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It was early August and outside linebacker Jadeveon Clowney was looking for work visiting the castle that Steve Biscotti built when he bumped into new Ravens wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. in the halls of the sprawling $220 million Owings Mills facility.
Nearly a decade earlier, in 2014, the two had entered the NFL as part of the same star-studded draft class, Clowney as the first overall pick by the Houston Texans and Beckham as the 12th overall pick by the New York Giants. Now here they were, two aging and outsized if not oft-injured stars in search of one last shot at Super Bowl glory in the twilight of their respective careers. Their paths had actually crossed before, in 2021, when they were briefly teammates on the Browns before Beckham’s controversial departure from Cleveland six games into the year. He went on to win a ring with the Los Angeles Rams later that season, while Clowney would have his own ugly exit from the organization after the following season.
“I know what kind of player he is, what he brings to the table and I knew this place would be perfect,” Beckham recently told The Baltimore Sun of the encounter. “I knew he’d been through XYZ, but knew he could still play.”
Indeed.
Clowney, 30, tied his career-high with 9 1/2 sacks during the regular season, played every game in a season for the first time since 2017 and logged 654 snaps, his second-most since 2018. He was a disruptive presence, too, with 23 quarterback pressures, as well as a valuable edge-setter against the run. Perhaps not coincidentally, he’s also been healthy and happy, meshing well in a locker room replete with large personalities and rising young stars, particularly on defense.
Much of his success, Clowney told The Sun, can be traced to the work he put in during the offseason in Houston with trainer Ben Fairchild, who was recommended to him by former Texans teammates Johnathan Joseph and Kareem Jackson and with whom he has worked at Fairchild’s eponymous performance center in Houston since the weeks leading up to the 2021 season. The alliance paid off then just as it did now, with Clowney playing 14 games that year and registering nine sacks, which led to him re-signing for another year with the Browns.
But things soured in Cleveland late last year when he was quoted by cleveland.com three days before the final game of the regular season as saying the organization was more interested in individual accolades for fellow edge rusher Myles Garrett than winning. Clowney was sent home the next day and made inactive for the game.
“You’re all trying to get [Garrett] into the Hall of Fame instead of winning games,” Clowney was quoted as saying, in part, adding that the situation was “B.S.” and that he didn’t have time for it.
Baltimore Ravens practice for 2023 season
Karl Merton Ferron/Baltimore Sun“I was planning on sitting out this season,” outside linebacker Jadeveon Clowney, right, recently told The Baltimore Sun. (Karl Merton Ferron/Staff)A free agent in the summer, Clowney, a three-time Pro Bowl selection, also began to eventually wonder if other teams had time for him, or if he did for them. In no hurry to participate in training camp after 10 seasons littered with injuries, surgeries and arduous recoveries, including what he said was an annually aching knee from a torn meniscus he suffered his rookie year, he considered all the options, including not playing.
“I was planning on sitting out this season,” he told The Sun. “I was done with football, and all that training was gonna be for nothing because people were feeling some type of way from what happened in Cleveland. I don’t know, maybe I’d get picked up in midseason.”
He said he also struggled to find a solution to his ailing knee and that he also underwent surgery on his elbow after being diagnosed with pitcher’s elbow, a diagnosis that is caused by overuse and repetitive motion, which results in pain and swelling from the elbow down to the wrist.
Clowney said the injury, along with what he says was a torn triceps, sapped his power last year, and the unrelenting knee issue didn’t help things, either.
“I tried a lot of stuff,” he said of treatments for his knee. “I went to see guys all over, from New York, to Miami, to L.A. Anybody that was hitting me up telling me they could help me with my knee, I was going to see them.”
Eventually, he settled on stem-cell injections in New York on the recommendation of current Dallas Cowboys cornerback Stephon Gilmore and former Texans wide receiver Andre Johnson.
“I didn’t know all of that when I was playing for Cleveland,” Clowney said of the arm injuries. “They were telling me I had a bone spur; they never told me that was torn. I played every game like that and I wasn’t using my power like I needed to.”
He’d also become disenchanted over the experience he had with his previous two teams, the Browns and Tennessee Titans.
But the chance encounter with Beckham, who raved about the culture in Baltimore, helped sway him, and a $2.5 million deal that could be worth up to $6 million with incentives didn’t hurt, either. Clowney said the organization reminded him of the Seattle Seahawks, for whom he played one season in 2019 after being traded from the Texans.
“They respect players, veterans, want you to come in and be a pro,” he said of the Ravens. “The other two places, they were like college to me, it was, ‘do what we say, it’s the system, it’s not about the players.’ I was like, what are they talking about? That [expletive] ain’t gonna work with our players. When I got here, they made it all about the players. It made it easy to play for the staff, to play for somebody who respects you as a football player and somebody who loves the game instead of questioning your love for the game. Just be a grown man, come in and be professional, do your job and go home is the attitude here.
“I love it here. I can just watch guys move around in the building, how they’re interacting. I hadn’t been here for 48 hours and thought I could fit. [Coach John] Harbaugh is also a guy I’ve been a fan of my whole career.”
It helped there was some familiarity among the staff, too. Ravens associate head coach/defensive line coach Anthony Weaver worked with Clowney in Houston and head trainer Adrian Dixon with him in Tennessee.
And even though controversy and questions swirled around Clowney’s exit from Cleveland, it didn’t take long for coaches and teammates to rave about the rejuvenated veteran.
“The guy that I see is a guy that loves playing football,” defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald said. “He loves being around his teammates. He’s a gregarious guy who has a lot of thoughts on a lot of things, which is cool to hear, and he plays the game the right way.”
Said outside linebackers coach Chuck Smith: “There’s nobody in this building, probably except Lamar Jackson, who’s had as much pressure as Jadeveon Clowney [has]. The difference in Jadeveon Clowney in other places, is that he’s developed a skill move. But also, add in, he has the complementary pieces around him that he’s not Jadeveon Clowney, the first-round pick, the No. 1 guy.”
The latter point is one Clowney acknowledges has helped tremendously, calling the linebacker group spearheaded by inside backers Roquan Smith and Patrick Queen the best he’s been around in his career.
Clowney, though, has been pretty good himself.
While there was a three-game stretch in the middle of the season when he had zero sacks and just two pressures, has been fairly consistent in wreaking havoc, particularly when not getting chipped off the edge by a second blocker.
Perhaps his best game came in Week 12 against the Los Angeles Chargers at SoFi Stadium, where was a constant menace to quarterback Justin Herbert and delivered the game’s biggest play with a clutch fourth-quarter strip-sack of Herbert that ended a 21-play drive that had spanned nearly nine minutes. In that game, he recorded a pressure rate of 24%, per Next Gen Stats, and the Ravens won, 20-10.
Ravens Chargers Football
Ryan Sun/APRavens outside linebacker Jadeveon Clowney strip-sacks Chargers quarterback Justin Herbert on Nov. 26. (Ryan Sun/AP)“He’s a real impressive dude in terms of the ways he plays and the way his mentality is in terms of him saying he wants something and then he goes and gets it,” Ravens third-year outside linebacker Odafe Oweh told The Sun. “I knew he was coming back from a controversial career; kudos to him for that; it’s not easy.
“I heard some negative things [but] I was impressed. He’s a genuine dude [and] he just wants to win.”
As Beckham notes, it helps that the Ravens won, too. They finished the regular season with the best record in the NFL, are the top seed in the AFC and have home-field advantage through the conference championship game.
After earning the coveted first-round bye, Baltimore will host the team that drafted Clowney, the Texans, in Saturday’s divisional round.
The Ravens are 9 1/2-point favorites in that game, and they’re the AFC favorite to reach the Super Bowl, which would be the first of Clowney’s career. Pressure and expectations are high after the Ravens flamed out in 2019, when they went 14-2 and secured the top seed but were stunned at home in the divisional round by the Titans.
Clowney’s presence on the field and in the locker room should help, much the way it has all year.
“Sometimes in here you wanna win so much, it’s so tight,” Oweh told The Sun. “He does a good job easing the room. He’s funny as hell.”
Veteran defensive tackle Michael Pierce has noticed it, too.
“Anytime you can get premium guys off the edge, it’s always a good time,” he said. “And he keeps everything light, he laughs a lot, he has fun with football. He plays like the young guy we used to know. It’s been good to see him resurrect his career. He’s a team guy. He’s been awesome.”
And motivated, too, given how the divorce from Cleveland played out, within the organization and in the media, and that he felt like he never got the chance to live up to the hype he built coming out of South Carolina as the top overall pick because of injuries.
“I felt like I left a lot out there and got the short end of the stick because I got hurt early in my career,” he told The Sun. “You ain’t get to see the guy you drafted after I had my knee injury. I was never past 80% or 85%, and I wasn’t the guy I wanted to be, so in the back of my head, I wanted to get back to that point where I could go out and perform.
“[Leaving Cleveland] motivated me the most because people got a perception that I was a bad teammate or out for myself. … But that’s behind me now. I can’t control what people think, what people wrote about what I said or didn’t say. This year, it’s just, put your head down and grind and let the chips fall where they may.”
If Clowney can deliver in the postseason the way he did in the regular season, that just might include a Super Bowl championship.
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Baltimore Ravens linebacker Kyle Van Noy works on pass rushing drills during practice at the Under Armour Performance Center in Owings Mills, Md. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) 
Baltimore Ravens defensive tackle Justin Madubuike (92), works on pass rushing drills during practice at the Under Armour Performance Center in Owings Mills, Md. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) 
Baltimore Ravens defensive lineman Michael Pierce (58), works on pass rushing drills during practice at the Under Armour Performance Center in Owings Mills, Md. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) 
Baltimore Ravens defensive tackle Bravvion Roy works on pass rushing drills during practice at the Under Armour Performance Center in Owings Mills, Md. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) 
Baltimore Ravens linebackers Roquan Smith (0), and Trenton Simpson (51) move to the next drill during practice at the Under Armour Performance Center in Owings Mills, Md. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) 
Baltimore Ravens head coach John Harbaugh talks with wide receiver Rashod Bateman during practice at the Under Armour Performance Center in Owings Mills, Md. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) 
Baltimore Ravens linebacker Odafe Oweh (99), right, works with outside linebackers coach Chuck Smith on pass rushing drills during practice at the Under Armour Performance Center in Owings Mills, Md. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) 
Baltimore Ravens defensive tackle Justin Madubuike (92), works on pass rushing drills during practice at the Under Armour Performance Center in Owings Mills, Md. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) 
Baltimore Ravens linebacker Kyle Van Noy works on pass rushing drills during practice at the Under Armour Performance Center in Owings Mills, Md. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) 
Baltimore Ravens defensive tackle Justin Madubuike (92), works with outside linebackers coach Chuck Smith on pass rushing drills during practice at the Under Armour Performance Center in Owings Mills, Md. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) 
Baltimore Ravens tight end Mark Andrews move to the next drill during practice at the Under Armour Performance Center in Owings Mills, Md. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) 
Baltimore Ravens seconary coach Chris Hewitt work with the defensive back during practice at the Under Armour Performance Center in Owings Mills, Md. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) -
While the status of tight end Mark Andrews, the Ravens’ top pass-catcher in 2021 and 2022, remains day to day, the team’s leading receiver this season — rookie Zay Flowers — is expected to play in Saturday’s playoff opener.
“I feel great,” Flowers said Wednesday. “I’m ready to go.”
Flowers caught nine passes in his NFL debut Sept. 10 against the Houston Texans — the Ravens’ opponent in the AFC divisional round — and has recorded 77 receptions for 858 yards and five touchdowns in 16 games. The first-round draft pick out of Boston College missed the Week 18 game against the Pittsburgh Steelers with a calf injury and did not practice last week. He was limited in practice Tuesday but was a full participant Wednesday.
Andrews has been out since suffering an ankle injury Nov. 16 against the Cincinnati Bengals, but there’s a chance he could play Saturday. He was a full participant in practice Wednesday.
“It’s day by day. It’s week by week,” he said, noting that it’s “very promising where I’m at.”
Cornerback Marlon Humphrey again missed practice Wednesday, leaving his status for Saturday up in the air. The Ravens are no stranger to playing without the three-time Pro Bowl selection, who’s missed seven games this season, including Baltimore’s Week 1 win over Houston.
Wide receiver Tylan Wallace (knee), linebacker Del’Shawn Phillips (knee) and outside linebacker Jadeveon Clowney (illness) also did not practice Wednesday. Outside linebacker Odafe Oweh (ankle) and linebacker Malik Harrison (groin) practiced fully after being limited Tuesday.
One player who could be back is two-time Pro Bowl returner Devin Duvernay, who has been out since Dec. 10 with a back injury but has been a full participant in practice this week. Ravens special teams coordinator Chris Horton said that if Duvernay is healthy, he would resume his kick and punt returning roles over Justice Hill and Wallace, respectively.
The Ravens will be without reserve running back Melvin Gordon III. After rushing for 81 yards and a touchdown in four games this season, he was waived Wednesday, the team announced. The Ravens signed Dalvin Cook, a four-time Pro Bowl selection, earlier this month after he was released by the New York Jets.
Houston, meanwhile, was missing five players at Wednesday’s practice: defensive ends Will Anderson Jr. (ankle), Jonathan Greenard (ankle) and Jerry Hughes (ankle); defensive tackle Sheldon Rankins (ribs/shoulder); and fullback Andrew Beck (back). Seven others were limited: linebackers Blake Cashman (knee), Christian Harris (calf) and Denzel Perryman (ribs); wide receivers Robert Woods (hip) and John Metchie III (foot); cornerback Kris Boyd (hamstring); and defensive tackle Maliek Collins (hip).
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Ravens tight end Mark Andrews said he’s still facing a “day-by-day” decision as he prepares for a potential return from ankle surgery in Saturday’s divisional round playoff matchup with the visiting Houston Texans.
“It feels incredible. It’s a blessing,” Andrews, a three-time Pro Bowl selection, said Wednesday in his first public remarks since the injury that seemed to end his season.
Andrews hobbled off after Cincinnati Bengals linebacker Logan Wilson tackled him around the legs early in the Ravens’ Nov. 16 win at M&T Bank Stadium. Though coach John Harbaugh immediately said Andrews’ ankle injury was serious, he left open the possibility for a postseason return after the tight end visited surgeon Robert Anderson in Charlotte, North Carolina.
“We ended up talking with the doctors and going through the surgery, and the surgery went incredibly well,” Andrews said. “You just never know. It’s day-by-day, week-by-week. I made a lot of progress every week. It was big, big jumps. I’m feeling good with where I’m at right now. It’s still day-by-day, like everyone is saying. But it’s very promising where I’m at.”
He was listed as a full participant on Wednesday’s injury report after returning to practice last week.
Andrews credited the Ravens’ detailed rehabilitation plan and added that his girlfriend’s family chipped in by lending him a hyperbaric oxygen chamber for recovery. He still had to work to reduce the swelling in his ankle after each hard practice.
He said it was both uplifting and difficult to watch the Ravens (13-4) play some of their best games and clinch the No. 1 seed in the AFC playoffs without him. His backup, Isaiah Likely, caught five touchdown passes in six games in his absence.
“You see it game-by-game, him getting better and better and making big-time plays,” said Andrews, who led the team in catches and receiving yards in each of the previous four seasons after being drafted in 2018. “That’s a credit to how hard he’s worked. It’s been awesome to see him do that. We’re thankful to have him.”
Wilson’s hip-drop tackle on Andrews reinvigorated debate over a possible rule change prohibiting the practice, but Andrews had no interest in fueling that discussion.
“It’s just kind of an unfortunate event,” he said. “I’m going to let everybody else do their thing. If they want to ban the tackle, fine. But I’m going to go out there and play hard no matter what. I don’t blame the guy. He’s just playing ball.”
Asked what factors will determine his game status Saturday, Andrews said: “I think it’s how I feel at the end of the day. Just knowing how good this team is, how good our players are, how good our tight ends are, if I feel like I’m going to be helpful to the team, I’ll go. If I feel like I’m close but not there, I’ll let these guys go and hopefully get that next weekend.”
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Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson was shaking his head and fidgeting before the question was even finished. It wasn’t because he was chilled from the dropping temperature.
“I’m antsy, but I have to stay locked in knowing what’s ahead,” he said. “I’m definitely antsy.”
The 27-year-old $260 million face of the franchise was talking about having an extra week off and waiting to find out Baltimore’s opponent in the divisional round of the playoffs after the Ravens finished the regular season with the best record in the AFC and received the conference’s only first-round bye. They will host the Houston Texans on Saturday at M&T Bank Stadium, where the quest for the organization’s third Super Bowl title begins in earnest. And as the Ravens prepare for a rematch of Week 1, reminders of the urgency of the opportunity in front of them percolate all around.
While Jackson’s future is secure after he signed a five-year extension in April that keeps him with the organization through the 2027 season, the same can’t be said for many of the important players surrounding him.
The Ravens have more than 20 players who are set to become free agents after their season ends. Many of them have been key contributors to a historically dominant defense that became the first in NFL history to lead the league in sacks (60), takeaways (31) and points allowed per game (16.5), and are unlikely to be back given the constraints of the salary cap and roster flexibility general manager Eric DeCosta will need to maintain to field a competitive team.
Among the most notable players on defense due to hit the open market are defensive tackle Justin Madubuike, inside linebacker Patrick Queen, outside linebackers Jadeveon Clowney and Kyle Van Noy, safety Geno Stone and cornerback Arthur Maulet.
Madubuike, who is a rare gifted run and pass disruptor for his position and whose 13 sacks in the regular season led all NFL interior defensive linemen, will command a salary of at least $20 million a year, according to a projection by Over The Cap. The Ravens, meanwhile, are projected to have only roughly $10 million in effective cap space.
Though that number is not set in stone and restructuring current deals can help create more room, there’s only so much that can be done. Others, like Queen, who had a career-high 133 tackles this season, will also fetch sizable offers, and with the Ravens already having invested $100 million over five years in fellow inside linebacker Roquan Smith after signing him to an extension last January, spending big for another player at the same position would be prohibitive. Clowney is another player who figures to get a pay raise after matching his career high with 9 1/2 sacks.
“It’s crazy,” Maulet said of the Ravens’ long list of future free agents. “They’re always built to win, too, so it’s not like they’re not going to get the first overall [draft] pick too many times.”
There are questions over who will be back on offense, too, with wide receivers Odell Beckham Jr. and Nelson Agholor, running backs J.K. Dobbins and Gus Edwards, guards Kevin Zeitler and John Simpson, and backup quarterbacks Tyler Huntley and Josh Johnson all slated for free agency as well.
By all measures, Baltimore had one of the best offenses in the league. The Ravens will still have receivers Zay Flowers and Rashod Bateman, along with tight ends Mark Andrews, Isaiah Likely and Charlie Kolar, running back Justice Hill, and, of course, Jackson. But the offensive line could look dramatically different, especially if there’s a change at the team’s two tackle spots with Ronnie Stanley and Morgan Moses having battled injury and age this season.
Given all of the moving pieces, the sense of winning now is palpable, particularly among the team’s veterans.
“This is the best chance I’ve had [to win a Super Bowl] besides when I was with the L.A. Rams,” said Beckham, who is in his first season in Baltimore. “I got to choose where I thought would be the champion. There were 32 teams to choose from.”
And with success, the rest of those teams will undoubtedly plunder the Ravens’ coaching and front office staffs.
Defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald, shown during practice Dec. 28, is among several Ravens coaches who have interviewed for head coaching jobs around the NFL. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) Already, seven coaches and front office personnel have interviewed with other organizations, with second-year defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald and first-year offensive coordinator Todd Monken among the most sought-after candidates to be head coaches elsewhere. Director of player personnel Joe Hortiz and vice president of football administration Nick Matteo, two key members of DeCosta’s front office, are also in the running for general manager jobs with the Los Angeles Chargers and Carolina Panthers, respectively.
It’s possible some of them could stay, but with a handful of jobs open around the NFL, that’s far from guaranteed. Either way, the Ravens are expected to lose at least some of their staff.
There’s also a sense of capitalizing on what has been perhaps Jackson’s best season to date.
The presumptive NFL Most Valuable Player for a second time, he has produced career highs in passing yards (3,678) and completion percentage (.672) along with a 102.7 passer rating, the second-highest mark of his career and best since his 2019 unanimous MVP season. This is also the best collection of talent he has had around him in his six years in Baltimore, but that group likely won’t be together long.
It’s also difficult to find the kind of chemistry the Ravens have enjoyed this season.
“I believe that this is one of the most connected teams I’ve ever been around,” coach John Harbaugh said. “I think it starts with the fact that I really believe they love one another. I think they have a spiritual connection that runs through the whole team. You can just tell when a group of people like being around one another, like working together, trust one another, believe in one another and want to see everybody succeed — the idea that if one of us succeeds, we all succeed.
“I see that with this group as much or more than any other team that I’ve been around in 40-plus years of coaching.”
In other words, opportunities like this one don’t come around very often.
AFC divisional round
Texans at Ravens
Saturday, 4:30 p.m.
TV: ABC
Radio: 97.9 FM, 101.5 FM, 1090 AM
Line: Ravens by 8 1/2
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Mark Andrews broke from the line during quarterback drills, sped downfield, quickly cut to the outside and leaped into the air, snagging a pass from Lamar Jackson before getting both feet down in bounds along the left sideline. That was the scene toward the end of Tuesday’s Ravens practice, which was held indoors after several inches of snow fell overnight at the Owings Mills facility.
“I think today was his best showing so far,” coach John Harbaugh said of Baltimore’s star tight end. “He took a big step. That’s encouraging. We’ll just have to see how it goes.”
Though Andrews, who is two months removed from ankle surgery, was limited, his sight wasn’t the only welcome one for the Ravens. Wide receiver Zay Flowers (calf) and outside linebacker Odafe Oweh (ankle) also returned to practice Tuesday, four days ahead of Baltimore’s divisional-round playoff game against the Houston Texans on Saturday at M&T Bank Stadium.
Flowers, the team’s leading receiver, missed the regular-season finale against the Pittsburgh Steelers two weeks ago and sat out practice all of last week. Oweh left the Ravens’ Jan. 6 loss to the Steelers with an ankle injury and also did not practice last week.
Both were limited Tuesday, as was linebacker Malik Harrison (groin).
Meanwhile, wide receiver Devin Duvernay (back), who was placed on injured reserve early last month but was designated to return last week, was back and a full participant. But cornerback Marlon Humphrey (calf), linebacker Del’Shawn Phillips (shoulder) and wide receiver Tylan Wallace (knee) did not practice.
For the Texans, fullback Andrew Beck (back), guard Dieter Eiselen (illness), defensive end Jerry Hughes (ankle), defensive tackle Sheldon Rankins (ribs), tackle Laremy Tunsil (rest) and guard Shaq Mason (rest) did not practice on Tuesday.
Seven others were limited for Houston, including defensive end Will Anderson Jr. (ankle), linebacker Denzel Perryman (ribs), defensive end Jonathan Greenard (ankle), defensive tackle Maliek Collins (hip), linebacker Blake Cashman (knee) and wide receivers John Metchie III (foot) and Robert Woods (hip).
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After having to wait an extra day to find out who their opponent would be in the AFC divisional round of the playoffs, the Ravens now know they’ll play the Houston Texans at 4:30 p.m. on Saturday at M&T Bank Stadium after the Buffalo Bills knocked off the Pittsburgh Steelers, 31-17, on Monday night in snowy Orchard Park, New York.
The fourth-seeded Texans are the lowest-seeded team remaining in the AFC after crushing the Cleveland Browns, 45-14, Saturday in Houston and thus draw the top-seeded Ravens. They’re also playing at a much higher level than they were in Week 1 of the regular season when Baltimore held them without a touchdown in an easy 25-9 victory on Sept. 10.
Baltimore Sun reporters Brian Wacker and Childs Walker answer the five biggest questions facing the Ravens as they prepare to take on the Texans.
How are the Texans different from when the Ravens beat them in Week 1?
Wacker: The last time these two teams met was so long ago, literally and metaphorically, that it feels like it was in a different season. C.J. Stroud was making his first NFL start and coach DeMeco Ryans his head coaching debut. Stroud threw for 242 yards and zero touchdowns while passing 44 times. He was also sacked five times and Houston averaged just 3.7 yards per play. Against the Browns, Stroud was far more deadly, completing 16 of 21 passes for 274 yards and three scores. He also hasn’t thrown an interception since mid-November, while the Texans’ defense harassed Browns quarterback Joe Flacco into two interceptions that they returned for touchdowns and sacked him four times.
Walker: That was Stroud’s first game as an NFL quarterback, Ryans’ first as an NFL head coach. The Texans’ most talented defensive players, edge rusher Will Anderson and cornerback Derek Stingley Jr., were also neophytes. The Ravens rolled up 30 pressures, six quarterback hits and five sacks against Stroud. The Browns’ top-ranked defense managed just five hurries and one quarterback hit against him in Houston’s wild-card round blowout. Stroud made use of that clean pocket to execute a near-perfect postseason debut. As John Harbaugh said Monday, the Texans are 17 games different than they were in the opener, and they’ve made the most of those 17 games.
The Texans dominated the highly rated Cleveland Browns defense in the wild-card round. How will they try to attack the Ravens’ defense?
Wacker: There are a few ways to make life tough on the Ravens: running the ball, controlling the clock and hitting on the occasional deep shot or off-script play. That’s easier said than done, of course, but Devin Singletary is a solid back with speed who has flashed a few times this season. The Texans are also coming off an efficient performance against the Browns in which Stroud was masterful in directing an offense that ranked in the 94th percentile in terms of expected points added, a metric that defines the value of each play by the effect it has on the offense’s likelihood to score.
Walker: Texans offensive coordinator Bobby Slowik, a hot name in the coaching rumor mill, called a masterful game in keeping the Browns off-balance. He learned under San Francisco 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan, so he favors zone runs and bootleg pass plays designed to stretch a defense horizontally, with deep shots peppered in. The Ravens just played the 49ers on Christmas, so they’re well-tutored on these concepts. They bottled up the Texans’ so-so running game in Week 1, built a two-score lead in the third quarter and kept Stroud uncomfortable. The Texans will hope to hit on a big play early so the Ravens can’t play from ahead and ratchet up the pressure.
Why should Ravens fans be worried about facing quarterback C.J. Stroud?
Wacker: Stroud is in such a rhythm and seemingly playing better every week he takes the field. Over the Texans’ past six games, excluding their Dec. 10 loss to the lowly Jets, he has completed 71.8% of his passes for an average of 265.8 yards passing per game and an average passer rating of 123.2 while throwing nine touchdowns and no interceptions. Stroud will be the NFL’s Offensive Rookie of the Year, though he’ll have to try to find a way to win in the playoffs for a second straight game without two of his top targets, Tank Dell and Noah Brown, both of whom combined for nearly 1,300 receiving yards this season.
Walker: Stroud is coming off one of the most impressive rookie quarterback seasons in history, and he actually raised his game against Cleveland’s fast, aggressive defense. He’s deadly on intermediate and deep throws and makes big-time connections without turning the ball over. A 23-to-5 touchdown-to-interception ratio is remarkable for a rookie who wasn’t playing conservatively. He’ll have to do it without two of his top targets, Dell and Brown, but he did fine without them against the Browns, in part because his connection with third-year wide receiver Nico Collins is already one of the league’s most fruitful.
How will the Ravens’ defense, which led the NFL in sacks, takeaways and points allowed per game, attack the Texans’ offense?
Wacker: Putting pressure on the rookie, much the way they did in Week 1, will again be paramount. Defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald has been terrific with his disguises, from simulated pressures to unusual twists and stunts. Baltimore has gone after quarterbacks all year long and with success, and that’s not changing.
Walker: Macdonald is a master of deception, keeping quarterbacks uncomfortable with simulated pressure, stunts at the line of scrimmage and shifting zone coverage. He’ll try to keep changing the picture in front of Stroud and generate pressure without leaning too heavily on blitzes. As poised as Stroud is, his Pro Football Focus passing grade fell from 90.8 out of a clean pocket to 51.9 when he was under pressure. The Browns could not make him throw under duress. The Ravens’ effort to get to Stroud will be as important as any subplot in the game.
Ravens vs Texans
Jerry Jackson/Baltimore SunRavens running back Justice Hill heads for the end zone for a touchdown against the Texans in the season opener on Sept. 10. (Jerry Jackson/Staff)The Texans’ defense has allowed 12 points per game over its past three. How will the Ravens’ offense attack them?
Wacker: We’ve seen Lamar Jackson dial up the passing game and take shots downfield against susceptible defenses and the Texans certainly qualify with one of the poorer secondaries in the league, especially on the outside. Also, watch out for Justice Hill catching passes out of the backfield and for the Ravens to milk things on the ground if they get in front.
Walker: Houston’s defense ranked 23rd in Defense-Adjusted Value Over Average (DVOA) against the pass, allowing 6.5 yards per attempt but stiffening on third down. So don’t be surprised if Lamar Jackson comes out firing on early downs. Offensive coordinator Todd Monken seems to prefer building a lead with his passing game and locking it down with a more run-heavy attack after halftime. Flacco found plenty of success against the Texans before his pair of pick-sixes in the third quarter upended everything. Houston’s secondary covers the middle of the field, where Jackson prefers to work, better than the outside, but is vulnerable to deep shots.
AFC divisional round
Texans at Ravens
Saturday, 4:30 p.m.
TV: ABC
Radio: 97.9 FM, 101.5 FM, 1090 AM
Line: Ravens by 8 1/2
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The wait is finally over.
After the AFC wild-card round ended Monday with the Buffalo Bills’ 31-17 win over the Pittsburgh Steelers in a game postponed a day by a snowstorm, the top-seeded Ravens (13-4) know they’ll host the Houston Texans (11-7) in the divisional round at 4:30 p.m. Saturday.
It’s a rematch of the Ravens’ season opener at M&T Bank Stadium on Sept. 10, but much has changed for both teams since then. Here are five things to know about the Texans as they prepare to make a return trip to Baltimore:
They have a record-setting rookie quarterback
In NFL history, only Joe Montana and Tom Brady have ever finished the season first in both passing yards per game and touchdown-to-interception ratio. C.J. Stroud did it as a rookie.
The No. 2 overall draft pick threw for 4,108 yards with 23 touchdowns and five interceptions to lead the Texans to a 10-7 regular-season record and their first AFC South title since 2019. Then, at 22 years and 102 days old, the former Ohio State star became the youngest quarterback to win a playoff game when he torched the Cleveland Browns’ vaunted defense for 274 yards and three touchdowns in a 45-14 rout.
“C.J. is the reason why we’re in this position,” first-year coach DeMeco Ryans said after Saturday’s victory. “He’s special, a special young man. Special player. Continues to shine no matter how big the moment is.”
Backup quarterback Case Keenum, an 11-year veteran, took it a step further.
“I think he’s gonna be the best of all time,” Keenum told The Athletic. “Like, he truly has the ability to be that way. … I know, it’s very early to say that sort of stuff. But, man, he does some stuff that is just out of this world.”
They’ve made an unprecedented turnaround
After churning through Bill O’Brien, interim Romeo Crennel and former Ravens assistant David Culley, the Texans went 3-13-1 with former Chicago Bears and Tampa Bay Buccaneers coach Lovie Smith last season. He, too, was fired.
The Texans then hired Ryans, a former All-Pro linebacker in Houston who had become one of the league’s budding stars as defensive coordinator for the San Francisco 49ers. In one season, the 39-year-old Ryans rebuilt the franchise into a contender.
One year after allowing 2,894 rushing yards, the sixth-most in NFL history, the Texans allowed the sixth-fewest (1,643) in the league. They rose from 28th in Defense-Adjusted Value Over Average (DVOA) last year to 16th this season, according to FTN Fantasy. They jumped from 31st in defensive grade to 11th, according to Pro Football Focus.
After finishing in last place in the AFC South, Houston is the first team in the Super Bowl era to win its division with a rookie coach and a rookie quarterback.
Ravens vs. Texans
Kenneth K. Lam/Baltimore SunRavens linebacker Patrick Queen, top, sacks Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud during the season opener at M&T Bank Stadium on Sept. 10. (Kenneth K. Lam/Staff)They’re a completely different team from Week 1
The Texans hardly looked like a playoff team in the season opener, as the Ravens rolled to a 25-9 victory at M&T Bank Stadium.
Houston averaged just 3.7 yards per play that day, while Stroud was sacked five times and lost a fumble. Running backs Dameon Pierce and Devin Singletary averaged fewer than 3 yards per carry.
Since that game, Stroud blossomed into an NFL Most Valuable Player candidate, Nico Collins grew into an elite wide receiver and Singletary became one of the league’s most productive running backs. Rookie wideout Tank Dell also flashed his potential with 709 receiving yards and seven touchdowns in 11 games before suffering a season-ending leg fracture.
The 6-foot-4, 215-pound Collins finished top 10 in both receiving yards (1,297) and touchdown catches (eight), while Singletary recorded a career-best 898 rushing yards after supplanting Pierce, who struggled in the team’s new outside zone running scheme. From Week 9 on, only Christian McCaffrey and Najee Harris rushed for more yards than Singletary, who had 66 yards and a touchdown against Cleveland.
The defense is peaking at the right time
The season opener offered a glimpse of what was to come for Houston.
After sacking Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson four times in Week 1, the Texans finished the season with 46 sacks and ranked fifth in the league in pressure rate (25.7%) despite blitzing at one of the lowest rates in the league (21%).
Will Anderson Jr., who Houston traded up to select No. 3 overall, led all rookies with 59 quarterback pressures and recorded seven sacks while grading well against the run. Fellow defensive end Jonathan Greenard also enjoyed a breakout season, ranking 10th in the league with 12 1/2 sacks.
That ability to generate pressure made the difference in Saturday’s win over the Browns, as Joe Flacco was sacked four times and threw a pair of interceptions that were returned for touchdowns on back-to-back drives. The former Ravens quarterback had a passer rating of 31.7 when pressured, according to ESPN.
The Texans also have a budding shutdown corner. After struggling during his rookie season, Derek Stingley Jr. is playing at a Pro Bowl level and is coming off perhaps the best performance of his career. Stingley covered Browns star receiver Amari Cooper on 83.3% of his routes Saturday and allowed just one catch for minus-6 yards just three weeks after Cooper burned Houston’s secondary for a franchise-record 265 yards.
They’ve had some impressive wins … and disappointing losses
While a 23-19 win over the Indianapolis Colts in Week 18 sealed a playoff berth for the Texans, some head-scratching losses earlier in the season nearly kept them out.
An 0-2 start was followed by dominant wins over the Jacksonville Jaguars (37-17) and Pittsburgh Steelers (30-6), but then Houston allowed Desmond Ridder to throw for 329 yards in a 21-19 loss to the Atlanta Falcons on a last-second field goal.
Two weeks later, the Texans fell, 15-13, to the Carolina Panthers, who finished the season 2-15. Stroud was held to 140 yards and was outplayed by No. 1 pick Bryce Young.
After winning four of its next five games, including a 30-27 victory over Joe Burrow and the Bengals, Houston allowed Zach Wilson to throw for 301 yards and two touchdowns in a 30-6 loss to the reeling New York Jets. Stroud went just 10-for-23 for 90 yards and was sacked four times before exiting late with a concussion, which forced him to miss the next two games.
But Stroud returned in Week 17 to lead a 26-3 win over the Tennessee Titans that kept Houston in playoff contention. After the game, he offered some prescient words of encouragement.
“The time is now,” he said. “It’s not next year. It’s not the year after that. It’s right now.”
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The Ravens will host the Houston Texans and sensational rookie quarterback C.J. Stroud in the AFC divisional round of the playoffs at 4:30 p.m. Saturday. The game will be broadcast on ABC and ESPN.
They had to wait an extra day to find out their opponent because of ferocious winter weather in Buffalo, but the Bills finished off the Ravens’ other potential foe, the Pittsburgh Steelers, 31-17, in Monday’s rescheduled AFC wild-card contest.
The Ravens beat the Texans, 25-9, in their season opener, but that was Stroud’s first NFL game, and he has since produced one of the greatest rookie quarterback seasons in league history. He hit a new peak on Saturday, completing 16 of 21 passes for 274 yards and three touchdowns as the Texans thrashed the Cleveland Browns and quarterback Joe Flacco, 45-14, in the wild-card round.
Ravens coach John Harbaugh praised the Texans after the opener, saying they would exceed expectations.
“They are 17 games different,” he said Monday when asked how they’ve evolved. “It’s coaching, experience — all the things that a good team does that continues to improve throughout the season. They’ve done a really good job of that. Obviously, they’re very well-coached. They have really good young players, some veteran players as well. They’ve continued to improve throughout [the season].”
The Ravens “dialed in” on preparing for the Texans as soon as they dispatched the Browns, Harbaugh said, but were ready to pivot to the No. 7 seed Steelers if they upset Buffalo.
Ravens fans had spent weeks anticipating a possible bittersweet reunion with their last Super Bowl hero, Flacco, who lifted the Browns to four straight wins and the AFC’s No. 5 seed after spending the first half of the season home with his family.
Instead, it will be Stroud, who completed 28 of 44 passes for 242 yards at M&T Bank Stadium in September, throwing to his top target, wide receiver Nico Collins. The Texans also feature a talented young defense led by rookie edge rusher Will Anderson, second-year cornerback Derek Stingley Jr. and linebacker Blake Cashman. Coach DeMeco Ryans led Houston, which drafted Stroud and Anderson with the second and third picks in the 2023 draft, respectively, to a seven-win improvement in his first season.
The Texans clinched their first AFC South title since 2019 by beating the Colts in Indianapolis on the last Sunday of the regular season while the Jacksonville Jaguars lost to the host Titans.
The Ravens went 13-4 in the regular season to earn the AFC’s No. 1 seed, the first-round bye and home-field advantage throughout the conference playoffs.
The No. 2 seed Bills, meanwhile, will host the No. 3 Kansas City Chiefs in the other AFC divisional round game at 6:30 p.m. Sunday. If the Ravens beat the Texans, they’ll host the AFC championship game at M&T Bank Stadium for the first time Sunday, Jan. 28 at 3 p.m.
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While the Ravens wait to find out who their playoff opponent will be in the divisional round, other teams are not. After Baltimore finished the regular season with the best record in the NFL at 13-4, organizations around the league began to target members of its coaching staff and front office to fill their vacancies.
Second-year Ravens defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald, the mastermind behind the first defense to lead the league in sacks (60), takeaways (31) and points per game allowed (16.5), has already interviewed with multiple teams that have head coach openings. First-year offensive coordinator Todd Monken, whose scheme tapped into the unique talents of quarterback and presumptive NFL Most Valuable Player Lamar Jackson, has as well.
No in-person interviews with a coach currently employed by another team that is playing in the postseason can take place until after this week’s divisional round, so the interviews were conducted remotely, though interviews for general manager openings can take place in person immediately.
Here’s a look at Ravens coaches and front office staff who have been interviewed so far.
Defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald
One of the hottest coaching candidates around the league, Macdonald, 36, has drawn rave reviews for his defensive wizardry, ability to connect with players and sharp mind. Over the past two seasons, the Ravens’ defense has ranked in the top five in scoring, total yards, rushing yards, red-zone touchdown rate and third-down conversion rate. Among the teams he has already interviewed with are the Los Angeles Chargers, Tennessee Titans, Carolina Panthers and Atlanta Falcons. The Washington Commanders also requested an interview, and the Seattle Seahawks are reportedly expected to. Macdonald would become the youngest head coach in the NFL if he were to be hired.
So far, Ravens offensive coordinator Todd Monken, whose lone head coaching job was with Southern Mississippi from 2013 to 2015, has interviewed with the Falcons, Chargers and Panthers. (Kenneth K. Lam/Staff) Offensive coordinator Todd Monken
In Monken’s first year in Baltimore after arriving off two straight national championships at Georgia, the Ravens’ offense ranked sixth in the NFL in yards per game (370.4) and Jackson was named first-team All-Pro. At 57, he’s 10 years older than the league’s average age for head coaches, but players have thrived in his scheme. So far, Monken, whose lone head coaching job was with Southern Mississippi from 2013 to 2015, has interviewed with the Falcons, Chargers and Panthers.
Ravens associate head coach/defensive line coach Anthony Weaver has already had interviews with Falcons, Commanders and Panthers. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) Associate head coach/defensive line coach Anthony Weaver
The 43-year-old former defensive end was the Houston Texans’ defensive coordinator in 2020 before rejoining Baltimore two years ago and being promoted to associate head coach last year. Another head coach in the making, Weaver has already had interviews with Falcons, Commanders and Panthers.
Ravens passing game coordinator/secondary Chris Hewitt has interviewed with the Jaguars for their open defensive coordinator job. (Karl Merton Ferron/Staff) Passing game coordinator/secondary Chris Hewitt
The Ravens allowed the sixth-fewest passing yards and third-fewest passing touchdowns in the NFL this season, along with recording the third-most interceptions. Second-year safety Kyle Hamilton was also named an All-Pro and cornerback Brandon Stephens blossomed. That, among other things, caught the attention of the Jacksonville Jaguars, who interviewed Hewitt for their open defensive coordinator job. The 49-year-old has been with the Ravens since 2012, joining them as defensive backs coach the same season they went on to win the Super Bowl before being promoted to passing game coordinator/secondary in 2020.
Ravens defensive backs coach Dennard Wilson has interviewed with the Giants for their open defensive coordinator position. (Kevin Richardson/Staff) Defensive backs coach Dennard Wilson
Hewitt, of course, isn’t the only one drawing interest. After the New York Giants parted ways with defensive coordinator Don “Wink” Martindale, who served the Ravens in the same capacity from 2018 to 2021, they looked to Baltimore again, interviewing the defensive backs coach for the opening. Wilson, 41, is in his first year with the Ravens after coming over from the Philadelphia Eagles.
The Chargers have interviewed the Ravens’ director of player personnel Joe Hortiz for their general manager position after firing Tom Telesco along with coach Brandon Staley late in the regular season. (Kenneth K. Lam/Staff) Director of player personnel Joe Hortiz
Hortiz has been with the Ravens since 1998 and in his current position since 2019. Given the success of many of the Ravens’ draft picks and free agent signings, it’s of little surprise that Hortiz would be a hot job candidate, with the 48-year-old helping oversee college and pro scouting and serving as general manager Eric DeCosta’s top personnel evaluator. The Chargers have interviewed him for their general manager position after firing Tom Telesco along with coach Brandon Staley late in the regular season.
Vice president of football administration Nick Matteo
In his fourth season in Baltimore, Matteo oversees all areas of football administration, including day-to-day salary cap management and roster transactions. Before that, he spent nine years with the NFL Management Council, eventually being named the league’s senior director of labor operations. The Panthers, who fired general Scott Fitterer after the regular season, interviewed Matteo for the opening.
This story might be updated.
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While the Ravens have to wait until Monday night to find out who they’ll face in the divisional round of the NFL playoffs, kickoff at M&T Bank Stadium has been narrowed down to two possible time slots.
The NFL announced Sunday night its divisional round schedule, including two games each on Saturday, Jan. 20, and Sunday, Jan. 21. The first AFC game will kick off at 4:30 p.m. Saturday and will feature either the No. 4 seed Houston Texans traveling to Kansas City to face the No. 3 Chiefs or Houston heading to Baltimore to take on the No. 1 Ravens. The second AFC matchup kicks off at 6:30 p.m. Sunday and will be either Kansas City at the No. 2 Buffalo Bills or the No. 7 Pittsburgh Steelers at Baltimore.
The AFC matchups are still in limbo after the Bills-Steelers wild-card game was postponed from 1 p.m. Sunday to 4:30 p.m. Monday because of a snowstorm that swept through Buffalo. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said Sunday that the game “will not be pushed back again” despite an ongoing travel ban in the area around Highmark Stadium in Orchard Park.
Essentially, the Ravens’ hosting scenarios next weekend boil down to this:
- If the Bills beat the Steelers on Monday, the Ravens will host the Texans at 4:30 p.m. Saturday (ESPN/ABC).
- If the Steelers beat the Bills, the Ravens will host the Steelers at 6:30 p.m. Sunday (CBS).
Buffalo enters Monday’s game as a 10-point favorite over Pittsburgh, which landed in the Buffalo area Sunday afternoon after delaying its travel plans because of the postponement. The Texans, meanwhile, rolled to a 45-14 win over Cleveland Browns and former Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco on Saturday behind three touchdown passes from rookie C.J. Stroud.
The Ravens (13-4) received a first-round bye and home-field advantage throughout the AFC playoffs after finishing with the league’s best regular-season record. If the Ravens win their divisional round matchup and advance to the AFC championship game, M&T Bank Stadium would host for the first time. That game is set to kick off Sunday, Jan. 28, at 3 p.m. and will be broadcast on CBS.
Super Bowl 58 kicks off at 6:30 p.m. on Sunday, Feb. 11, at Allegiant Stadium, home of the Las Vegas Raiders, and will be televised on CBS.
NFL postseason schedule
Saturday, Jan. 20
AFC: Houston at Baltimore/Kansas City, 4:30 p.m. (ESPN/ABC, ESPN+)
NFC: Green Bay at San Francisco, 8 p.m. (Fox)
Sunday, Jan. 21
AFC: Philadelphia/Tampa Bay at Detroit, 3 p.m. (NBC, Peacock)
AFC: Kansas City at Buffalo or Pittsburgh at Baltimore (CBS, Paramount+)
Sunday, Jan. 28
AFC championship game, 3 p.m. (CBS, Paramount+)
NFC championship game, 6:30 p.m. (Fox)
Sunday, Feb. 11
Super Bowl 58, 6:30 p.m. (CBS)
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By LARRY LAGE (AP Sports Writer)
DETROIT (AP) — Jared Goff threw for a touchdown and completed a game-sealing first down against the team that cast him away, and the Detroit Lions won a playoff game for the first time in 32 years, beating Matthew Stafford and the Los Angeles Rams 24-23 on Sunday night.
The Lions (13-5) ended a nine-game postseason losing streak — the longest in NFL history — that dated to a victory over Dallas on Jan. 5, 1992. They lost a home playoff game two years later and hadn’t hosted one since.
Detroit will have two home playoff games for the first time in franchise history, hosting either Tampa Bay or Philadelphia in the divisional round next Sunday.
The Rams (10-8) had a chance to take the lead late in the fourth quarter, but Detroit’s defense held. A holding penalty pushed Los Angeles out of field goal range, and Stafford — the Lions’ longtime quarterback who won a Super Bowl after he was traded to the Rams — threw incomplete on fourth down.
On the first play after the two-minute warning, Goff hit Amon-Ra St. Brown for 11 yards, allowing the Lions to run out the clock — much to the delight of long-suffering fans who witnessed the franchise’s second postseason victory since winning the 1957 NFL title.
Against the franchise he once led to the Super Bowl, Goff was 22 of 27 for 277 yards and threw a 2-yard touchdown pass to rookie tight end Sam LaPorta that put Detroit ahead 21-10 midway through the second quarter. The Lions acquired Goff and a pair of first-round picks for Stafford three years ago.
Stafford, who played most of the game with a bandaged and bloody hand after he slammed it into a defender’s helmet, finished 25 of 36 for 367 yards with two touchdowns. Record-breaking rookie Puka Nacua had nine receptions for 181 yards.
David Montgomery and rookie Jahmyr Gibbs each had a rushing touchdown for the Lions, and St. Brown had seven receptions for 110 yards.
The Lions scored on their first two drives to take a 14-3 lead.
The Rams got within 21-17 at halftime thanks to Stafford’s 50-yard touchdown pass to Nacua and his 38-yarder to Tutu Atwell.
Michael Badgley’s season-long, 54-yard field goal gave the Lions a seven-point lead midway through the third quarter.
The Rams moved the ball at will for much of the game, but had to settle for short field goals by Brett Maher on drives late in the third and midway through the fourth to get within 24-23 with 8:10 remaining.
Stafford has made a career of fourth-quarter comebacks, a fact the fans at Ford Field were well aware of. With a chance to put the Rams ahead for the first time, he led a drive to the Detroit 34, but the Lions’ defense forced him backwards from there.
Detroit took over with 4:07 to go, and Los Angeles had only one timeout left after calling two earlier in the half to cope with a crowd as loud as a blaring siren. That allowed Goff to take a knee after his throw to St. Brown.
The Lions started strong and looked as fired up as their long-suffering fans, with rapper and Motor City native Eminem in the house along with Hall of Famers Barry Sanders and Calvin Johnson.
The fans showered Stafford with boos when he ran onto the field, where he posed for a pregame photo with his wife and their daughters, and chanted “Jar-ed Goff! Jar-ed Goff” for the Lions’ third-year quarterback.
INJURIES
Rams: Stafford’s right hand was taped up after it was cut in the second quarter and he walked off the field slowly after getting hit by two Lions late in the third. … RB Kyren Williams had a hand injury in the fourth quarter. … TE Tyler Higbee limped off the field, favoring his right leg, after taking a low hit in the fourth. … S Jordan Fuller, the team’s second-leading tackler, was ruled out after being listed as questionable with an ankle injury.
Lions: WR/KR Kalif Raymond, TE James Mitchell and CB Jerry Jacobs were inactive.
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By SCHUYLER DIXON (AP Pro Football Writer)
ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — Aaron Jones grew up idolizing Emmitt Smith and the Dallas Cowboys.
The Green Bay running back found a new, and most painful, way to torment the all-time rushing leader’s former team.
Jones ran for three touchdowns, Jordan Love threw for three more in his postseason debut, Darnell Savage returned an interception 64 yards for a score and the Packers handed the Cowboys their first home loss since the 2022 opener in a 48-32 wild-card stunner Sunday.
“This was my dad’s team,” Jones, who has 488 yards in four career games against the Cowboys, said of his late father. “You always want to be like your father, so that’s how it became my team. Dallas is a special place to me, so it’s a full-circle moment. It feels like home.”
Even against a team that had won 16 consecutive home games.
Green Bay (10-8) will visit top-seeded San Francisco in the divisional round next weekend.
Dak Prescott threw two interceptions before three mostly empty touchdown passes in another playoff flop for him and the No. 2 seed Cowboys (12-6).
The first home loss for the Cowboys since now-retired Tom Brady and Tampa Bay beat them 16 months ago was also the most points the franchise has allowed in a postseason game. The previous high was 38.
The Cowboys, who haven’t reached an NFC championship game since the most recent of their five Super Bowl titles 28 years ago, didn’t trail by more than eight points at AT&T Stadium this season before falling behind 27-0 in the first half.
The loss will raise questions about the future of Dallas coach Mike McCarthy after the Cowboys lost their playoff opener at home for the second time in three postseasons under the former Green Bay coach.
Dallas is the first team to win at least 12 games in three consecutive playoff seasons without making a conference title game.
The Cowboys surged to the NFC East title in the final two weeks and had a chance to be home at least twice this postseason. Instead, they head into a suddenly uncertain offseason.
“Just shocked, honestly,” Prescott said. “From the beginning of the game, we got beat. There’s no which way around it. There’s no way to sugar coat it. Shock.”
Romeo Doubs had a career-high 151 yards receiving a week after being hospitalized with a chest injury as the Packers rolled after finishing the regular season 6-2 to grab the NFC’s final playoff spot.
“We came in here with a mindset of we’re going to dominate,” Love said. “A lot of people were counting us out, and we didn’t care about that.”
The Packers have never lost in six trips to AT&T Stadium — including the Super Bowl over Pittsburgh during the 2010 season. They now have two playoff victories over the Cowboys after Aaron Rodgers led a 34-31 divisional win when Dallas was the NFC’s top seed in 2016, Prescott’s rookie year.
Those Packers let a 21-3 lead slip away. These Packers, with the four-time MVP’s successor, left little doubt with a 48-16 fourth-quarter lead before two late Dallas TDs.
“We knew it would take time,” Jones said. “You would hear me during the season and other players (say), we were right there, we’re right there, we’re right there. We’ve been able to get over that hump.”
Facing the NFL’s fifth-best defense, Green Bay matched its Super Bowl-winning team from 2010 for the most points in a playoff game. That was also on the road, a 48-21 victory at top-seeded Atlanta in the divisional round.
Doubs, who returned to the Green Bay sideline after his hospital trip before the end of last week’s 17-9 home victory over Chicago that secured a playoff spot, had 102 yards at halftime. It was seven more than the second-year player’s previous best.
First-half catches of 22, 26 and 39 yards helped get Love going, and the fourth-year QB finished 16 of 21 for 272 yards as the Packers scored touchdowns on six of their first seven offensive possessions in their highest-scoring game since 2014.
One of them was set up by Prescott’s first interception at the Dallas 19-yard line, from Jaire Alexander after he was questionable coming in when he sprained an ankle during the week.
A 46-yard grab by Doubs early in the second half helped finish off the Cowboys after they had scored 10 points on either side of the break. Doubs, Luke Musgrave and Dontayvion Wicks had TD catches.
Jones rushed for 118 yards, putting him over the century mark in all four career games against the Cowboys with nine touchdowns.
“That was fun,” said Green Bay coach Matt LaFleur, who took over in 2019 after McCarthy was fired during the 2018 season. “To put on a performance like that. Couldn’t be happier for them.”
The crowd under the retractable roof on a frigid day in the Dallas area had already been stone-cold silenced when Prescott tried to throw a slant to top receiver CeeDee Lamb.
Savage, who went without an interception in the regular season for the first time in his five-year career, stepped in front and run untouched for a 27-0 lead with 1:50 left before halftime.
“They were mad at me ‘cause I wasn’t celebrating afterward,” Savage said. “I was like, ‘We gotta keep playing. But it was definitely a momentum swing in the game, I think.”
Prescott finished 41 of 60 for 403 yards, with all three of his touchdowns to tight end Jake Ferguson.
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HOUSTON — Joe Flacco and the Browns’ offense didn’t get the same gift from the Texans that they did on Christmas Eve — a defensive unit that was missing its two starting edge rushers and more starters.
Their coach, DeMeco Ryans, was miffed he gave Flacco all day to throw in that 36-22 Browns victory and wasn’t about to let it happen again.
With edge-rushers Jonathan Greenard (12 1/2 sacks on the season) and Will Anderson Jr. (seven sacks) coming off the edge — and with rookie C.J. Stroud slinging it to the tune of 274 yards and a rookie-record three touchdowns — it was a different ballgame for the Browns, and they got blown out 45-14 in the wild-card round to end their season at 11-7.
It was a crushing end to the Flacco Fairytale that characterized the final five games of the regular season. Unfortunately for him and the Browns, it won’t end with his second trip to Disney World.
“It’s always difficult, man, when you get to this time of the year,” said a subdued Flacco. “Usually the further you go, the more heartbreak there. It’s a lot of fun along the way, but if you do get beat, it’s hard to deal with.
“I don’t want to let everybody in the locker room, but there is part of me that wishes you could see just how much everybody cares and how much everybody cares about each other and just what kind of team that was. It’s definitely a shame the way it went down and hard to deal with at the moment.”
The hard part for Flacco (34 of 46, 307 yards, 1 TD, 2 INT, 80.6 rating, 4 sacks) is that he threw two pick-sixes in the third quarter that broke open a 38-14 lead for the Texans.
Just before that, Flacco had completed a 16-yard pass to David Bell to the Texans 34, and they were almost in field goal range while trailing 24-14.
But Flacco got hit by Derek Barnett, and his pass down the deep left side was picked off by safety Steve Nelson and returned 82 yards for a touchdown that made it 31-14 with 6:05 left in the third.
“I was trying to throw it away,” Flacco said. “Taking it back, I could see the guy was getting pressure pretty quickly. I wish I would’ve just, I knew where Elijah [Moore] was going to be, so I knew I had a throwaway there. Looking back on it, I wish I threw it at like the lower guy’s feet. Kind of thought of that earlier or just took the sack, to be honest with you. But obviously when you look at things in hindsight.”
Two minutes later, Flacco threw a short pass to the left to tight end Harrison Bryant, and on a fourth-and-2, and Christian Harris swiped it and returned it 36 for a touchdown that made it 38-14. The game was over at that point; the Texans tacked on an insurance score in the fourth quarter, a 19-yard touchdown run by Devin Singletary.
“You never want to throw those,” Flacco said. “I do think you have to look at interceptions as a quarterback and as an offense, as a quarterback group. When you go back and watch the film, you have to look at ‘em for what they are. Are they bad decisions? Are they bad throws? Are they just happening because it was just something wild happened.
“So I think you always have to address those. You don’t want to turn the ball over, but you do have to see some of the ways some of them have happened, it is what it is.
“At the end of the day, you have to be able to live with sacks. And I think in that [first interception] drive, we’ve overcome a second and long from a holding and in the back of your head you just kind of like, ‘OK, we got over that one. Let’s not get back in that position.’ And you almost let your guard down a little bit. And like I said, I think you have to realize that sometimes sacks aren’t bad things.”
The two picks were the ninth and 10th for Flacco in his six starts for the Browns, who gave it away more than any team in this NFL this season. During the year, the Browns were able to overcome the picks with big plays, and excellent defense. But Stroud was too hot for them to get away with interceptions in this instance, and they were dealbreakers in the game.
“I don’t think there’s really much that needs to be said about it,” Flacco said. “When you’re driving down and you’re trying to get back to a one-score game and then all of a sudden it’s a three-score game or whatever it ends up being … The second one’s on fourth down, maybe you can, I thought I’d be able to jam one in there. And that’s just a calculated risk at that point. The first one is the one that, like I said, I was talking about [trying to throw it away].”
Browns quarterback Joe Flacco, getting sacked by Texans outside linebacker Will Anderson Jr. in the third quarter, threw two pick-sixes in the second half of Saturday’s 45-14 wild-card round playoff loss in Houston. (Carmen Mandato/Getty) No one would dare more blame the game on Flacco, who got the Browns to the dance in the first place with his 4-1 record after being out of football all season.
As it was, he had the Browns ahead twice in the first half, firing passes of 45 yards to David Njoku and 47 to Harrison Bryant that led to two Kareem Hunt touchdowns.
“It’s hard to reflect on all of it right this minute,” Browns coach Kevin Stefanaski said. “I appreciate how he battled today.”
He acknowledged that the attack-minded Ryans did an excellent job bringing the heat and making it tough on Flacco. They had picked him off twice in the first meeting and were confident they could do it again.
“They did a nice job pressuring,” Stefanski said. “We and I needed to do a better job putting those guys in position.”
It didn’t help that the Browns couldn’t run the ball again against the sixth-ranked run defense and that Amari Cooper (4 of 5 for 59 yards) got banged up early on but fought through it.
“He was battling,” Stefanski said.
Flacco, who resurrected his stagnant career in Cleveland after no one called him in the first 10 weeks, acknowledged he’d be open to being back.
Turning 39 on Tuesday, he will be free to sign with any team when his contract is up in March. The Browns will have Deshaun Watson back as their starter next season, but Flacco would be an excellent option as a backup. He’ll clean out his locker tomorrow, and no one knows if he’ll be back again.
“I love it here and we’re dealing with so much right now, just going through the emotions of this game and being so excited to be in this position and now to come up empty,” he said. “So I think that’s where my head is, is just kind of trying to soak it all in and let this digest a little bit.”
Flacco, who had the Browns up 7-3 and 14-10 in the first half, acknowledged that the experience was completely different than on Christmas Eve, when he wasn’t sacked once. He threw for 368 yards that game, and Cooper set the Browns record with 265 receiving yards.
“Those guys were flying around today,” Flacco said. “It seemed like we were keeping up there a little bit, and it was a decent little fight for a quarter and a half. And really the first half, I mean 24-14, not that you’re asking for things, but that’s playoffs. It’s not going to be easy. You’re going to be in tough games where you have to battle to the end, and obviously we just came out in the second half and weren’t really able to put it together enough.”
He acknowledged that the full-strength Texans defense at least on this day, was more than the Browns could handle.
“They did what they do well,” he said. They seemed a little bit more aggressive. They seemed to be playing a little bit faster. Just basic things. They played with a little bit more confidence, a little bit more speed, a little bit more hunger. They just seemed to have a better day. The game got away from us obviously, and we all know why.”
Flacco, one of 11 rookies in NFL history to win a playoff game, was impressed with Stroud, who has an arm that rivals Flacco’s and plenty of mobility to go with it. He managed to remain pick-free and threw only five in the regular season against 23 touchdowns.
“He got the ball out and I thought he did a good job on a handful of throws that he had to make in those situations,” he said. “There was a couple plays where I did notice him kind of getting hit in the pocket and he was able to stand in there and do what he needed to do on those plays.”
A former Super Bowl MVP, Flacco was the feel-good story of the season until the Texans spoiled the ending. It was supposed to include a storybook trip to Baltimore to try to beat his former team on the way to the Super Bowl.
“I was so fortunate to become a part of this team,” he said. “It’s a special group, and I’m super grateful for it. This is why we love football. This is why we love NFL playoffs. It’s 14 really good football teams, and it’s one game.
“Unfortunately for us, we were the loser, but that’s what we love about this game. You have to learn how to deal with it when you’re not the guy. It was a close group, so you can imagine how they’re taking it, but they’re going to hold their heads high because I know who they are.”
No one who was at the Cleveland Browns Stadium for the playoff-clinching victory over the Jets on “Thursday Night Football” will ever forget the electrically charged atmosphere. For five weeks, Flacco had the Browns and their fans believing they could go all the way.
“When the city embraces you and the team the way they have, you definitely want to do big things, mostly for your teammates because those guys, like I said, have been incredible, but it’s hard not to feel the way the city rallied around the group of guys in that locker room,” he said. “That’s another reason why we love the NFL. It’s the fans. And as crazy as they can be, it’s what makes the game.
“It’s about getting these communities excited about their team. That’s what we like to do here. We love the NFL and we like to get excited about teams. So I can’t thank the organization, my teammates, the city enough. I mean, it stinks the way it ends, but it was a lot of fun and I’m grateful for the time that we had.”
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By DAVE SKRETTA (AP Sports Writer)
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — It was so cold that Patrick Mahomes’ helmet shattered on a hit. Andy Reid’s mustache froze on the sideline. Fans and players alike huddled for warmth, trying their best to grit their way through the fourth-coldest game in NFL history.
The Kansas City Chiefs managed to handle the adversity well Saturday night.
Handled the Miami Dolphins quite well, too.
Mahomes threw for 262 yards, found Rashee Rice eight times for 130 yards and a touchdown, and made several daring runs for key first downs. Isiah Pacheco pounded over the frozen turf for 89 yards and another score. And the Chiefs shut down a prolific Miami offense in a 26-9 victory in the wild-card round of the playoffs.
Harrison Butker added four field goals for the reigning Super Bowl champs, who appear to be warming up for another run.
“Guys came with that attitude, that mentality — we knew it was going to be cold,” Mahomes said. “All week we were preaching, ‘Let’s come in there with that fire and just get after it and see what happens.’”
Meanwhile, the injury-depleted Dolphins (11-7) looked nothing like the same dynamic offense that led the league in yards. Tua Tagovailoa was pressured relentlessly by the NFL’s second-ranked defense, wide receiver Tyreek Hill had a 53-yard TD catch but was otherwise shut down in his return to Kansas City, and the Dolphins finished with 264 yards in all.
They have not won at Arrowhead Stadium since Nov. 6, 2011, nor won a playoff game since Dec. 30, 2000.
“Losing is never fun, and when the stakes are higher — when it’s playoff time — you feel that maybe 10 times more,” said Tagovailoa, who was just 20 of 39 for 199 yards passing with an interception. “We’ve got to live with that loss.”
The Chiefs get to live with another win in their 15th consecutive home playoff game, not counting a trio of Super Bowls that netted them two Lombardi Trophies. But they will head to Buffalo next week if the Bills beat the Steelers on Monday in a game pushed back a day by a blizzard. Otherwise, the Chiefs will host Houston, which beat the Browns earlier Saturday.
“Everybody was out there playing for each other,” Rice said. “We just put the weather to the side and knew that our opponent didn’t want to be out there just as much as we didn’t, and we showed our love for the game.”
It was minus-4 degrees Fahrenheit (minus-20 Celsius) at kickoff, easily setting a record for the coldest game at Arrowhead Stadium. But it was wind gusts, whipping through at more than 25 mph and driving the wind chill to a bone-rattling minus-27 degrees, that made the weather truly miserable for just about everyone.
That included pop star Taylor Swift, who once again turned up to see her boyfriend, Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce.
She at least got to watch from an enclosed suite. Most fans bundled up outside in parkas, ski goggles and snow pants, and players huddled around heaters on the sidelines as if they were oases in the cold. The National Weather Service even issued a warning for what it called “dangerously cold” weather that had blanketed the Midwest.
In fact, the cold may have made Mahomes’ helmet brittle enough that a hit in the third quarter knocked a chunk of the plastic shell from it. Once officials saw the fist-sized hole, they made Mahomes get a backup helmet from the bench.
“We have to talk about where we store the backup,” Mahomes said with a smile. “It was like, frozen.”
The weather didn’t seem to bother Hill, who was playing in Kansas City for the first time since his old team traded him to Miami two years ago. The league’s leading receiver warmed up in a short-sleeve shirt, then proceeded to scorch the stout Chiefs defense and All-Pro cornerback Trent McDuffie for a his long touchdown reception midway through the first half.
“It’s where it all started for me,” Hill said afterward. “Just being back on the field brought back so many memories.”
The Dolphins otherwise struggled on offense, though, just as they did in a 21-14 loss to the Chiefs in November in Germany. They were just 1 for 12 on third down, and they never put together a truly sustained drive until the fourth quarter.
“We knew they were going to put a lot of attention toward our receivers,” Dolphins coach Mike McDaniel said. “We thought we had the right plan and obviously it wasn’t, and hats off to them for executing their plan in the most important time.”
On offense, the Chiefs scored on four of their six first-half drives. Mahomes capped the first with his TD toss to Rice, and while ensuing drives continually fizzled in the red zone, Butker added a trio of field goals to help Kansas City forge a 16-3 lead.
“Butker was phenomenal,” Reid said. “That was like kicking a block of ice.”
The Chiefs added another field goal in the third quarter, but it was still a two-possession game in the fourth when the Dolphins appeared to force another field goal. But a late flag on Christian Wilkins for roughing the passer on third down gave Kansas City a fresh set of downs, and Pacheco plowed into the end zone moments later to give the Chiefs a 26-7 lead.
The Dolphins never threatened down the stretch in their 11th straight loss when game-time temps are 40 degrees or less.
Far less, in this case.
INJURIES
Miami: S Jevon Holland (knee) and CB Xavien Howard (foot) were inactive. CB DeShon Elliott (calf) left in the fourth quarter.
Kansas City: WR Kadarius Toney (hip) was inactive. DT Derrick Nnadi (elbow) left in the second quarter.
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AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/NFL
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HOUSTON — Rookie C.J. Stroud became the youngest quarterback to win a playoff game after throwing for 274 yards and three touchdowns, and the Houston Texans returned two interceptions by Joe Flacco for scores in a 45-14 rout of the Cleveland Browns in a wild-card matchup Saturday.
Stroud, the second overall pick in the draft last April, is also the highest-drafted rookie QB to win in the postseason. He picked apart Cleveland’s vaunted defense, throwing touchdown passes of 15 yards to Nico Collins, 76 to Brevin Jordan and 37 to Dalton Schultz.
At 22 years and 102 days old, Stroud passed Michael Vick, who was 22 years, 192 days old in 2002 when his Falcons beat the Packers.
Stroud threw for 236 yards and three touchdowns before halftime as the Texans built a 24-14 lead. The defense took over after that, with Steven Nelson and Christian Harris returning interceptions for touchdowns on consecutive drives in the third quarter to extend the lead to 38-14.
With the Texans up 45-14 with nine minutes to go, Stroud’s work was done, and he was replaced by Davis Mills.
Stroud’s stellar play and the leadership of first-year coach DeMeco Ryans transformed the Texans (11-7), back in the playoffs for the first time since 2019, from NFL laughingstock to AFC South champions.
Flacco, who turns 39 in three days, came off the couch to go 4-1 as a starter to end the regular season and lead the Browns (11-7) to just their third playoff appearance since their 1999 expansion rebirth, but second in four seasons under coach Kevin Stefanski.
Playing in his 17th postseason game but first in nine years, Flacco couldn’t continue his magical run under the bright lights of the playoffs.
He finished with 307 yards and had a touchdown pass in the first half, but his mistakes under pressure in the third quarter were too much for the Browns to overcome on a day when Stroud easily outshined him in his playoff debut.
The previous highest-drafted rookie QB to win a postseason game was the New York Jets’ Mark Sanchez, who was the fifth overall pick in 2009.
Cleveland’s Deshaun Watson was under center for the Texans during their last playoff run but played just six games for the Browns this season before having season-ending shoulder surgery. He was on the sideline Saturday for just the second time since his surgery, watching the coming out party for the man who replaced him as Houston’s franchise quarterback.
The sellout crowd was rowdy and ready for Houston’s return to the postseason after three awful seasons where the team combined for just 11 wins. They chanted “MVP! MVP!” throughout the game when Stroud dropped back to pass.
Collins had six receptions for 96 yards and a touchdown, and Devin Singletary ran for 66 yards and a late score for Houston.
Kareem Hunt ran for a touchdown and had a TD reception in the first half, but had just 26 rushing yards.
The Browns took a 7-3 lead when Hunt scored on a 1-yard run with about two minutes left in the first quarter.
Texans linebacker Christian Harris sacks Browns quarterback Joe Flacco during the second half Saturday. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip) A 29-yard run by Singletary started Houston’s next possession before John Metchie III grabbed a 27-yard reception. Two plays later, Stroud connected on a short pass with Collins for a 15-yard score to put the Texans on top 10-7.
The Browns got another huge gain on the first play of their next drive when Flacco found Harrison Bryant for a 47-yard reception. Hunt struck again when he grabbed a shovel pass from Flacco and ran 11 yards for a touchdown to put Cleveland up 14-10.
The lead would last only 10 seconds as Jordan grabbed a short pass and outran multiple defenders for a 76-yard touchdown to make it 17-14. It was Houston’s longest play this season and the longest in franchise playoff history.
Stroud’s third TD toss was a 37-yard pass to Schultz that pushed the lead to 24-14 with about a minute left in the second quarter.
Flacco was hit by Derek Barnett as he threw and his pass was picked off by Nelson and returned 82 yards for a touchdown to make it 31-14 with about six minutes left in the third quarter.
The Browns went for it on fourth-and-2 on their next drive and Flacco was picked off again. This time, Harris returned it 36 yards for the score to make it 38-14.
The Texans are the first team to return two interceptions for touchdowns in a game since the Seahawks did it on Jan. 5, 2008.
Injuries
Browns: LG Joel Bitonio injured his ankle in the second quarter.
Texans: WR Noah Brown hurt a shoulder in the first quarter. … LB Denzel Perryman injured his ribs in the third quarter.
This story will be updated.
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The Ravens will have to wait a little longer to learn who they’ll play in the postseason.
The Buffalo Bills’ wild-card playoff game against the Pittsburgh Steelers that was scheduled for Sunday was moved to Monday amid a forecast for dangerous winter weather, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Saturday.
Hochul and other officials said they were making the change for safety’s sake. The forecast for the Buffalo area called for heavy snow and winds gusting as high as 65 mph Saturday, with 1 to 2 feet or more of snow eventually piling up.
“We want our Bills to win, but we don’t want 60,000 to 70,000 people traveling to the football game in what’s going to be horrible conditions,” Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz said at a news conference in suburban Buffalo.
The game will be played at Highmark Stadium at 4:30 p.m. Monday instead of 1 p.m. Sunday. The NFL and Bills issued a statement citing “public safety concerns” as the reason to push back the game by a day.
The AFC wild-card round was originally set to be completed by Sunday afternoon, which meant the top-seeded Ravens (13-4), who received a first-round bye and home-field advantage through the conference title game, would know which of four possible opponents — the No. 5 seed Cleveland Browns, No. 4 Houston Texans, No. 6 Miami Dolphins or No. 7 Steelers — would travel to Baltimore for the divisional round Jan. 20 or 21. The NFL playoffs are reseeded after the wild-card round, so the Ravens will host the lowest-remaining seed.
Instead, the Ravens must wait for the conclusion of Monday’s game between No. 2 Buffalo and Pittsburgh, which pushed back its travel plans and will now head to Buffalo on Sunday. Game times for the divisional round will be announced at a later date.
The Ravens practiced Wednesday, Thursday and Friday this week and have a scheduled practice Saturday at M&T Bank Stadium in an effort to stay sharp during the bye. The “rest versus rust” debate has resurfaced among fans after the top-seeded Ravens lost to the sixth-seeded Tennessee Titans, 28-12, following a record-setting 14-2 season in 2019.
“One part of you wants to be out there playing and going at it, and the other part of you appreciates that you’re already 1-0 for the week,” coach John Harbaugh said Friday. “With that, it’s not a vacation week. It’s not an off week. It’s a work week. It’s a work week to become the team that we need to be going forward into next week. Our guys have taken that really seriously.”
Quarterback Lamar Jackson, who’s expected to win his second NFL Most Valuable Player Award next month, said Wednesday he’s “definitely antsy” to play.
“But I have to stay locked in knowing what’s ahead,” he said. “We have nothing ahead right now. We’re just practicing and trying to get better for whoever our opponent is next week.”
The Bills are familiar with weather-related schedule changes. In 2022, a lake effect storm led to Buffalo’s home game against Cleveland being moved to Detroit in November. A month later, a massive blizzard forced the Bills to delay their trip home, forcing them to stay overnight in Chicago on Christmas Eve.
Though NFL playoff games have been shifted in the past for various scheduling reasons or to add games to determine tiebreakers, this marks just the third time weather has played a direct factor.
In January 2017, wintry weather in Kansas City led to the NFL pushing back the start of an AFC divisional playoff game between Pittsburgh and the Chiefs from 1 p.m. to 8:20 p.m.
The Associated Press contributed to this article.
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CLEVELAND — If Joe Flacco hadn’t gotten a job soon, his wife, Dana, might’ve had the perpetual shakes.
“Joe’s not one to sit still,” Dana told cleveland.com. “He was always like, ‘What I can do? I’m just going to get you a coffee.’ I think I had like seven coffees a day.”
If anyone could get Flacco — who saved the 11-6 Browns’ precarious season with a 4-1 record and will start for them Saturday against the Houston Texans in the wild-card round — through unemployment this fall after 15 years as an NFL quarterback, it was Dana. She had been with him since their senior year at Audubon High in south New Jersey, where he was the star quarterback and she was co-captain of the cheerleading squad.
They started out as friends, but soon realized it was something more.
They dated through most of college, with Flacco starting out at Pittsburgh and then transferring to Delaware, where the Ravens drafted him 18th overall in 2008. Dana remained close to home, first getting a certificate in radiology and then a bachelor’s in allied health.
They took a break for a few months after Flacco had been with the Ravens for a couple of years, but quickly realized they were meant for each other.
One night as they were watching a movie, Dana came back in the room from getting some hot chocolate, and Flacco was holding her gray and white cat, Sylvia.
“You don’t like cats,” Dana said.
She soon saw that Flacco had tied the engagement ring around Sylvia’s neck.
“Oh, that’s why,” Dana said.
The engagement was short. Three months later, in June 2011, they got married in Philadelphia, with 300 people in attendance. Dana was such a trooper, she posed as a center in wedding photos, snapping the bouquet to Joe.
Joe Flacco, right, sits with his mother, Karen, and father, Steve, at his family home in Audubon, New Jersey. Flacco was picked 18th overall by the Ravens in the 2008 NFL draft. (Lloyd Fox/Staff) Along comes the Flacco Flock
A year later, they had the first of their five children, Stephen, named after Flacco’s dad. They thought their timing was good with a June baby, but he arrived in the middle of Ravens mandatory minicamp.
“He got out of camp on Wednesday and Thursday,” she said.
Nine months later, Dana and Stephen traveled to New Orleans for Super Bowl XLVII, where the Ravens beat the San Francisco 49ers, and Flacco earned MVP honors for his three-touchdown performance.
“I didn’t go out much that week,” Dana said.
Afterward, she dragged Stephen around to Disney World and the “Late Show with David Letterman” on planes and helicopters for Flacco’s MVP circuit.
Their second child, another boy, came along just as the Ravens and Browns were about to kick off in Baltimore in Week 2 of the 2013 season. Dana, who had all of her babies back home in Jersey, told Joe the day before the game to not worry about missing the birth. But Baby Daniel had other plans. On Sunday morning, Dana called Joe during pregame warmups and told him she was on the way to the hospital with her mom.
“He said, ‘What do I do?’” she recalled. “I’m like, ‘Well, obviously go play and hopefully everything works out.’”
As luck would have it, Daniel was her easiest delivery of the five, arriving at 11:30 a.m. while Joe was still in the locker room.
“We talked on the phone, and we were able to send a picture to get his mind off it,” Dana said. “I’m like ‘All right, now you go play. I’ll see when you’re done.’”
The nervous dad threw for 211 yards and a touchdown that game en route to a 14-6 victory. The defense did its part, sacking Brandon Weeden five times.
Next came Francis, who was born a week after the Ravens got knocked out of the playoffs in 2015, meaning Flacco got to be there. A Pro Bowl alternate that year, he skipped the invitation to witness the birth. Next came Evelyn, their only girl, who was born on a Tuesday — a day off for NFL players and thus the perfect stork delivery day.
Last came Thomas in April 2018, which Dana thought was the perfect time of year. But Joe left a week later for the offseason program, and she suddenly found herself at home alone with five kids.
“And one of them was a newborn,” she said.
Unemployed QB
When Flacco found himself without a team in the fall — those former Super Bowl MVPs make the worst kind of out-of-work dads — Dana was the perfect person for the job. She rarely brought up the fact that the phone wasn’t ringing, even though NFL quarterbacks were dropping like flies.
“We all just kind of felt it,” she said. “Joe was probably frustrated at times, but he didn’t really show it.”
It was mostly when he was out and about, taking the kids to basketball games and wrestling matches, that folks grilled him. It’s hard to miss a 6-foot-6, 245-pound, out-of-work NFL quarterback in the tiny town of Audubon, population 8,707.
“You have people come up to you and they’re just kind of like, ‘Oh man, how’s retirement?’” Flacco said. “And you don’t really want to get into it with people. So sometimes you’re just like, ‘Oh yeah, man, going good.’ And other times you’re like, ‘Well, I’m not actually retired. I do want to play. So we’ll see what happens.’
“Other times, fellow sports dads would ask, ‘Hey, anybody call you yet?’ So they’re reminding you of it. And I’m like, ‘Yeah, nope. Haven’t gotten a call yet, man. Yeah, I don’t know. It’s crazy.’ But ultimately it was still all fun. You have other things to kind of keep your mind off of it most of the time.”
Such as?
“He was doing a lot of mom stuff,” said his dad, Steve Flacco, 62 and a former Penn running back.
Thanks to 15 NFL offseasons, Flacco wasn’t a complete stranger in the home.
“We’ve kind of gotten used to that routine,” Joe Flacco said. “I can help getting the kids out the door in the morning. I can throw some eggs on the stove before they get down there or ask them what they want. We’re always loaded up with chocolate milk, bagels, eggs, different protein shakes.”
Evelyn, daddy’s little girl, loved having Joe around full time, doing girl-dad stuff with her.
“I’ve tried to put my daughter’s hair in a simple ponytail and I’m a mess,” he said. “It’s just fun for me to try to do every now and then.”
The oldest of six kids himself — including five boys — Flacco is used to a chaotic household and hectic sports schedule.
“Ultimately, I’m just another one of the children,” he said. “I do get in the way probably more times than not. I can do little things here and there to try to help out, but my wife is the star of our house, there’s no doubt about it.”
Once a week, Evelyn’s piano teacher would come by for her lesson, and Flacco would hang around and listen.
“I’d see myself looking to see what they were trying to do and then look at her little book,” Flacco said.
Finally, he asked the teacher to start teaching him too.
“To be my age and start from scratch at something, there’s something exciting about that,” Flacco said. “I had a lot of fun with it the couple of months that I was doing it because I would sit down with him and I would be bad at it, and by the time he came back next week, I would be pretty good at what I was trying to be good at.”
The last song the teacher left him with in November was “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.”
“It was right before I got the call from the Browns,” he said. “I had to call [the piano teacher] and say ‘Hey, I’m not coming back.’ But I did bring the sheet music out here with me.”
Steve — Joe’s No. 1 hype man for getting him back in the game — knew it was time to ramp up his efforts when Joe took up piano.
“I said, ‘Man, that’s looking for something to do,’” Steve kidded. “But I think he enjoyed it.”
Unemployed NFL quarterbacks — especially ones who played every sport in high school — also make excellent playmates for four rambunctious sons, ages 5 to 11, and their friends.
“As soon as my boys walked in the door after school, they’d be like, ‘Dad, let’s go. We’re going to have a catch outside,’” Dana said. “Or ‘Can you take us to the field to play home run derby? Let’s go play basketball, dad.’ Even when all of their friends were over, they just wanted him to be out there with them.”
But coaching them up? That was another story.
“He’ll be like, ‘Hey, get your hands like this.’ Or if they’re playing basketball, it’s like, ‘Get your elbow up more,’” Dana said. “Whatever it is, the kids don’t want to hear it from their dad.”
Four days a week, Flacco worked out with his trainer, Brian Kane, at Evolution Fitness, sometimes with Dana, and sometimes on his own. He also worked with a nutritionist.
“Whatever he ate for dinner, the whole family ate for dinner,” Dana said. “I’m not one to make a hundred meals. I’m like, ‘This is what we’re having, and that’s that.’”
![PLEASE CREDIT THESE COURTESY THE FLACCO FAMILY.AUDUBON, NJ -- 7/1/09 -- SP FLACCOS FERRON -- Steve Flacco with sons Joe (striped shirt) and Mike in a photo dated 1989 Wednesday, July 1, 2009. The Flaccos have two sons involved in professional sports - Joe in pro football (NFL's Baltimore Ravens) and Mike in pro baseball (MLB's Baltimore Orioles, after signing a minor league contract). (Karl Merton Ferron [Sun Photographer]) (_DSC2996.JPG)](https://i0.wp.com/www.baltimoresun.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/TBS-L-SPFLACCOBROS24P1_167069339.jpg?fit=620%2C9999px&ssl=1)
Steve Flacco holds his sons Joe, left, and Mike, right, at their home in New Jersey in 1989. (Courtesy of the Flacco family) Workouts with his dad and brother
On Tuesdays and Thursdays, Joe headed to a youth football field in nearby Haddon Township for 45-minute throwing sessions with Steve and Joe’s youngest brother, Tom, 29. Tom’s 2-year-old son Joseph and niece Sophia were also often in tow.
“Joe didn’t want to give that up when he got to Cleveland,” Steve said. “He’s thinking, ‘This is crazy already. Last thing I’m doing is telling people I’m throwing a ball to my dad.’”
While Joe, 38, was the oldest in the family, Tom was the baby. But they bonded over playing quarterback. Tom, who had a short stint in the Canadian Football League and still has some UFL bites, played at Towson University when Joe was with the Ravens, and they became close.
“Joe and I would get warmed up and then we’d place my dad in certain positions where we’d want to throw it,” Tom said. “Joe and I would do the footwork and hit my dad, and he was just spot catching.”
But Steve was more than just a throwing net.
“Listen, I do run,” he said. “Sometimes I’ll run a partial route or something like that just to give them the idea of throwing it over my head as I’m moving. But even if I was in great running shape, how many routes could I run? Not many.”
Besides, it was tough enough catching passes from his two cannon-armed boys.
“I’m catching twice as many balls and I have to throw them back,” he said.
Before long, Steve started wearing receiver gloves.
“They’d make fun of me,” Steve said. “Depending on how good it went on any given day, I could be a little bruised up.”
The three were so locked in, they’d sometimes lose Joseph and Sophia.
“We’d have to go looking for them,” Steve said.
Steve used the sessions to rattle off all of the NFL teams that needed quarterbacks and which ones might call. The phone wasn’t ringing, but Steve kept track of who was up, who was down, who had the best defense and the best receivers.
“My dad would just talk about the games on Sunday the whole workout,” Tom said. “If a quarterback got hurt, he’d be like, ‘I wonder if they’re going to reach out.’ Joe and I would just tune him out. He didn’t need much of a response. He could just keep going.”
While Steve railed into the wind from his various spots on the turf, Joe kept slinging the ball into his hands, with pinpoint accuracy and pillow-soft touch.
“It’s not about throwing the ball hard,” Steve said. “It’s about getting it to a spot on time and making it as catchable as possible. Joe does a good job with that. He has a really good sense of timing. Part of that is not overthrowing the ball.”
Joe Flacco holds the Lombardi Trophy after the Ravens defeated the San Francisco 49ers, 34-31, in Super Bowl XLVII in New Orleans. Flacco was named Super Bowl Most Valuable Player. (Baltimore Sun file) Sundays at Mom and Dad’s
On Sunday afternoons, the Flaccos all gathered at Steve and Karen’s house in Audubon — about 25 strong including aunts, uncles, cousins and kids — to watch football and feast on the Super Bowl Sunday-worthy smorgasbord Karen rolled out from the kitchen — pork roast, lasagna, spaghetti, ham, wings.
Steve is mostly Italian, and Karen, who learned to cook from Grandma Flacco, is mostly Irish.
“We’re actually an Irish-Italian family, which is very common,” Steve said. “For some reason, we all marry each other.”
The gatherings — and Friday night pizza nights at the behest of their grandfather who insisted on a tight-knit family — included most of Joe’s siblings, Mike, John, Brian, Tom and Stephanie. Mike was drafted by the Orioles in 2009 and played minor league baseball for a while, and also played tight end for the Jacksonville Jaguars and San Diego Chargers. John was a walk-on receiver at Stanford.
“I’ve played a lot of catch and thrown a lot of batting practice,” Steve said.
During frequent arguments among the brothers over important topics such as which of them will get fat first, Joe is the loudest in the room.
“That’s how he thinks he’s winning the argument, by just being louder than the other person,” Tom said.
For the past 15 years, the Flaccos gathered to yell and scream over Joe’s games — mostly with the Ravens — living and dying with every pass, every third-down conversion, every time they ran the ball when they obviously should’ve let Joe throw it.
“It was total chaos,” Steve said. “You couldn’t hear the telecast.”
With Joe in the house this season, it was more subdued. While Steve and some of the others flipped around from game to game to see if any quarterback job openings arose, Joe mostly avoided the TV and spent time with the kids. As the weeks went by and some bitterness crept in, it was easier not to watch.
“I used to say to him, ‘I can’t believe you’re sitting here on the couch with us,’” Tom said.
Flacco has mulled the reasons no one picked up the phone.
“I’m not that sexy of a pick,” he said. “How do you in the offseason get your fan base excited about bringing in this guy that everybody thinks they know who he is and has been around for 15 years? When you’re not playing, your confidence does take a little bit of a hit. But the overall feeling of ‘I can still play,’ that never went away.”
Flacco’s disinterest in NFL games didn’t stop Steve from providing the quarterback play-by-play each week, and from texting Joe’s agent, Joe Linta, with suggestions on who to call.
“His agent would get frustrated because he wouldn’t get any callbacks,” Steve said. “At the same time, I’m like, ‘You’ve got to put a bug in their ear because you don’t know what’s going to happen week to week.’”
Browns quarterback Joe Flacco, right, talks to tight end Harrison Bryant before a game against the Bengals on Jan. 7 in Cincinnati. (AP Photo/Emilee Chinn) The Browns come calling
The Browns asked Flacco to work out for them after Deshaun Watson fractured his shoulder against the Ravens, even though Flacco had gone 18-3 against them over the previous 15 years, including a crushing come-from-behind 31-30 victory in Week 2 last year when he was with the Jets. Flacco threw two touchdown passes in the final 82 seconds, including a 66-yarder with that rifle arm.
“I said, ‘Dude, they’ve got a million hours of film, but if they see you in shorts throwing a ball around, they’re really going to like you,’” Steve said. “I said, ‘It’s not going to hurt.’”
When the Browns signed Flacco to the practice squad on Nov. 20, his son Daniel, 10 — the one born 90 minutes before the Browns game — broke into a huge smile.
“He’s like, ‘Amari Cooper and Elijah Moore,’” Dana said. “Daniel knows everybody in football. The boys have fantasy football teams, and they’re 11, 10, and 8.”
Like Joe, they’ll have to wait to play tackle football.
“We’ve had them do a little bit of flag football,” Dana said. “Joe didn’t actually play organized football until sixth grade, and our oldest is fifth grade. They ask all the time. They love going out front and throwing the football. They’re like, ‘I want this to be my sport.’ And we’re like, OK, in a year or two.”
It hasn’t stopped them from being armchair quarterbacks while their dad is playing.
“Daniel will turn to me after an interception and say, ‘Who was that supposed to be to?’” Dana said. “I’m like, ‘I don’t know.’ And then they show the replay and I’m like, ‘Oh, the dude fell down.’ But as soon as he walks out to see the kids, it’s ‘You threw an interception. You didn’t complete that pass.’”
Dana gathered up all the kids on Christmas and headed to the airport to spend the day with Joe at his two-bedroom apartment in a Cleveland suburb, followed by the Thursday night game three days later against the Jets, a win-and-in proposition for the Browns. When she arrived at the airport parking lot, she heard a familiar, disturbing sound in the car.
“I was like, ‘What just happened? Did you just throw up?’” she said.
When Joe picked them up in Cleveland, Dana delivered the bad news.
“Your son just threw up,” she said. “He was like, ‘OK, don’t come near me, don’t touch me, you guys are in there,’” she said.
Somehow they pulled off Christmas anyway, with the hottest quarterback in the NFL keeping a safe enough distance to go out and clinch a playoff spot three days later, and producing the gifts of the year in the process. Dana tried to order No. 15 Flacco jerseys for the kids, but they didn’t come in time for Christmas. She implored Joe to find some.
“I don’t know how he did it, but there was an extra little Christmas under his tree at the apartment, with Flacco jerseys and sweatshirts,” she said.
Apparently, Brownie the Elf worked his magic to conjure up the jerseys and Dawg sweatshirts. Flacco also gave Evelyn a “Tuddy Buddy” bear that former NFL quarterback and Amazon Prime analyst Ryan Fitzpatrick had jokingly given to Flacco for having thrown a touchdown to the same receiver. Evelyn clutched it during the game.
After a 37-20 victory over Flacco’s former Jets that catapulted the Browns into the playoffs for only the third time since 1999, with all the boys in their No. 15 Flacco jerseys and Dana and Evelyn with her bear, everyone joined Joe on the field for the postgame interview and celebration.
Cherishing the moment with his wife and kids, he said in his postgame presser, “I’m going to remember this for the rest of my life.”
Twenty more family members and friends cheered him on from the stands — a Flacco frenzy — including his real-life Tuddy Buddies, Steve and Tom. The night included Nick Chubb smashing the Dawg Pound guitar with his Batman mask on, a twinkling lightshow in the pitch-black stadium incorporating fans’ phones, and fireworks when the Browns clinched. “Celebration” blared over the loudspeakers, and fans lingered long after the game ended to celebrate.
“We’ve never experienced anything quite like that,” Steve said. “Not even at the Super Bowl. It’s exciting, but it’s different. Not like that, where it’s focused on one team by one fan group. They’re turning those lights out, and adults turned into a bunch of little kids.”
Not even in Baltimore, where Joe might have to face his former team in the playoffs?
“Baltimore was incredible,” Steve said. “They had 71,000 people every game that we were there, and it was a great atmosphere, but nothing like that. I couldn’t even imagine Ray Lewis coming out of that tunnel in the smoke in the dark. It would’ve freaked everybody out.”
It took a flock of Flaccos to help get this not-your-average-Joe back on the field and on the road to the Super Bowl with the Browns. It’s proven to be just the caffeine buzz the whole family and all of Browns Town needed.
AFC wild-card round
Browns at Texans
Saturday, 4:30 p.m.
TV: NBC
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Ravens tight end Mark Andrews is back.
Nearly two months after undergoing what was thought to be season-ending ankle surgery, the three-time Pro Bowl selection and 2021 All-Pro was designated to return and hit the practice field Friday in Owings Mills.
Andrews, 28, has been out since suffering the injury during Baltimore’s 34-20 victory over the Bengals on Nov. 16 on a controversial hip-drop tackle by Cincinnati linebacker Logan Wilson.
After that game, coach John Harbaugh said that the injury was “very serious” and would likely end Andrews’ season, adding that it was a “form of a high ankle” injury but “more than just a sprain.”
But in recent weeks, Harbaugh has been more optimistic about the possibility of Andrews returning, saying he wouldn’t rule it out for the playoffs.
On Friday, Andrews caught passes during special teams drills, worked with the other tight ends during positional drills and participated in individual work. The Ravens have 21 days to add him to the active roster or he would revert to injured reserve.
The potential return of Andrews for the divisional round, which begins for the Ravens (13-4) on either Jan. 20 or 21 after they earned a first-round bye, would be significant. At the time of the injury, his 61 targets, 45 receptions and 544 yards ranked second on the team behind only wideout Zay Flowers, while his six touchdown catches were more than the rest of the Ravens combined (five).
Andrews, who has long been a security blanket for Ravens quarterback and presumptive NFL Most Valuable Player Award winner Lamar Jackson, led the team in catches and receiving yards in each of the previous four seasons after being drafted alongside Jackson in 2018.
In his absence, second-year tight end Isaiah Likely has blossomed, with 30 catches for 411 yards and five touchdowns, all coming in the team’s final five regular-season games. That included two in Baltimore’s 56-19 blowout of the Miami Dolphins on Dec. 31 that clinched the top seed in the AFC.
It would also come at a good time with Flowers dealing with a calf injury. He hasn’t practiced the past two weeks, though he indicated he could be back next week ahead of the Ravens’ divisional round game at M&T Bank Stadium.
Others who were also not practicing Friday included wide receiver Tylan Wallace, left tackle Ronnie Stanley, outside linebacker Odafe Oweh (ankle), cornerback Marlon Humphrey (calf), outside linebacker Malik Harrison (groin) and linebacker Del’Shawn Phillips (shoulder). Humphrey and Harrison were running on other field, however. An injury report will not be released until next week.
Harbaugh is scheduled to speak to reporters Friday afternoon.
This story will be updated.
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The team with the best record in the NFL unsurprisingly had three players named first-team All-Pro by The Associated Press and another three to the second team.
Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson, who is also the favorite to be named the NFL Most Valuable Player next month, was named to the first team for the second time, while second-year safety Kyle Hamilton received first-team honors for the first time. Inside linebacker Roquan Smith, meanwhile, was named to the first team for a second straight year.
Three other Baltimore players were named second-team All-Pro for the first time in their careers: defensive tackle Justin Madubuike, inside linebacker Patrick Queen and fullback Patrick Ricard.
Only the San Francisco 49ers, whom the Ravens beat, 33-19, on Christmas night, had more All-Pros with five players selected to the first team and two on the second team.
A national panel of 50 media members casts ballots for the honors. The Associated Press honored 12 players on offense and defense this year, adding fullback and slot corner to the voting.
This season, Jackson posted career bests in completions (307), completion percentage (.672) and passing yards (3,678) while also rushing for a team-high 821 yards. The last time Jackson was a first-team All-Pro was in 2019, when he was the unanimous selection for NFL MVP.
Hamilton, meanwhile, blossomed into one of the league’s best and most versatile defensive players. During the regular season, he had 81 tackles, 13 passes defended, four interceptions (one of which he returned for a touchdown) and three sacks.
Smith continued his dominant play since being traded to Baltimore from the Chicago Bears for a second-round draft pick midway through last season, registering a team-high 158 tackles that ranked sixth in the NFL. He also had 1 1/2 sacks, one interception, a forced fumble and was the leader of a defense that became the first to lead the NFL in points allowed (16.4), sacks (57) and takeaways (29).
Madubuike also broke out this year with a career-high 13 sacks to lead all NFL defensive linemen, while Queen had a career-high 133 tackles and matched a career high with six passes defensed while adding 3 1/2 sacks.
Ricard helped pave the way for the league’s top rushing attack, which ranked first in total yards (2,661) and second in rushing touchdowns (26). He played in all 17 games and caught five passes for 52 yards and scored the sixth touchdown of his career.
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After the Ravens finished the regular season with the best record in the NFL behind presumptive league Most Valuable Player Lamar Jackson and a historically dominant defense that became the first to lead the league in sacks, takeaways and points allowed per game, teams with head coach openings continue to target Baltimore’s staff.
Ravens offensive coordinator Todd Monken and defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald both interviewed with the Carolina Panthers on Thursday for the team’s head coach opening. The Atlanta Falcons also reportedly requested permission to interview Macdonald for their vacant head coach job.
The Panthers fired Frank Reich in November after the team started 1-10, while the Falcons let go of Arthur Smith earlier this week after finishing 7-10.
While no in-person interviews with a coach currently working for another team can take place until after the divisional round of the playoffs Jan. 20-21, both were able to meet with the Panthers virtually. Macdonald, 36, also confirmed that he has interviewed with other teams, with the Washington Commanders and Tennessee Titans also having requested permission to speak with perhaps the league’s hottest candidate.
The Ravens (13-4) received a bye through the wild-card round, which begins Saturday. The team has conducted practices as if it were a normal game week, including a planned practice Saturday at M&T Bank Stadium.
“Our focus right now with our guys is to try improve and really stay sharp and ramp up and make sure we’re on our ‘A’ game come next weekend,” Macdonald said Thursday. “So, when we’re here, that’s what we’re focused on and then fortunately, I can try to compartmentalize it and work on the Zooms and things that happen at night, and I’m doing those at my house.”
The Los Angeles Chargers had also previously requested permission to interview Monken, 57, after parting ways with Brandon Staley and general manager Tom Telesco last month.
Others from the Ravens drawing outside interest include associate head coach/defensive line coach Anthony Weaver (Commanders), vice president of football administration Nick Matteo for the Panthers’ open general manager job and director of player personnel Joe Hortiz, who has also been rumored to be a candidate for general manager openings.
“It says a lot about the organization,” Monken said when asked about other teams’ interest in Ravens coaches and front office staff. “It says a lot about our players. It says a lot about our coaching staff. You don’t do it alone. You have to have a great staff, great organization and a great team [with] players that believe in the plan and are able to execute it at a high level.”
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The benefit of time has apparently not completely healed the wound for Ronnie Stanley.
The Ravens left tackle is still bothered by what took place the night of Jan. 11, 2020, at M&T Bank Stadium during the divisional round of the playoffs. Baltimore had finished the regular season with the best record in the NFL, was coming off a first-round bye and had home-field advantage through the conference championship game. Then it was stunned (embarrassed?) by the sixth-seeded Tennessee Titans, 28-12.
If the scenario sounds familiar, it should, because the Ravens (13-4) are in the same position again as they wait to find out who they will play in this year’s divisional round.
Stanley is one of just nine players remaining from that record-setting 2019 team that went 14-2 and he is motivated to not let history repeat itself.
“I’m still not completely over it to be honest,” he said. “Those opportunities don’t come too often. Lucky, we have another chance this year and we’re going to make sure that we don’t take it for granted.”
Among the many reasons they do — a quarterback in Lamar Jackson who is again expected to be the NFL’s Most Valuable Player, a historically dominant defense that led the league in sacks, takeaways and points allowed per game — is the performance of perhaps the most unheralded group of which Stanley is a member of.
The Ravens’ offensive line is one of the best in the league by several metrics, if not the eye test. Pro Football Focus ranked it fifth overall, with the unit allowing the fifth-fewest total pressures (160) this season. It also proved its depth, with nine players logging at least 160 snaps. That was pivotal as Stanley and right tackle Morgan Moses missed four and three games apiece because of knee and shoulder injuries, respectively.
The line helped pave the way for a rushing attack that was the best in the NFL in terms of yards (2,661), second in touchdowns (26) and third in yards per carry (4.9) despite Baltimore being without its top back, J.K. Dobbins, who suffered a season-ending torn Achilles tendon in Week 1.
The Ravens were even more efficient with their pass blocking, giving Jackson enough time to throw for a career-high 3,678 yards along with 24 touchdowns. While he was sacked 37 times, the second-most in his career, he was pressured on just 15.7% of dropbacks, the lowest mark of his six seasons. His 22 hurries were easily the fewest of his tenure as the full-time starter.
“They’re just giving me a lot of time to read out concepts and read the defenses and get the ball to my guys,” Jackson said. “It’s tremendous. I feel like that’s any quarterback’s dream to just sit back in the pocket and just let things happen and develop and just throw strikes.
“I believe they got better throughout the season with guys going down and just getting healthy at the right time and just blocking their tails off.”
No one more so than the man at the center of the line, 23-year-old Tyler Linderbaum, who in just his second season was selected to his first Pro Bowl.
Drafted 25th overall out of Iowa in 2022, the 6-foot-2, 305-pound center allowed zero sacks and just three quarterback hits on 499 pass blocking snaps this season, per PFF. His 4.8% pressure rate allowed was the fifth lowest among centers with at least 300 pass-blocking snaps, according to Next Gen Stats, and his 3.57-second time to pressure mark was the third-longest among centers who allowed at least 20 pressures. He allowed one half-sack across 15 starts.
Linderbaum’s dominance, along with the rest of the line, was perhaps most on display during the Ravens’ blowouts of the San Francisco 49ers and Miami Dolphins in Weeks 16 and 17. Jackson was pressured just five times between the two games and threw for a combined 575 yards and seven touchdowns while the Ravens rushed for a total of 262 yards.
“I think whenever you have a bunch of talented guys, you have to play together,” Linderbaum said. “We’ve continued to get better and better no matter who’s in there — it’s just all five [of us] playing together. It doesn’t do you any good if four guys are playing well together and then one guy isn’t.
“That’s the unique thing about the position is the continuity that needs to happen in order to be successful as a unit and just continue to make strides and strides and get better. You want to be playing your best football towards December and January. I think we’re trying our hardest to get to that point.”
2023 NFL: Seattle Seahawks at Baltimore Ravens
Karl Merton Ferron/Baltimore SunRavens wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. celebrates his first touchdown with offensive linemen Tyler Linderbaum, left, Patrick Mekari and John Simpson during a win over the Seahawks on Nov. 5. (Karl Merton Ferron/Staff)To Linderbaum’s point, the Ravens’ tackle rotation has helped ease the burden on Stanley, 29, and Moses, 32, as they have been slowed by age and injury. It helps to have solid backups.
Patrick Mekari has graded above 70 in six games this season, per PFF, and has played both tackle spots. Daniel Faalele, who has filled in almost entirely on the right side, hasn’t been as consistent with just two grades above 70 this season, but he has improved in Year 2, particularly with his pass blocking.
“We’ve just been able to get closer to each other as a unit,” Faalele said. “Playing five as one coach always harps on that and just seeing everything through the center’s eyes and how we can communicate that across the line and make sure we’re all on the same page.
“It definitely helps just building my confidence gaining that experience, the in-game experience that I need. … I feel like that just helps with the repetition; the footwork and the technique and also just understanding the defenses and where the ball is going and where the aiming points are, that just helps me fit up the blocks better.”
The snaps that Mekari, Faalele and Ben Cleveland have been able to take help, too, especially this time of the year.
“This week is gonna be huge because my body’s hurting,” left guard John Simpson said of the Ravens’ bye.
So, too, will be their next game. Stanley says he isn’t annoyed by all the questions about 2019, but they will undoubtedly continue to be asked over the next two weeks and until the Ravens vanquish that demon.
To do so, they’ll undoubtedly need another good performance from their offensive line, and Stanley hasn’t forgotten about the last time he and the Ravens were in this position.
“Those are [the] stuff that are always in the back of our head, the guys that were there and experienced it,” he said. “We know the feeling that stuck with us still to this point and we don’t want to feel that again. We want to correct our loss.”
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Baltimore Sun staff writers pick every game of the NFL season. Here’s who they have winning in the wild-card round of the playoffs:
No. 5 seed Cleveland Browns at No. 4 Houston Texans (Saturday, 4:30 p.m.)
Brian Wacker (169-103 season; 8-8 last week): Browns
Childs Walker (173-99 season; 10-6 last week): Browns
Mike Preston (163-109 season; 9-7 last week): Browns
C.J. Doon (180-92 season; 11-5 last week): Browns
Tim Schwartz (164-108 season; 12-4 last week): Browns
No. 6 Miami Dolphins at No. 3 Kansas City Chiefs (Saturday, 8 p.m.)
Wacker: Chiefs
Walker: Chiefs
Preston: Chiefs
Doon: Chiefs
Schwartz: Chiefs
No. 7 Pittsburgh Steelers at No. 2 Buffalo Bills (Sunday, 1 p.m.)
Wacker: Bills
Walker: Bills
Preston: Bills
Doon: Bills
Schwartz: Bills
No. 7 Green Bay Packers at No. 2 Dallas Cowboys (Sunday, 4:30 p.m.)
Wacker: Cowboys
Walker: Cowboys
Preston: Cowboys
Doon: Cowboys
Schwartz: Packers
No. 6 Los Angeles Rams at No. 3 Detroit Lions (Sunday, 8 p.m.)
Wacker: Lions
Walker: Rams
Preston: Rams
Doon: Rams
Schwartz: Rams
No. 5 Philadelphia Eagles at No. 4 Tampa Bay Buccaneers (Monday, 8:15 p.m.)
Wacker: Eagles
Walker: Eagles
Preston: Eagles
Doon: Eagles
Schwartz: Buccaneers
Ravens Insider: John Harbaugh, with mix of love and old-school rigor, has Ravens set for playoff run
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Anxiety percolated behind the scenes. How could it not? Lamar Jackson, the superstar quarterback around whom the Ravens had shaped their roster and their plans, asked to be traded.
John Harbaugh, entering his 16th season as the team’s coach, faced the prospect of starting over at the most important position in football. He had made the call, back in 2018, to fashion a new vision around Jackson’s unique talents. Now, it was in jeopardy. But he did not feel jeopardized.
“I was in a good place,” Harbaugh said, reflecting on those uncertain days in March and April. “I felt really strongly that God had it, to be honest with you. Whatever direction it was going to go, it was going to be good. I was rooting for Lamar to be back because I knew Lamar, but I knew that if he didn’t come back, there was going to be a reason for it, and I was going to be OK with that.”
Jackson signed an extension with the Ravens in late April, and nine months later, he’s poised to lead them into a playoff matchup with the Houston Texans at M&T Bank Stadium. It will be the team’s 11th postseason run under Harbaugh. Though he still feels “like a young coach,” with Bill Belichick and Pete Carroll at least temporarily out of the trade, he’s the NFL’s second-longest-tenured and second-oldest.
Never in that span has Harbaugh, 61, lost his team’s attention, but Jackson’s contract saga presented a fresh test. In his public statements, he reiterated his admiration for the quarterback and his faith that the team and player would both end up satisfied. His upbeat calm stood in contrast to fan and media roiling over Jackson’s fate.
The man at the center of all that scrutiny heard and appreciated Harbaugh’s tone.
“Being the quarterback of the franchise and knowing the head coach has your back, every quarterback would want that. Every player should want that,” Jackson said recently.
ESPN commentator Domonique Foxworth played for Harbaugh from 2009 to 2011, when the coach was still feeling his way through leading an NFL team. Even then, Foxworth was struck by Harbaugh’s understanding that the interpersonal side of his job was at least as important as the tactical.
“Some coaches are focused on the micro, which he is too, but he also has an awareness of the macro, the relationship side of it,” Foxworth said. “He knows there are buttons there to be pushed also. The benefit of maintaining a good culture is that you will get the best out of your players no matter what the game plan is. I think the head coach can affect that more than anybody else in the organization. It’s one of the few responsibilities you cannot delegate.”
Harbaugh doesn’t have a tidy explanation for why he’s never lost the thread with his players. “Standing up in front of the team, it just always comes to me what to say,” he offered.
But when current Ravens are asked why he has endured, they note the genuine interest he shows in them as athletes and people.
“You know when people care for you,” said wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr., who’s on his fourth NFL team. “It’s not politics or you’re just … like this is your job to act this way. This is a genuine act that he has. I feel like it kind of reflects throughout this building and definitely reflects on values and things that I stand for — love, all of those things. He’s been everything that I can ask for. He goes on my Mount Rushmore of coaches that I’ve had, for sure.”
The thing is, Harbaugh’s just as apt to converse with a practice squad player as with Beckham.
“He goes out of his way to make sure he has these relationships to every single player on the team,” said fullback Patrick Ricard, who has played for Harbaugh since 2017. “Guys open up to him. I know guys who come here from other places, they tell me, ‘I’ve had head coaches who didn’t even know my name.’ Harbaugh knows where everyone’s from. He knows their families. I think that’s why he stays very connected.”
They don’t hand out NFL Coach of the Year trophies for subtlety, and there’s not much talk about Harbaugh winning that award as he did in 2019, the last time the Ravens claimed the AFC’s No. 1 playoff seed. But his delicate hand with Jackson, on top of changes he made to his defensive and offensive staffs the past two seasons, spoke to his gift for adapting. Fans still call for his ouster every time the Ravens blow a lead or mismanage the game clock, but that’s part of the gig. Harbaugh just keeps winning; the Ravens made the AFC championship game in his first season, won the Super Bowl in his fifth, earned their conference’s top seed in his 12th, and finished with the league’s best record in this, his 16th.
This year’s team bears only modest resemblance to the 2019 edition and little at all to Harbaugh’s world champions from 2012. But he endures, wedded to bedrock principles he learned from his father, Jack, and from Bo Schembechler, the great Michigan coach of his youth, but never so wedded that he won’t adopt new systems suited to new generations of talent.
“They are one of the more flexible teams,” Foxworth said. “To be able to go from a [Joe] Flacco-led offense to the original Lamar offense to the new Lamar offense — I do think when the league is constantly changing, having the ability to change along with it is like a Belichick characteristic that Harbaugh has also.”
Harbaugh laughed and nodded recently when it was suggested that his Ravens’ defining trait might be having no defining trait.
“You’ve got to be really versatile as an NFL coach,” he said. “Because circumstances are ever-changing.”
The coordinators he chose — Todd Monken on offense and Mike Macdonald on defense — are shape-shifters, more interested in tailoring their plans to the talent on hand than imposing rigid visions.
Harbaugh saw a future head coach in Macdonald, who’s a candidate for at least five NFL openings, when he was still a fresh-faced staffer, learning the ropes in a cramped office he shared with Chris Horton, who’s now the Ravens’ special teams coordinator.
He did not know Monken well before he hired him away from the University of Georgia, but he liked the way the veteran coach had run everything from the pass-happy “Air Raid” at Oklahoma State to a more balanced attack for the back-to-back national champion Bulldogs.
Harbaugh has football principles — “When you come here, you know you’re going to have good, hard practices, and every situation’s going to be detailed,” Ricard said — that he expects his top assistants to reinforce, but otherwise, he gives them wide tactical latitude while he focuses on the Ravens’ big picture.
“Consistency,” Monken said when asked what he’s learned to appreciate about his boss. “His day-to-day approach, his positive energy, his connection with the team, whether we’ve won or whether we’ve lost — I’ve never been around anybody like that. I think that allows you, when you have a season as long as we do, to sustain for the long haul.”
Whatever serenity Harbaugh felt before Jackson decided to return, he’s still a practical man. He knew the Ravens’ prospects for 2023 soared with their franchise player back in the fold.
“It was like, ‘And now we can launch,'” he recalled.
As soon as the Ravens got to work in the summer, he sensed he was dealing with an unusually mature team, one for which living in the moment was not an empty cliche but a driving belief. These guys liked one another and knew how good the team could become. Jackson was at the forefront, again a lively presence in the locker room and a leading proponent for maintaining moment-to-moment focus.
“I think this is maybe the most connected team, the most tied-together that I’ve seen here,” Harbaugh said. “They’re very evolved that way. You know it when you see it, and I’ve seen it all year. … You’re not having too many awkward conversations with guys, where you’re scratching your head, wondering what a player or a coach might be thinking. Because they’re thinking the right way.”
The Ravens added veterans such as Beckham and Jadeveon Clowney in part because they thought it would be fun to play for Harbaugh, who has developed a reputation for encouraging individual expression within the team’s greater mission.
“I believe guys like that want to run through a wall for him,” Jackson said.
Thirteen wins later, the Ravens have their best chance to reach the Super Bowl since they won it 11 years ago, led by the likes of Flacco, Ray Lewis and Ed Reed.
Two nights after they finished their regular season, Harbaugh beamed as confetti rained around him, marking the national championship his younger brother, Jim, had just won for the Michigan program they both grew up worshiping. He listened to his father bellow out the family catchphrase — “Who has it better than us?” — to an eager crowd clad in maize and blue.
And for a moment, Harbaugh violated his credo. He thought ahead, to a Sunday evening in February when the championship confetti might rain again, on him and this Ravens team he has come to appreciate so deeply.
“It sinks in, ‘Like man, I really want to experience this for our team. I want our team to experience this,'” he said. “That’s the big picture, the ultimate goal for the season. And then with that, back to one day at a time, one play at a time.”
AFC divisional round
Texans at Ravens
Saturday, 4:30 p.m.
TV: ABC, ESPN
Radio: 97.9 FM, 101.5 FM, 1090 AM
Line: Ravens by 9 1/2
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