TBird

That's what Pissburgh said when they cut Unitas. I like what this guy said. In grabbing a vet, the Ravens have given their secondary another experienced player. While Cox may not be a world-beater what he is is a guy who can actually play for you -- even if its only in certain sub-packages. On a current roster where Webby has a back issue, Asa is undersized and inexperienced and Chykie is Chykie adding a guy who has experience and can be thrown onto the field in sub-packages isn't a bad thing. I'll admit that I personally wanted more or a higher-level player, but finding a good caliber corner may've cost more via trade than Ozzie was willing to part with -- as Ozzie has said publicly ' we (the Ravens' organization) like draftpicks'. I'm okay with the move. Sometimes you have to build things from the bottom up, and if this move pushes Chykie out of any reasonable playing packages defensively then I call that a 'win'. We'll see how it goes folks.

Yea, I forgot about Webb. He obviously got the message when they got rid of Boldin. When the team asks you to restructure it's because they need the savings and you better take a cut or else.

I called that on rg3 and his knee hasn't been the same since Ngata ruined it.

According to Eisenberg. I dunno. Article starts out saying he's played more than Flacco. ILMAO. That's because they don't want Joe to get hurt. As far as winning Tyrod runs better than he throws and I'm thinking Ravens keep Wenning for a future backup. They might try to sneak him on the practice squad or keep 3 QBs. They need them. Rams QB went down for the season over the weekend with ACL. Man, how they're dropping like flies with ACLs. http://www.baltimoreravens.com/news/article-1/Eisenberg-Ravens-Can-Win-Games-With-Tyrod-Taylor/03fee6c2-b305-4d94-8c70-409cc8ef8fc9

Fans are saying no big deal. He just goes at the bottom of the pile. They want a legit starter at CB but they are hard to find. Harbs did say the FO is working on a trade for one. We're deep in LBs and WRs and teams need them. Everyone from Ozzie to Kokinis is making calls. Meanwhile Cox isn't so bad. He had a good rookie year and went to SD after playing out his contract. Didn't do so hot so Minn picked him up for camp and just released him. How about Franks. Nobody was excited when he came. Since he gave up the TD to DEZ after Jimmy went down, he has settled down and is doing OK for us, not great but OK and he missed some of camp but has settled down. He didn't lose any games for us. We won them all this summer. Film Study gave him a (0/+1) rating. Cowboys receiver Dez Bryant (right) celebrates a TD ... which ended with Bryant leaping over Ravens cornerback Dominique Franks .. I don't remember anyone getting excited when Corey Graham was signed but look what he did and everyone was pissed when he left, same with IH. So Oz picks up another vet on the cheap who just might be able to help us while still trying to trade. Oz brought in Monroe and Zuttah when everyone was panicing over the o-line. Cox, the vet, just might turn out to be OK playing for a SB team. http://www.baltimoreravens.com/news/article-1/Ravens-Sign-Cornerback-Derek-Cox/24472cfe-74c8-415e-9784-adb80907e31b

I said on the other thread that he could make the team based on his special teams skills. We'll need a backup if JJ goes down or even get him in anyway so JJ won't get hurt. We need him as a WR.

When he bought the team he said he was gonna be a "hands off" owner but hasn't been. Of course when you spend close to $1B for a team and you're the 2d youngest owner ever, you do what you want. He threw his weight around in that draft and could have cost us Joe and Rice and we probably don't go to the SB. Also, at the end of last season he put HARBs and Oz on notice. They better not have another mediocre season or else. I really don't think he'd ever fire Oz and if he was stupid enough to there'd be 31 teams line up with open check books to sign him at any cost. He is also over-paying DeCosta who makes more than most of the GMs in all pro sports. I fear for when Ozzie retires because none of his assistants that left did well except for the current GM in KC who was also the GM in NE and helped Bellicheat with all those players including Brady when no one else in the world wanted him. Phil Savage was fired and then his replacement was fired even faster and Ozzie's pal The Shack was fired in JAX and after Oz flleeced him for all those picks for Flacco. The guy Shack wanted, a pass rusher to stop Manning and tHE Dolts wasn't good, a guy name Harvey, I think. So who's to say DeCosta will do any better? He's the one who pimped Oher on Oz and Kruger who did nothing til his last season and only 1/2 of his last season after Suggs comes back. He left town bitching about lack of playing time in SB 47 after making a good stop or 2 but he would have lost the SB had he stayed in. Teams ran all over him during the season and SF just might have won if Kruger stayed in. Oher was a dumb as could be and is gone too. I told DeCosta that he f******ed up the Oher draft when he spoke to our club. It got me kicked out the club too-lol. Well that and the Anita Marks joke I played on Scott Garceau who was the MC at our Scholarship Banquet. Anyway, He could have had Nicks who led the Giants to their SB trophies and was the go to guy in the end. We wouldn't have had Lee Evans dropping that ball with 25 secs to the SB to play the Giants and we would have won it. That was our Sb.. He said Nicks wasn't as good a player as Oher. Well Oher was run out of town and the didn't even try to sign Kruger, opting for Ellerbe instead but couldn't close the deal but then Dooooom fell into their laps. Kruger gets $45M for 1/2 a good season and promptly gets his entire coaching staff and front office fired for such a dismal year. Anyone associated with trying to sign Kruger was fired. ILMAO. You could say that Webb salvages that draft like Suggs salvaged the Boller draft but we won the SB w/o Webb who was out most of the year - AGAIN, and guess who is out now and hasn't played since training camp started. All that said, we're damn lucky to have Bisciotti. They're bitching about Boy Wonder down the road right now and we could have had him. Well, we had Irsay all those years who stole our team. I think Biscut learned to stay out of the draft although he still might fired HARBs if he goes 8-8. That won't upset me but if he fires Oz I'm getting Issis on him. Make that Issis and the Hamas-lol. I have contacts in the White House-lol. WE GOT OUR BOOKENDS - ERIC DECOSTA

And while I always said that Joe was the guy Oz wanted, people said why did he try to trade up for Ryan. Well now we now. Bisciotti was sticking his big dick into the picture. Just think, we wouldn't have had Joe or Ray Rice had we traded up and Matt Ryan gets blown out of the playoffs early every year except the year we went to SB47. I wanted SF in that SB and was scared to death to get Atlanta's fleet wide recievers on that fast indoor track. The SB would have been a blowout if the lights hadn't gone out.

I always heard Oz traded up to 18 because he heard that Jets and Gruden wanted Joe. Jets had worked him out for 4 days in NY. TB needed a QB so Oz moves in front of Gruden to grab Flacco and Gruden is out of football for lack of QB. I told everyone that Joe was Ozzie's guy all along and even said it to Aaron Wilson when he spoke to our club. I said if everyone is picking us to take Matt Ryan if he drops, then it means he's taking someone else and it ain't gonna be Henne or Brohm. Aaron said usually that's right but you're not in the same room as Ozzie to see his eyes light up when he talks about Matt Ryan. A week after the draft, DeCosta told our club that I'm not exactly sure we would have drafted Ryan even if he dropped because of all the work my staff did on Flacco. BINGO! Hell, he didn't even know about Flacco and neither did Oz until their east coast scout called and said Joe is the real deal and you gotta come up here to see him. DeCosta said, hell, I didn't even know anyone in Delware. You don't know how hard it was for me to go to such a tiny school and give him an A. He waited for Joe to play Towson State and he didn't want to go then. He just returned from a long road trip of scouting and wanted to spend the day with his family but he went. He saw a giant of a man walk on the field before the game, pick up a football and throw it 50 yards and laid it on a dime. Flacco knew he was there and DeCosta said, damn, I gotta see this kid play. Then he took all his scouts to see Joe bring Navy from behind looking like Unitas in the 2-min drill to beat Navy at the end. They all went back to OM and submitted grades to DeCosta in sealed envelopes and they were all As. HARBs and hired and brings in CAM so DeCosta wanted CAM to work Joe out at Delaware. Here's CAM trying to find a home for his family and I drag him all the way up to tiny Delware. CAM loved his arm and especially how fast he changed his mechanics when instructed and told DeCosta to get him but he said, I'm the only one who talks to Joe. Enter Zorn and Zorn departs, sic, sic. We almost became the first team to send a rookie QB and rookie head coach to the Super Bowl. We just missed it that year.

Guys, guys - it's just preseason where nobody is as bad as they look or as good as they play. Remember the old Skins used to win all the pre-season titles only to be disastrous in regular season. Granted, Squeelers have their problems. They should have drafted CB instead of LB and DE early on. Eagles ripped them apart on first two drives. If you think ours are depleted, there's are worse and have been since Tebow split them in the POs a few years ago. So they draft Shazier who is one mean dude. He drilled a teammate in the back with a football from point blank range in practice He then did the same to the Buff Bills in first pre-season game. He was a one man wrecking ball. Last night he did nothing vs Eagles. Even Dirty Sanchez threw over him and under him and around him. He was supposed to be good in coverage but Sachez abused him with the scrubs. Tuitt was the DE they drafted who was supposed to be great. He might be too but he looked like the statue of liberty as Philly ran over him all night. Squeelers were so desperate the left their first team in with Big Jen still playing and they still couldn't move until later on. By the end of the game that defense gave up 31 points and almost 500 yards. That said, I guarantee you they won't give that much up vs us. They always bring their A game vs us as everyone does and they've beaten us with Charlie Batch, a 3rd string QB and almost with Dixon. Shaz and Tuitt will be good down the road but not this year and they're paying for some bad drafts and not drafting CBs early on. .

So Ravens are #1, most valuable, in the division. Also, don't forget, there are about 6 teams that own the stadium like in Dallas and DC so that increases their value. Ravens are ahead of Pitt's stadium too which is a piece of _______ compared to ours. Looks like it was built with an erector set. I've been there a couple of times. Also, there was a thread on the boards right after the World Cup where Forbes listed the values of all the sports teams in the world and Ravens were #19 overall. First 3 teams were soccer teams followed by two famous baseball teams. After that it was mostly pro football teams. That's why Goodell wants to play games in London. He wants the NFL to go global and compete with the soccer around the world which is the most popular sport. Football is king here but not overseas. A lot of Europeans love American football and one board I go on has a UK sub forum with many Britts in there. They never even played football but jumped on the band wagon and know their stuff.

Getting open doesn't do you any good if your not catching the ball or if it isn't being thrown to you.

Fort what it's worth, I just read an article that the Squeelers running game isn't so hot while their rookie linebacker, Shazier, is tearing teams apart. He'll be a force but back to Taliaferro, we know that he and Pierce will be able to fill in for Rice when he is out for 2 weeks. Kubes hasn't shown anything of his offense other than the run game. He had to see if he had the guys to plug in for Rice and he has. Forsett is the only one who hasn't produced but he is a product of Kubes system and should be better.

Kamar Aiken and Jeremy Butler After having a good game against the 49ers, the two were virtually invisible against the Cowboys, catching one pass for 10 yards.

No, it's not a meaningless stat because as Willis of SF just commented at the close of camp with SF, Kubes wil.run and run at you and set you up with the play action with Torrey Smith, Steve Smith and Jacoby Jones stretching the field. So far I don't remember any play actions but Kubes isn't showing anything. Its all vanilla except for the running. Get used to it in this pass happy league. Old School football still says that the run sets up the pass.

Yea, he said that Harvard used a very similar system as Kubes. He was even familiar with the terms. Everyone loves this system.

KJ said he thought for two years about his entrance when his name was called out and he wanted a combination of a tough guy image along with something clever, which is uncommon for full back, the clever part, but KJ did go to Harvard. Anyway, check out the vid not that this will make anyone forget about Ray's dance. BTW, after Mikie Prestone said KJ would be great catching the ball out of the backfield as he did all during camp and the first two pre-season game, he said KJ wouldn't be the great blocker as Leach. Well move over Mikie because KJ is improving as a blocker and I saw him pancake a guy in the second level and knock him into two other guys that fell on the same play vs SF. What a great find he is turning out and from Harvard no less. Now check out this dance. I'd call it kicking down the door. The link isn't coming in. Click on the site's link below and then KJ article. Sorry www.baltimoreravens.com

Kiper agrees with you and gave Ravens a B because they didn't take a OT early in the draft but now we see why Oz took all that defense. Even Joe said he sees why Oz took all that defense. Last year in Miami Rice scored standing up when Wagner pancaked his man playing on an unbalanced line on the left side. I really wanted Zack Martin in the draft but there was no way Ravens were taking him. DeCosta said they would have drafted Mosley even if they had the #10 pick of the draft with Lewan and Zack on the board. DeCosta said Zack rose on hype from the 2d round and went high on supply and demand. Everyone needs a tackle. He also said we like the players we have - Wagner and Jensen who is now the #1 backup on the depth chart. They kept Jensen all last year even with a broken leg or foot. He is listed as RG behind Yanda but can play RT and Center. I'll bet that Jensen will play Center before you see Gino again if Zuttah goes down. Gino and Shipley are still horrendous and Gino was always an undersized Center who couldn't even learn the ZBS last year. Back to Wagner, he had a great game vs SF except one play where Dial stood him up as he stripped Forsett of the ball, as they threw one guy after another at him and he held his own vs Doooooom in practice all summer, especially early on when he blew him away. Doooooom caught up towards the end of camp getting into the backfield but Wagner adjusted as he came back. I only saw him get beat once in Dallas reminiscent of Dial standing him up vs SF. His man blew by him and hit Joe as he threw the ball forcing it wide of his receiver but that was the only time I saw that. So I've only seen two bad plays from him, one in each game and only one that impacted the game adversely vs Dial. Otherwise, I'd give him an A instead of a B but he has only started two pro grames - both exhibitions. Ja Reid is the #1 backup for tackle and he had a decent camp, starting a few fights left over from the barroom brawl he was in down in Key West, but these fights were legal-lol. Wagner would have been at least a 3rd round draft choice last year but he had a broken leg I think during the draft process so he dropped way down and Ravens took him and Jensen who didn't play one snap all last year but was kept on the parent team and he had a good camp. Wagner just separated himself above Jensen for RT. I have a friend in Green Bay who followed Wagner at Wisconsin where o-linemen grow on trees like Joe Thomas. He's out of that mold. Yanda had great things to say about him in the off season. Said he came in here and did his job, worked hard in the gym, kept his mouth shut and he reminds me of me. LOL WE HAVE OUR BOOKENDS - BRIAN DECOSTA

The good news is Kubes was showing only his vanilla offense loaded down whith whipped cream and tasted more like salt water. Squeelers and Bungals won't even bother with the game tape as they run the same thing in pre-season.

Webb will miss rest of pre-season. http://www.baltimoreravens.com/news/article-1/Lardarius-Webb-Done-For-Preseason-More-Injury-Updates/47f5c247-0a1d-4664-a57f-686582efc922

I think Taliaferro had 56 yds in Dallas playing with the 2d unit. He definitely moved up the depth chart. Not bad.

Jimmy isn't practicing with the team,today, not that I expected him to. We probably wont see him for the rest of pre-season. Get him ready for Week 1.

A. Samuel of the Falcons and formerly the Eagles is available. Jets were talking to him but no deal but you're right, not many are available and everyone needs one. Oz will probably pick up someone who gets cut.

Exactly. You are spot on, sir.

Speaking of tough calls, I see Camp coming up with a mysterious injury for IR. Doubt if they can sneak him to the practice squad. OFFENSE: WR Michael Campanaro The receiver from Wake Forest continues to impress during training camp, and his acceleration was on display during individual receiver drills. When it came to running double moves, Campanaro looked fluid, and his cuts were biting coming in and out of his breaks. He simply flies out of his release off the line. Campanaro also showed off his body control on a diving catch near the sideline during live action. He was able to find a soft spot in coverage and got behind the underneath defender. On another play, the rookie caught a short, underneath square-in pass and dashed past defenders in the open field, ripping off some serious yards after the catch (YAC).