ExtremeRavens Posted Thursday at 10:30 AM Posted Thursday at 10:30 AM The Ravens’ summer vacation begins now. After three weeks of voluntary practices followed by two days of mandatory minicamp on Tuesday and Wednesday, players are off until the start of training camp. Rookies will report July 15, while veterans will do so a week later, so they’ll only get about a month off. While there won’t be football until then and most of the 11 practices over the past month were not attended by the full roster, there was plenty to be gleaned, especially from the past two days. Here’s a look at the top five things we learned from mandatory minicamp. Kicking competition by no means decided With practice indoors and therefore space limited on Wednesday because of inclement weather, there wasn’t much to be observed from rookie kickers Tyler Loop and John Hoyland. But both had their ups and downs over the spring. “I think the biggest thing is to try to put them in tough situations as much as we can,” coach John Harbaugh said Wednesday. That has at times included kicking in front of owner Steve Bisciotti, who at one point during organized team activities watched Loop, a sixth-round draft pick out of Arizona, go just 5-for-9, with all of his misses coming from beyond 50 yards. During one minicamp session Tuesday, Loop again made just two of his kicks, all from 45 yards and in, while John Hoyland, who was undrafted out of Wyoming, knocked in all four attempts from the same distances. Sure, Baltimore used a draft pick on Loop and that perhaps gives him an edge, but the Ravens are not averse to cutting a late-round selection, something they have done in the past. Harbaugh added that both kickers are working on trajectory and other tweaks to their kicking motion to try to make it repeatable and dependable. Those are just two things being charted in the process. It’s clear the job replacing Justin Tucker, whom the team cut after he was accused of sexual misconduct by several massage therapists from numerous Baltimore-area spas, is still up in the air. “All those things I think add up, and then the end result with all that going on has been really good,” Harbaugh said. “And again, we’ll pick it up in training camp.” Ravens kicker John Hoyland, shown practicing earlier this month, is firmly in the mix to land the starting placekicker job after the team's OTAs and minicamp. The undrafted Hoyland is competing with Tyler Loop, a sixth-round draft pick. (Kenneth K. Lam/Staff) Lamar Jackson looked mostly sharp in his return Some will undoubtedly make a big deal about Jackson missing all but one of the voluntary practices, and in theory the question of, “is he doing everything he can to get over the hump to his first Super Bowl?” is perhaps a fair one. But it also doesn’t hold a lot of water when it comes to OTAs. Jackson, who has had similar attendance in previous years, was the NFL’s Most Valuable Player in 2023 and nearly won the award again last season when he put up career highs in passing yards and touchdown passes during the regular season. The Ravens did start slowly each of the past two seasons, and maybe a few more OTAs would have helped avoid that, putting them in better position for the postseason. But again, the Ravens had the best record in the NFL two years ago, so it only goes so far. As for his performance the past two days, it was about what would be expected this time of year. He was mostly accurate, spread the ball around, was engaged, corrected young receivers on the depths of their routes, and had good timing and plenty of bounce in his step. Clearly still bothered by the divisional round loss to the Bills and the two turnovers he committed in that game, he said the team is looking to bounce back with “vengeance.” He also said that he plans to have more meetings with the players — something that began at one point last season with receivers attending some of the quarterback meetings — as well as get together with his pass catchers between now and the start of training camp. Defensive backfield loaded Baltimore executives are fond of saying a team can never have too many cornerbacks. Injuries are inevitable and depth therefore necessary, particularly for a defense that deploys a lot of nickel and dime looks. The Ravens added to that depth in a significant way Wednesday with the signing of two-time Pro Bowl cornerback Jaire Alexander, who was also a teammate of Jackson’s at Louisville and drafted 14 picks before the quarterback in 2018. A day earlier, Jackson had implored general manager Eric DeCosta to “go get” the former Green Bay Packers standout who has also been oft-injured. In reality, negotiations had already been underway before then. The Ravens signed cornerback Jaire Alexander, shown above at the team's minicamp, to a one-year deal worth up to $6 million. (Stephanie Scarbrough/AP) Now that Alexander is here, though, the Ravens’ defensive backfield has five former first-round picks, including cornerbacks Marlon Humphrey and Nate Wiggins and safeties Kyle Hamilton and rookie Malaki Starks. There are what could be solid contributors behind them, too, with cornerbacks Chidobe Awuzie, Jalyn Armour-Davis and T.J. Tampa along with safety Sanoussi Kane. Losing safety Ar’Darius Washington to a torn Achilles tendon earlier in the offseason that could keep him out for the year stings, but it’s not insurmountable. And there’s always the possibility Baltimore could add a veteran safety at some point this summer, with plenty still available and affordable. Vorhees, Faalele front-runners to start at guard Last season, Andrew Vorhees and Daniel Faalele began the season at left and right guard, respectively, before Vorhees lost his job in part due to an ankle injury. With both healthy, they’ll be the front-runners to start there again this season, though Harbaugh stopped just short of guaranteeing it. “In one sense, every job is open,” he said. “You never know what’s going to happen the next day. You’ve got to be ready for every possibility. “But those are two of the positions that I kind of think I’ve got a pretty good idea that the guys that you saw out there today are in the lead, especially Daniel. He had the most experience last year. So, he did a nice job and really played well as the season went on, and then when Voorhees got his chance, he looked really good, too, in that one game, the Browns game. But they both know they’ve got to play well. The standard will be very high, but we expect them to play up to it.” The rest of the starting offensive line, meanwhile, is set in stone with left tackle Ronnie Stanley, who has been a regular attendee through the spring after signing an extension this offseason, center Tyler Linderbaum and right tackle Roger Rosengarten. How the reserves shake out remains to be seen, but backup center Nick Samac, veteran Ben Cleveland, free agent acquisition Joe Noteboom, third-round rookie Emery Jones Jr., fifth-round rookie Carson Vinson and seventh-round rookie Garrett Dellinger all figure to have a good shot to be on the roster. That would also give the Ravens 11 offensive linemen, which doesn’t leave a lot of room for others vying for a job. Which also brings us to … Ravens executive vice president and general manager Eric DeCosta, left, walks with coach John Harbaugh during a practice this past season. The duo will enter training camp with a good idea for how the 53-man roster will shake out. (Karl Merton Ferron/Staff) There likely won’t be a lot of jobs up for grabs at training camp It’s still too early to project what the Ravens’ 53-man roster will look like, especially given the specter of inevitable injuries during training camp. But perusing the current 91-man roster, there simply are not a lot of openings. At quarterback, there’s Jackson with Cooper Rush behind him. At running back are Derrick Henry, Justice Hill and Keaton Mitchell. The top three receivers are Zay Flowers, Rashod Bateman and DeAndre Hopkins, likely followed in some order by Devontez Walker, Tylan Wallace and perhaps rookie LaJohntay Wester, who has a shot to win the punt return job. The tight end room is accounted for with Mark Andrews, Isaiah Likely and Charlie Kolar, along with fullback Patrick Ricard. Along the defensive line are Nnamdi Madubuike, Travis Jones, Broderick Washington and John Jenkins. At outside linebacker are Odafe Oweh, Kyle Van Noy, rookie Mike Green, Tavius Robinson and likely Adisa Isaac. Inside linebacker spots stack up with Roquan Smith, Trenton Simpson, veteran Jake Hummel and rookie Teddye Buchanan. The defensive backfield so far shakes out with six corners (Humphrey, Wiggins, Alexander, Awuzie, Tampa, Armour-Davis) and four safeties (Hamilton, Starks, Kane, Beau Brade). Then there’s the kicker, punter (Jordan Stout) and long snapper (Nick Moore). Add it all up, and that’s 52 spots already. Even if some players start the year on the injured list, there simply aren’t that many openings. It also means outside linebacker David Ojabo and running back Rasheen Ali, among a couple of others, could very much be on the bubble. It could make for a relatively quiet training camp, but that would also be a good problem to have. Have a news tip? Contact Brian Wacker at bwacker@baltsun.com, 410-332-6200 and x.com/brianwacker1. View the full article Quote
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.