yagersports

This will be a defining moment for Marshall, he will be asking himself if he should have just stayed in Denver!

I'm with Crav.....Ravens 483 - Dolphins -8. Ray Lewis has 8 ints and 3 receptions for TDs. Harbaugh throws TD ;)!

Mike Preston writes one article supporting Brian Billick and another praising Todd Heap?!?!?! Why do I feel like I'm in the twilight zone? Lol. BTW for those whom have not read the Heap article, you absolutely should, very, very well written.

I believe I would be bitter too! Who wouldn't? I'm not sure that is something that will go away for a long long time. Having said that, everything about Trent in the public eye says that he didn't go "off" on Oz. He probably was straight with him, and he probably told him exactly how he felt without sparing feelings.

Speaking of the offense....why can't we get Houshamazoad (championship!) goin? Honestly this guy is really freakin good. With Mason more than likely leaving next year shouldn't we be getting this guy involved and trying to entice him to stick around? The guy can absolutely play! Soft hands, good route runner, and knows how to settle into zones. What's the deal? I do agree that the offense can absolutely help the defense out. Let's start with converting 3rd and ridiuculously short lol, then we can move on to closing out games!

Hell yeah! It will be very nice to have him return at full strength.

Another quick response to the title of the thread. I agree with Max that "gone are the days of the dominant Ravens defense". At least for the immediate future, ie. this season and perhaps the next 1-2. This defense needs work and it will need a new personality very soon. Ray as unbelievable as he has been cannot possibly be a dominat personality on this defense as a player for more than 2 maybe 3 years. He's going to need someone to step up and take the mantle that he has created. We will also need a defensive coaching personality to step up and "take the reins" so to speak. It certainly isn't Mattison. I do not want the Mattison/Nolan types that have defenses that bend and don't break. Screw that, this is Ravens football. We attack on Defense! We need a coach that will bring that personality and fire! We should find a promising young disciple of Rex's crew. I'm sure there has to be someone that is studying hard on how to execute Rex's defense!

Quotes like this always crack me up because the only constant in life is change. Absolutely there will be great defenses again. Absolutely. Teams will figure out rules and work situations and create the defenses again. Coaches will scout players with the proper skill set to defend with the rule changes. People adapt, people change, and defenses will return. It's not like the NFL hasn't cycled through offensive and defensive eras before. Guys like Belicheck, Parcels, etc. They will always be adapting. Eventually a way will be found to defend successfully with these rule changes.

I agree with Papa here and I said it to my bro in law as soon as the play happened. There's no question the players' forward progress was stopped. Refs should have blown the whistle.

My bro-in-law summed it up for me. He said, quit your f#$%in whinnin, the Ravens are winning. He has a point. Haha

I think Cam knows that Flacco has to grow for this team to go where it wants to go. I think Cam was going to use Buffalo as a way of working lots of throws in for Flacco, but we got behind early and kinda jacked the plan up. Flacco still ended up throwing alot, but I don't think it was what Cam had in mind. Just a gut feeling there. As the season wears on, I imagine we're going to see more running. The weather gets cold and the passes slow down.

In hindsight we should have got something for him. I guess that is one weakness of our front office. We don't cut losses when we should and stockpile draftpicks. I do like the way NE does it. They've always got fresh legs moving in to compete. It keeps the team hungry. I do like our loyalty to some of our players though. Making Ray a Raven for life was necessary.

Do you mean those guys can't get in? If that's the case, wow! I'm not an expert on who is and isn't in the hall of fame or what it takes to get into the hall of fame. I would have to say though, the afore mentioned players with maybe the exception of Shannon are all from a totally differnet era, wouldn't Mason be going against the likes of Holt, Harrison, and Ward?

I do so wonder what some of our comments would be if two things did not happen: 1. Gaither stayed healthy and played. I believe he has a lot to do with out mauling running game. He was viscious in the running game. 2. If Kindle didn't get his major injury I really believe he would have contributed to this team. He played hard and fast and just "like" a Raven. However injuries happen every year and teams need to play through them. We need some players to step up! Where's our Hartwell? Thomas? Bart Scott? Where's our Will Demps? We've always had defenders step up to challenges. Hell even Gary Baxter stepped up! I don't see a single player on defense really stepping up beside Sugss, Ngata, and Ray. You can throw Ed in, but it's only been one week. We need more contributions from unsung players. Man up Ravens!

Seriously, how inept is this offense?

Glad we paid suggs big money to miss the sack!

Once again our offense cannot finish a game!

Our secondary is slow and cannot tackle. Also our d coordinator belongs in college. Not in the NFL.

Where the hell is terrance cody. I thought this guy was a beast. We've had trouble stopping the run today, couldnt we use him? Also what is with fitzpayrick juking ray lewis out of his shoes?! Comon man!!!!!!

I don't think Cowherd is 100% right, but I guarantee that he isn't all wrong. There's no doubt that teams are figuring Flacco out to a degree. He needs to prove that he can do more.

Whatever. It's clear concise posts like these that really piss me off....wait....haha. Honestly, very good post. I have a feeling Cowherd isn't totally wrong either though.

The fact of the matter remains....we have alot of work to do if this team is to go where it thinks it's capable of going. I think the article was pointing that out. We have alot of work ahead of us, that's not being pessamistic. Being pessamistic would be stating that the work is too hard or not possible to achieve. Acknowledging that we have a ton of work to do is essential to winning a championship if we want to win one. Championship teams don't let games get away like we let this past game get away. We need to keep our foot down and finish that type of game. This team is more than capable of addressing problems with the amount of talent that we have, that's a major positive! It's good to say that we are a playoff team that has not reached their ceiling yet.

This is all good news. The players can learn to hit hard while making a sound tackle. In rugby you absolutely have to tackle a certain way and it doesn't limit the tenacity of that game, why should the NFL allow players to permanently ruin players' lives with big hits. Tackles can be made with precision and power without helmet to helmet and unnecessary defenseless hits.

I'm still puzzled as to why we replaced the Blitz happy coordinator with a college coordinator. You would think Harbs would have wanted to bring someone in from the Eagles organization. In any case, we absolutely should be blitzing much more than we do! It's what the mentality of this team is, blitz first, think later haha. Really though, this defense is made up of attackers and risk takers, not cover two disciplinarians. Let em loose!

I think the failed QB sneak was the beginning of the lost momentum. And yes, the best QBs are able to thread some needles when they have to. Tell Manning, Rivers, Brees, Brady, and Rothlesberger don't do it? Tell me that the Santonio TD for Super Bowl was drawn up. It wasn't the WR made an adjustment and Ben rifled the ball to a tight window. Santonio made an equally great catch. Were's that with Boldin etc? They can't make the catches if Joe doesn't throw. The throws HAVE to be down the field in those instances.