ExtremeRavens Posted November 1 Posted November 1 Through seven weeks, the Cleveland Browns had not scored more than 18 points in a game and had passed for more than 200 yards just once. They defined toothless NFL offense. Against the Ravens last Sunday, the Browns scored 29 points and passed for 321 yards. It was a new nadir for a Baltimore defense verging on disaster and threatening to undermine an offense that’s not only the best in the league but the best in team history. A year ago, the Ravens allowed opponents 4.7 yards per pass attempt, tops in the NFL. This year, they have allowed 39 plays of 20 yards or more, five more than any other team and 24 more than the Kansas City Chiefs, the team they played nine months ago in the AFC championship game. These shortcomings were easier to overlook during the team’s five-game winning streak but dragged into the light of day by the Ravens’ sobering loss in Cleveland. Suddenly, one of ESPN’s top analysts, former NFL quarterback Dan Orlovsky, was saying, “I don’t trust Baltimore’s defense” and pointing to first-year coordinator Zach Orr’s overly predictable reliance on blitzes as the Browns marched for a game-winning touchdown. No less an authority than Bill Belichick said on his SiriusXM show that “the [Ravens’] defense is something that it seems like they have good players, but they just haven’t been able to do what they need to do defensively.” Though Ravens coach John Harbaugh has remained calm and optimistic in his public comments, several moves in recent weeks have suggested he and his staff are also grasping for solutions. First, they brought in the team’s former defensive coordinator, Dean Pees, to help advise Orr. Then, they benched $70 million safety Marcus Williams — an every-down player when healthy throughout his Ravens career — in favor of another veteran, Eddie Jackson, who couldn’t pull in a pair of interceptions and gave up the decisive touchdown against the Browns. So what the heck is going on with a group that so excelled at keeping quarterbacks out of sorts in 2023? “Even though you put in the work, everything doesn’t come together as fast as you may want it to,” Orr said. “We know that the work we’re putting in, the attention to detail that we’re doing, is going to pay off. Obviously, it sounds like a broken record. We’ve been saying that for a couple weeks. But I honestly, truly believe that with the coaches and players we have, it’s going to come together, and it’s going to come together at the right time.” It’s never just one thing. Sometimes, the Ravens get discombobulated making one of their myriad coverage adjustments. Other times, they lose one-on-one battles against the other team’s top pass catchers. They’ve tackled poorly on some key plays, left gaping holes in zone looks on others. They have dropped eight interceptions, more than any team in the league according to Pro Football Focus (if they’d caught even four of those, Harbaugh said, their other failings would be mitigated). Their four-man rush was stagnant in Cleveland, leaving Orr to rely too heavily on blitzes on the Browns’ go-ahead drive. The Ravens are also dealing with real injury adversity for the first time this season. Marlon Humphrey and Nate Wiggins, two of their top three cornerbacks, did not play against the Browns. Their top interior defender, Travis Jones, played just 15 snaps in Cleveland and did not practice Wednesday because of an ankle injury that hobbled him throughout last week. His beefiest compatriot, Michael Pierce, will miss at least the next four weeks after he left the Browns loss with a calf injury. Fellow defensive tackle Brent Urban is in concussion protocol. This sudden defensive line shortage could leave the Ravens vulnerable against the run, which they have smothered to date (allowing the fewest yards per game and per attempt). The team’s top defenders have maintained a united public front in the face of this unexpected failure, backing Orr and vowing to hush naysayers. “There is a lot of outside noise, and there is a lot of adversity, as well, but you can’t get rattled,” said All-Pro linebacker Roquan Smith, the Ravens’ on-field signal caller and vocal leader. “We keep receipts. At the end of the day, [we’ve] just got to make ‘cats’ pay for it, when the time comes. We’re going to be perfectly fine. We’ll look back at this interview pretty soon, and you’ll be like, ‘You were right.’” Ravens safety Kyle Hamilton doesn’t buy that the defense’s struggles can be attributed to the absences of coaches Mike Macdonald or Dennard Wilson. “I don’t think that necessarily there was a loss of talent,” he said. (Karl Merton Ferron/Staff) These defensive woes are puzzling in part because, as Belichick said, the Ravens are still loaded with Pro Bowl talent on all three layers. At age 27, Smith is the team’s leading tackler and more than that, a spiritual successor to Ray Lewis as the Ravens’ brash defensive quarterback. Kyle Hamilton, 23, disrupts offenses in a wider variety of ways than any other safety in football. Nnamdi Madubuike, 26, signed a $98 million extension in the offseason after he broke out as a rare elite pass rusher at defensive tackle. Aside from Hamilton and Humphrey, the Ravens aren’t getting enough from their defensive stars. Smith’s Pro Football Focus coverage grade is the worst of his career (49.5 compared with 83.2 last season) and among the bottom 20 among all inside linebackers. Not only does Madubuike have just two sacks, his pressures, in the face of increased double teams, are down from 0.14 per pass-rush snap in 2023 to 0.09 per pass-rush snap in 2024. Williams was off to a career-worst start before the Ravens sat him against the Browns in a move Harbaugh has chosen not to explain in detail publicly. Cornerback Brandon Stephens has taken a step back from his breakout 2023 season. After a hot start, outside linebacker Odafe Oweh has just six pressures over his past four games. The Ravens did lose significant talent in the offseason, including Jadeveon Clowney, their most consistent edge rusher, and Pro Bowl linebacker Patrick Queen, who was on the field for almost every defensive snap and played an underrated role in the team’s pass rush. The talent drain was even greater on the coaching side. Not only did coordinator Mike Macdonald depart to coach the Seattle Seahawks; Dennard Wilson, one of the league’s top secondary coaches, left to to run the Tennessee Titans’ defense, and Anthony Weaver, one of the most respected voices on Harbaugh’s staff, left to be the coordinator in Miami. The Ravens replaced Macdonald with the 32-year-old Orr, who had never run a defense and had to rebuild much of his staff. His plan looks much the same in its use of deceptive coverages and simulated blitzes, but to a man, Ravens players and coaches agree their execution has not been up to snuff. Hamilton doesn’t buy that their struggles can be attributed to the absences of Macdonald or Wilson. “I don’t think that necessarily there was a loss of talent,” he said. “I feel like we kept a good amount of people in our room — players and coaches — and I don’t feel like the room feels super different from last year. It’s just [about] executing, and last year, we were executing. I can’t pinpoint or give you an exact answer on why that isn’t happening right now, but that’s still something that we’re trying to figure out, we’re trying to perfect.” “I honestly, truly believe that with the coaches and players we have, it’s going to come together, and it’s going to come together at the right time,” coordinator Zach Orr said of the Ravens’ defense. (Amy Davis/Staff) He said that if he had to start anywhere, it would be with Ravens defenders winning their individual matchups, something all of them have proven capable of doing in past seasons. “I don’t think it’s difficult,” veteran cornerback Arthur Maulet said. “We’re playing the same thing with 90% of the same guys. It’s nothing new.” He noted that the Ravens are playing more man-to-man coverage, which means it’s incumbent on their pass rushers to reach the quarterback a beat sooner and for their defensive backs to stick with receivers a beat longer. “Rush and coverage have to work together,” he said. If there’s a move that has the potential to create unrest, it’s the recent decision to sideline Williams, a proven playmaker, to give more snaps to Jackson, who hasn’t shined in Orr’s defense. “We had those conversations together, with Marcus obviously and then with the defense on a personal level,” Orr said. “We kept those in house. One thing I’ll say is that the way he handled what went down is great.” The Ravens have been here before, though not to this degree. In Macdonald’s first season, 2022, they gave up 1,060 passing yards to their first three opponents. “Miscommunication” became a catch-all buzzword for their mishaps, much as it has been at times this season. But the Ravens traded for Smith at midseason, and Macdonald developed a better feel for how to deploy his players, including Hamilton, who evolved from an overwhelmed rookie to the Ravens’ best defender in their playoff loss to the Cincinnati Bengals. They ended up eighth in defensive DVOA. Can they make similar strides this season, whether that means adding a significant player before Tuesday’s trade deadline or finding more synchronicity between Orr’s plans and what actually happens on the field? Their performance in Cleveland, albeit marred by injuries, suggested they’re not progressing quickly enough, if at all. Nonetheless, there are those outside the building who have faith in the infrastructure under Harbaugh. “There’s a lotta time and a long way to go,” Belichick said on SiriusXM. “I’m sure that they’ll get it straightened out.” Baltimore Sun reporter Brian Wacker contributed to this article. Have a news tip? Contact Childs Walker at daviwalker@baltsun.com, 410-332-6893 and x.com/ChildsWalker. View the full article Quote
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