1. We keep wondering when Joe Flacco is going to become an "elite quarterback," when in reality, that's just a made-up label that isn't even quantifiable. There will never be a day when a light bulb goes off, and then everyone will know — Flacco included — he has reached "elite" status. What matters for Flacco and the Ravens, however, is that he continues to make progress, and has games like this, games where he reads the coverage and makes the right throws, and puts the ball in the hands of his playmakers.
You can make a pretty good case this was one of Flacco's best games as a Raven. He went 20-of-27 for 266 yards and two touchdowns. True, he threw a pass that could have (and really should have) resulted in a pick-six for the Dolphins, but that happens in the NFL. It looked like Anquan Boldin might have ran the wrong route anyway. (It was a mix up either way.) What I think was most impressive about his performance this game is the way he adjusted to everything Miami threw at him.
Yes, he threw check downs, something he's been criticized for in the past. But the reason they were effective this week is Flacco was able to hit the intermediate routes against Miami's three-deep cloud coverage to pull the linebackers back, and away from Ray Rice. When he needed to, he got the ball out quickly against the blitz. Other times, he hung in the pocket for an extra second to wait for someone to come open. On his touchdown throw to Mason, he looked like he made the perfect pre-snap read, saw the corner was shading Mason's outside shoulder, then threw an absolute laser into a tight spot where only Mason could get it.
Cam Cameron has received his share of criticism this year, and certainly some of it has been justified, but he called a great game today. Those screen passes got Miami on their heels early, gave Flacco a chance to complete some easy passes, and took advantage of the fact that Todd Heap, Anquan Boldin and T.J. Houshmandzadeh are really good downfield blockers. (Seriously, go back and watch Willis McGahee's touchdown. Housh and Heap threw two excellent blocks.) There were a lot of games in 2009 where Flacco dumped the ball off to Rice and asked him to make plays, but this game had a different feel. Rice had those opportunities today because the Dolphins had to cover everyone else as well.
He wasn't perfect. He took two bad sacks that contributed to the Red Zone Retreat the Ravens pulled after Lardarius Webb's interception. And he overthrew Boldin on what should have been a touchdown in the first half, which led to another strange challenge from John Harbaugh. (Challenges continue to vex the Ravens under Harbaugh.) But Flacco never seemed phased when he took a few licks, which is a good sign.
For whatever reason, the Ravens running game is really hit or miss this year. The red-zone struggles are good example of that. The offensive line looks great one week, then soft the next, especially in short yardage. They can't seem to get to the linebackers after initial contact with the defensive line — especially Matt Birk. So Flacco has to play well for them to run the ball. He has to, at minimum, keep teams honest, and best-case scenario, burn them when it counts. Today, he did all that.
He'll face a real challenge this week in Atlanta, since he has less time to rest, recover, then study film and the game plan. He'll be facing a defense that's aggressive, but also susceptible to giving up big plays. He'll be on the road, in a dome where noise will be a factor, and he may not play well on certain drives
But what matters is that he's making progress. He's learning from past mistakes. His mechanics are more consistent. There are still more struggles that are certain to come, because that's the way it works for most young NFL quarterbacks. But his bad plays aren't as bad as they used to be. And his good plays are showing up more frequently. I think that's the best way to describe his overall progress in his third year. It's not perfect. It is, however, realistic. And reason for optimism.
2. The Dolphins sure do talk a lot of trash for a team that couldn't stop anyone in the second half on Sunday.
Now let's stipulate up front that the Ravens have a reputation, at least nationally, for running their mouths. And I think it's a fair one. They are not shy about sharing their opinions, especially on defense. Ray Lewis and Terrell Suggs are not wallflowers, to put it lightly. But they also have a reputation for mostly backing it up.
The Dolphins don't. The Dolphins, right now, are a pretender. They're the third-best team in their division and they have one victory over a team with a winning record. They're a boxer trying to pump themselves up so they don't have to admit their shortcomings. And in defeat, it looks a little ridiculous.
Here is Karlos Dansby when asked by reporters if the Fins thought about shadowing Ray Rice during the game:
"No, for what?" Dansby said. "Why would we shadow him? He didn't do anything. They checked down to him, but he was the last resort. Why would we need to shadow him?"
When what you consider a "last resort" has just caught seven passes for 98 yards out of the backfield, and burned you repeatedly in the running game in a 26-10 victory, he's essentially putting a clown suit on if you continue to insist he's nothing special.
Channing Crowder also went on a bizarre rant after the game about Le'Ron McClain, and how McClain allegedly spit in his face. He then called McClain soft, a "ho" and followed it up with a strange reference to the referees being the equivalent of "Stevie Wonder and Anne Frank." (It seems Helen Keller is what Crowder was going for, a mix-up that has to make the educators at the University of Florida very proud right about now.) All of that conveniently distracted everyone from noticing Crowder didn't make a meaningful play the entire day.
If the verbal duel between Channing Crowder and Derrick Mason was a boxing match, Mills Lane would have called it after about the third sentence of Mason's post-game evisceration.
"I don't even think they want him on this team, but they have nobody to replace him, so he has to be there," Mason said of Crowder. "They took him out of the game, they played a little bit better. [When] he's in the game, he's getting knocked down, he's getting pushed out of the way. The guy is horrible. Honestly, the guy is horrible. He's probably a good guy. I'm not taking that away from him, but he's horrible. He's not a good football player. Honestly, he needs to go back and watch the film and humble himself and just play the next game and not say anything."
I actually don't mind a little trash talking. Part of that may be a generational thing, but growing up, I was always one of those athletes who understood that if you wanted the other team to shut up, the easiest way to make it happen is to play better. Obviously I'm not an NFL player, but that understanding exists on all levels of modern sports. That attitude tends to infuriate old school sports purists, who would prefer if everyone let their play do the talking, or acted like they've been there before. And I understand why people feel that way. It's just not realistic. But it is realistic to expect someone to shut up, put their head down, and sulk back to the bus if they've just been on the business end of a thumping.
As a journalist though, I'm all for it. Win or lose, it's always more fun for us when athletes are interesting.
3. The Ravens can make Terrell Suggs a more effective rusher by moving him around and involving him in more stunts.
Suggs has been a polarizing player ever since he signed his big contract prior to the 2009 season. Every week, he gets hammered for not being a more effective pass rusher or for talking too much while producing too little. But part of the problem with Suggs is perception, which I've written in the past, so forgive me if you're a regular reader who feels I'm repeating myself. Suggs didn't get that contract because the Ravens thought he could be Dwight Freeney. He's not a straight-up rushing end who will ever lead the league in sacks. He got that contract because the Ravens saw value in his all-around skill — that he could rush the passer, shut down the run, and even create problems in coverage for teams.
I wonder if part of the problem with Suggs lately is the Ravens have forgotten how to use him. For the most part, they've been lining him up on the edge, asking him to beat a tackle. You could see today that they moved him around a bit, which helped their pass rush. They had him running stunts where he knifed inside and had a blitzer come off the edge, which made Suggs much harder for the Dolphins to find and block. The Ravens pass rush wasn't great, especially in the first half. But they did get pressure late in the game.
Suggs' skill is his versatility, and the sum of his parts. If the Ravens pass rush is going to get better, it might help to do more of what the defense did today, which is make it harder to tell where he's coming from.
4. Josh Wilson has now shown enough to prove that he deserves to play more often than Fabian Washington.
If you'll notice, I didn't say that Wilson deserves to "start" ahead of Washington because John Harbaugh has repeatedly expressed that the media gets too hung up on "labels like starter" and that it doesn't really matter who starts the game. It seems like a bit of semantics from Harbaugh, but I'm happy to play along. It's actually an admirable quality from a coach, not wanting to further shame a guy by saying he's no longer a starter. Harbaugh is only trying to protect Washington from further embarrassment. You don't have to label Wilson the starter as long as you concede the Ravens are better when he's in the game.
This isn't personal. Washington is one of the best guys in the locker room. And at times, he's looked decent in pass coverage this year. What isn't debatable is that Washington's struggles, especially as a tackler, can no longer be brushed aside. Wilson is more aggressive, and he's fearless. He doesn't play 10 yards off the receiver for fear of getting beat deep.
Here is a telling stat that I think is a fair comparison: In 30 games with the Ravens (all starts), Washington has 29 pass deflections, 95 tackles and one interception. During that same time span, Wilson has played in 34 games (25 starts) and recorded 27 pass deflections, 120 tackles and grabbed seven interceptions.
5. You know what would improve the Ravens play in the red zone? If they could control the line of scrimmage on short-yardage plays. Right now, they can't.
A lot of fans seem to believe Le'Ron McClain is the answer to the Ravens short-yardage issues. I disagree. The answer is for the offensive line to do a better job blocking the guy in front of them. I think even they would admit that. It sounds stupid, but it really is that simple. Those are hard yards to get, but right now, Rice and McGahee don't have much of a shot at getting them at all. You can see the blocking break down before Flacco even hands the ball off sometimes. They're not moving guys off the ball, and they're not getting any kind of hit on the linebackers. In fact, in short yardage, the best they can hope for right now is a stalemate.
I know people want to blame Matt Birk, because he's older and he hasn't been a Raven for very long. He's a convenient target. But if you watch the plays closely, Birk is only part of the problem. True, he's not overpowering. But both Chris Chester and Ben Grubbs are having trouble sustaining their blocks in short yardage, and Michael Oher struggles about half the time. Only Marshal Yanda tends to dominate the guy in front of him in those situations, and even he doesn't do it all the time.
I'm not sure what the answer is. These are the linemen the Ravens have. Maybe you could bring in Oniel Cousins as an extra tackle and try to run that direction, or maybe go with an unbalanced line and have Yanda, Oher and Grubbs all line up on the same side. Maybe the Ravens should spread the field and ask Rice to find a hole somewhere, even in short yardage.
But the blocking issues never seem to come up when people are complaining about Cameron's play calls. Cameron hasn't been perfect in the red zone by any means, but improvement in that area needs to start up front.
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