ExtremeRavens Posted September 23 Posted September 23 Late Monday night, one question after another was hurled toward coach John Harbaugh trying to make sense of the Ravens’ 38-30 loss to the Detroit Lions. Nearly every answer opened with some form of “We got to …” Baltimore has a lot to clean up after its 1-2 start. Here are five things we learned from the game: The superstar duo looked human in prime time Derrick Henry two-hand slammed his helmet down and collapsed helplessly onto the bench. The superstar running back, who has long been the image of late-game reliability, watched the big board replay completely dumbfounded. The fourth-quarter fumble was his second costly turnover this season and the third time that he’s let the football slip from his grasp — both career firsts. An hour later, inside the home locker room at M&T Bank Stadium, Henry held that same arresting, sorrowful look in his eyes. “I’m gonna try to not beat myself up too much,” he said, shaking his head. “But it’s hard not to.” Midway through the fourth quarter, the Ravens set up for what might otherwise have been a go-ahead drive from their own 21-yard line. Henry cradled a handoff and bounced to his left when the disruptive fist of Aidan Hutchinson came crashing down. Henry has been fumble averse his entire career, particularly in prime-time games. He’s only ever fumbled four times in the NFL’s nightcap, two of them in the past three weeks. Baltimore signed him to be someone they could look to for the finishing move. His first three games this season have been anything but. The postgame apology to his teammates and Baltimore’s fan base sounded like a man in unfamiliar territory. He vowed to figure out how to be better. “It sucks right now,” Henry said, having rushed for 50 yards on 12 carries with a touchdown and the turnover. His quarterback wore a similar veil of shock. Lamar Jackson completed 21 of 27 passes for 288 yards with three touchdowns. But he was sacked seven times, tying a career high (vs. Pittsburgh in 2021), and pressured 30 times. That lack of stability in the pocket killed more than a few drives, like the back-to-back sacks on the edge of the red zone that held Baltimore to a field goal instead of a game-tying touchdown. The Lions looked well-equipped for the two-time NFL Most Valuable Player. Coach Dan Campbell said that former Raven Malik Cunningham, who the Lions signed to their practice squad Tuesday, simulated Jackson’s dual-threat mastery at quarterback for a practice. Come Monday night, the Lions “all bottled [Jackson] up,” Campbell said. “Guys made huge plays, and he had nowhere to go.” “They were doing stunts, and they had a spy,” Jackson said. “Sometimes the spy was grabbing my leg, and that’s just what it was. They were dropping into coverage, [and] they had three safeties back there, and I’m just not going to throw a Hail Mary ball. I’m going to read the coverage out, and then try to make something happen.” The Lions’ Amon-Ra St. Brown, left, beats the Ravens’ Marlon Humphrey to make the catch on fourth down late in the fourth quarter. Humphrey was also called for holding on the play. (Kenneth K. Lam/staff) Extended missed time for Madubuike and Van Noy, as expected, will be a problem Here’s a stat that, as it unfolded in real time, left all 70,000-plus fans at M&T Bank Stadium clenching their jaws: the last time the Ravens allowed a scoring drive of at least 95 yards at home was 2001. More than half of the current defense hadn’t been born yet. On Monday night, they allowed two such marathon drives. All of Baltimore’s defensive issues — an out of position secondary, the Lions’ unbeatable rushing attack between the tackles, and an inability to get hands on quarterback Jared Goff — can trace to the absences of two veteran difference makers along the defensive line: Nnamdi Madubuike (neck) and Kyle Van Noy (hamstring). Even if players and coaches don’t want to admit it. “It’s hard to measure that at this point,” Harbaugh said. “But you play with the guys that are out there and the guys that are out there are good enough to do it.” Added Kyle Hamilton: “We’re blessed to have guys who can make plays all over the field. Shame on us if we need a Pro Bowl guy to play good defense. … Obviously it hurts not having those two guys but we have guys in the room with ample amount of talent to make up for that at all three levels.” Madubuike and Van Noy each accounted for 21 1/2 sacks since the start of 2023. They’re two of three on Baltimore’s defense with a double-digit sack season. Without them, the Ravens relied on five guys between the interior and edges of the defensive line, all still on rookie contracts. That’s not to say that Baltimore’s defense was a steel wall with Madubuike and Van Noy, but the Ravens were certainly better equipped to plug the line of scrimmage with them in tow. The Lions allowed zero sacks, didn’t turn the ball over and, according to Next Gen Stats, made the optimal decision on every fourth down. Running back David Montgomery gashed Baltimore for 151 yards on 12 carries. His partner in crime, Jahmyr Gibbs, ran for 67 yards on 22 carries. Those two accounted for four touchdowns. When the Ravens couldn’t bandage Detroit’s ground game, it opened the flood gates to the air raid. Goff threw for 202 yards, completing 20 of 28 passes with a touchdown. He had no trouble operating from the pocket with how rarely the Ravens front disrupted his timing. Ravens vs. Lions, September 22, 2025 | PHOTOS By night’s end, cornerback Marlon Humphrey held court beside his locker, as he often does after weighty games like Monday night’s. He spoke for six minutes, a winding message that boils down to five words: “We’re just not very good.” The lasting image from the loss may be Humphrey, star fishing on the turf after Amon-Ra St. Brown burnt him up the right sideline. Detroit scored on a rushing touchdown a play later, hammering the final nail in an all-black coffin. Or perhaps it was earlier, when Montgomery ripped off a 72-yard, the kind of play that, Hamilton sighed, “just demoralizes you.” Collectively, the Ravens missed 20 tackles, per Next Gen Stats. Having allowed 426 yards of total offense puts them at the bottom of the league this season. While Baltimore’s defense ranked second in rushing success rate last year, it’s now in cellar of the NFL. “That’s not who we are,” Harbaugh said. “It cannot be who we are.” “I feel like they kind of did whatever they wanted to do all night,” Humphrey said. “We never got them off schedule and it’s really hard if the offense never gets off schedule. … I do know we got guys that want to compete, that want to get the job done. I feel like we are close. We gotta come together.” He ended on this point: “We just can’t expect our offense — I know we got Lamar Jackson — you just can’t expect them to score 30 points every game. We gotta do our part.” Time to worry about the Ravens’ goal line offense? The drive started at midfield. Three plays later, the Ravens were down to the 3-yard line. Henry picked up 2 yards and was stuffed within inches of the goal line. Two more tries up the middle for the future Hall of Famer went nowhere. That would have been a far more scrutinized play-calling sequence if it was anyone other than Henry in the backfield. What might come under more fire was the fourth-down call. Jackson faked the handoff and rolled to his right. He tucked the ball, while Mark Andrews and Zay Flowers floated parallel to the goal line. Jackson Lady Liberty’d the football when linebacker Jack Campbell wrapped him up and jarred it loose. That sequence was the third time Baltimore had run a play from its opponent’s 1-yard line this season. Not one of them has ended with a touchdown, according to ESPN — a far cry from the seven plays in such glamorous field position last year that all finished in the end zone. For all the magnetic success of the offense, it’s head-scratching they’ve had such trouble inside the 1-yard line. “I don’t know until I see the tape,” Harbaugh said, when asked to make sense of the statistical anomaly. “But you want to score when you’re at the 1-yard line, that’s for sure.” Jackson didn’t have much of an answer either. “We just didn’t score,” he said, “and that rarely happens.” Ravens tight end Mark Andrews celebrates his touchdown catch against the Lions with quarterback Lamar Jackson, right. (Karl Merton Ferron/Staff) Andrews and Bateman aren’t lost in the offense It was only a matter of time, right? Over the first two weeks of the season, Andrews and Rashod Bateman combined for 32 yards on six catches without a touchdown. They were nonexistent, forgotten in an offense with too many options. Not on Monday night. Andrews let out his signature yelp for the first time this season on a 14-yard touchdown in the third quarter. He caught all six of his targets for a team-high 91 yards and two scores. Bateman was similarly efficient, with five catches on seven tries for 63 yards and a much calmer second-quarter score. As we’ve learned through three games, it’s impossible to predict who might carry the offense. In Buffalo, Flowers and Henry shouldered the load. Tez Walker, Tylan Wallace and DeAndre Hopkins starred versus Cleveland. Andrews and Bateman were called on against Detroit. “It just felt good getting in the end zone, making some plays, getting in a rhythm,” Andrews said, “and I thought Lamar threw some incredible passes.” The Ravens’ offense leads the league in scoring with 111 points. They didn’t need much of Andrews or Bateman — two of their top-three pass catchers in 2024 — to top the league after two weeks, scoring 40 points in both games. They were bound to get a slice of the pie at some point. It’s another data point of how deep Baltimore’s offense goes when it’s clicking. And they’re still without tight end Isaiah Likely, who ramped up his return to practice this past week from foot surgery but was still listed as a limited participant. It’s fair to expect games like the last two where Andrews and Bateman are nowhere to be found. Just remember it won’t be long before they’re the ones carrying the production. Ravens haven’t shown they can beat Super Bowl contenders Think back to just a few weeks ago. The Ravens were a favorite to be in the Super Bowl, if not win it. Their defense was considered among the league’s elite. How would any team slow down this offense? Five playoff teams through six weeks on the schedule was a mighty task, but a manageable stretch for the AFC’s projected juggernaut. Oh, how far we’ve come. The Ravens are 1-2 and staring down a road trip to Kansas City, where they’ve never won in the Jackson era and are now granted one less day of preparation. Jackson conceded that this loss was a wake-up call. But so was Week 1 in Buffalo, he said. And so was their win over Cleveland, after having started slow offensively. Every game offered some pearl of wisdom, some reminder of their mortality. “It’s definitely not where we want it to be. No excuses can be made at this point,” Hamilton said. “If it’s not one thing, it’s another. We just have to patch everything up right now. … It’s on us as a defense just to put that fire out ASAP, and we didn’t do that.” As Hamilton said postgame, the sky isn’t falling. But there’s something to be said about this Ravens team, with ever-present February expectations and a dismal 1-5 record against the Bills, Chiefs, Eagles and Lions dating to the start of last season. In short, they have beat up on most teams in the NFL. At times, it looks like Baltimore is playing a different sport with how dominant they can be. It’s just becoming tougher to couple the Ravens with those other Super Bowl contenders — all of whom they’ve played (very) close — until Baltimore closes out a win against one. Have a news tip? Contact Sam Cohn at scohn@baltsun.com, 410-332-6200 and x.com/samdcohn. Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson looks down after being sacked during the fourth quarter of Monday's 38-30 loss to the Lions. Jackson was sacked seven times in the defeat. (Karl Merton Ferron/Staff) View the full article Quote
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