a game everyone expected to be a defensive battle.
14 Responses
Sooner or later winning ugly catches up with you! Without a prolific passing game, the offense is severely limited, especially in the Red Zone! In fact, a WR has not caught a TD pass in 10 games! And, people question why good WRs don’t want to play here! Blame Roman if you choose, but all Harbaugh’s OCs with the exception of Kubiak had one thing in common…..they all ran Harbaugh’s offensive system. Time for a change at the top of the coaching chain…..
Cleaning my cat litter box is more exciting than watching this team… and less aggravating
When is Roman getting fired. 8 yards per carry and Huntley threw 30 times !!!! This is insane. Roman has no awareness of the situation and no feel for the game. Time to Cam Cameron him. Franchise Lamar for one year with good WR corps and an OC who has a clue and see if he is the answer. 5 years of cheap Lamar wasted because of one stubborn incompetent coordinator
and harbaugh does?..he left three points off the board on the first drive…in a game that everybody knew would be played close to the vest…there was no reason not to take sure points ….AGAIN…
We need three receivers and three corners in the draft.
They got a delay of game COMING OFF OF A TIMEOUT. Pop Warner offenses know better. Why is Greg Roman on the plane back home?
we don`t have an efficient,consistent downfield passer on this roster…and yet people still can`t figure out why we don`t pass the ball consistently…..
how`s this for an idea…stop using an rpo guy as a back-up…bring in a guy who can actually throw the ball 15 yards accurately and consistently and do the hard work of trying to have an alternative game plan we can go to when the rpo isn`t enough(for whatever reason)…give the offense more than one option…sometimes a running game that yields almost two hundred yards on the ground isn`t enough…sometimes you need plan b…
That requires making adjustments during the game, a concept foreign to Roman (and Harbs indirectly)
In 2012, he made the necessary in season adjustment by firing Cam Cameron. He then made in game adjustments in the AFC championship game by allowing Flacco to “open it up” in the second half. The last three years he has been stubborn. And the reults is one and done in playoffs (if and when we even get there). A waste of talent over the last 5 years. The Roman / Lamar experiment has been tried and has failed, as much as I hate not watching Lamar doing Lamar things, he will NEVER go to a superbowl under this coaching staff. Harbs seems to have more faith in Roman than in Lamar and this tells me all I need to know about his understanding of the game
Harbaugh after the game – ” We just have to start scoring touchdowns”. There, we can all relax, Harbs has it all figured out.
I think Harbs has become more and more disrespectful of the fans. Yes he mentions how good they are every time we win, but his pressers are insults to the fans. We do understand football, writers do, pundits do, other coaches do, commentators do. And he is not, has never been the smartest coach in the league. He is an excellent motivator, possibly the best, but his blind faith in Greg Roman will be his downfall. This team is going NOWHERE, even with excellent WRs, because this “we zag when they zig” mentality is flawed. 31 teams zig, maybe they know something
I agree with everything you said. He’s disrespectful, dismissive of intelligent questions, very arrogant. I find it very insulting. And I’ve been saying exactly what you just said – we keep bragging about how unique we are, nobody else does what we do. Because everybody else knows this garbage DOES NOT WORK in the modern game.
Love the litter box analogy. It really is that bad. Maybe one more: the Ravens’ offense is a 1960s Magnavox black and white while the rest of the league is Samsung OLED.
When your defense holds a team to 13 points in todays NFL and you can not get 14 points. When you drive the ball 70 yards and give it to project Pat and he can’t get out of his stance because he’s so fat. When you do use Tucker and he misses. When Duvernay drops a td toss. Huntley should have been pulled in the 3rd quarter for Brown. Harbaugh needs the Billick payout and a house in St Michaels next to the Crab Claw and a nice fishing boat.
I took time to digest this game. The good-the D looked very good, the running game was excellent, and the O line was very good.
The bad-the coaching sucks and it is redundant so enough said.
We have 3 games left and hopefully take 2 out of 3. We make the playoffs and then an early out.
The ugly-we have the same coaching staff for the next 3 games. Got to admire the effort of the players on the field but this coaching staff is killing us every year.