ExtremeRavens Posted 5 hours ago Posted 5 hours ago Area 51, the Voynich manuscript and Lamar Jackson circa 2025. Unexplained mysteries all, though the latter has been particularly perplexing. After the Ravens quarterback spoke with reporters following a 32-14 debacle at the hands of the Cincinnati Bengals on Thursday night, he quietly retreated to his stall in the back corner of the locker room inside M&T Bank Stadium, sat for a moment and seemed to stare through the floor before quickly getting dressed and being joined by his 2018 draft classmate and longtime security blanket tight end Mark Andrews for a brief conversation and slap of hands between the two. To be a fly on the adjacent wall would’ve shed light on what was said but not likely answered the NFL’s most pressing question at the moment: What’s wrong with Lamar Jackson? “Lamar is great,” Andrews said. “I have no complaints. He’s our guy, and I have full trust in him. Football is a way of life. “Sometimes bad things happen.” Usually not for Jackson, a transcendent and generational virtuoso who will almost certainly one day be fitted for a gold jacket and be honored with a bronze bust in Canton, Ohio. Two seasons ago, he led the Ravens to the NFL’s best record, the brink of his first Super Bowl (and what would’ve been the organization’s first in a dozen years) and was named the league’s Most Valuable Player for a second time. Last season, he had career highs in passing yards and touchdown passes while piloting an offense that was historic as the first to top 4,000 yards through the air and 3,000 on the ground in the same season as the MVP runner-up. Yet there he was on a chilly Thanksgiving night, having not completed at least 60% of his passes nor produced a touchdown pass for a third straight game for the first time in his otherwise illustrious career. That it came against the league’s worst defense both in yards and points allowed only exacerbates the malaise. Over Jackson’s past three games, he has accounted for zero touchdowns, three interceptions, two fumbles lost and been sacked eight times. “I don’t know,” he said when asked why the offense has been struggling so mightily. “Can’t call it.” Perhaps not, but Jackson, who at his best is a dazzling blur, looks broken. Why is the great unknown, of course, though like any complex issue, the reasons are myriad. The offensive line Baltimore’s porous front has been at the nexus of much of the discourse surrounding the various struggles for the offense, and the criticism is certainly not without merit. Taking only the latest exhibit, the Bengals generated a 39.5% pressure rate on Jackson, according to Next Gen Stats, in what was their second-best performance of the season. They also did so without injured All-Pro edge rusher Trey Hendrickson. Joseph Ossai led the team with six pressures (his second-most in a game this year) and two sacks, while Myles Murphy added five to match his season high. Cincinnati also held Baltimore to a 38.6% success rate and minus-23.9 expected points added (EPA) on the night, both of which were season bests for the visitors. One area in particular the Ravens struggled with was the Bengals’ Cover 0 looks (meaning no deep safety in coverage). “You’d like to be able to make them pay for it, get the ball in somebody’s hands quickly or pick it up and extend the play if you can,” coach John Harbaugh said. “All those things are what you try to do. We did not do a good job of that tonight.” Sometimes it has been the line, sometimes it has been the quarterback. Injuries Jackson has long been reticent to discuss injuries — perhaps not wishing to speak any into existence — and likewise to not impute them for his inconsistencies. That was the case again Thursday night. “No, I just have to be more consistent,” he said when asked if they affected his performance. “I have to make those throws. I don’t miss them in practice, so I shouldn’t be missing them in the game.” Similarly, when Harbaugh was asked if Jackson is indeed fully healthy, he said, “Fully healthy? Yes, Lamar is fully healthy to play. Yes, absolutely.” That hasn’t always been the case this season, though. Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson has battled myriad injuries this season amid inconsistent play. (Karl Merton Ferron/Staff) A hamstring injury suffered in the third quarter of a Week 4 loss to the Kansas City Chiefs knocked him out of that contest and kept him sidelined for the next three (two of which were losses). Since returning in Week 9 against the Miami Dolphins, he has also been listed with knee, ankle and toe injuries in subsequent weeks. As prolific a passer as Jackson has been, his dynamic ability as a runner is what has made him perhaps the best dual-threat quarterback in history, but he is not running as much or as effectively this season. In the first four games, he rushed for 168 yards and a touchdown on 21 carries. Over his past five, he has 98 yards on 31 rushes. Jackson has yet to register a single run of at least 20 yards, and his 13 carries for at least 10 yards is well down from his pace of last season when he had 37. His 5.1 yards per carry are also the fewest since his rookie year. Then there’s the matter of whether an individual one or an accumulation of the many is impacting his ability to throw accurately. Jackson has always had moments of laissez-faire in some of his simpler throws throughout his career, much the way perhaps Monet would if presented with a finger painting kit, but the inaccuracies have started to creep to an inexplicable, if not unacceptable level. For his part, he says they are not mechanical. “No, I’ve been throwing like that all this time,” he said. “I just have to be consistent.” Vision One of the more baffling plays from the Bengals loss was Jackson’s fumble inside his own 20 with about 30 seconds left in the first half when he lost the ball on an aborted pass attempt as he pulled the ball down. The turnover led to another field goal for Cincinnati. More worrisome, though, was what Jackson didn’t do — hit an open Zay Flowers on a post route. Jackson explained the decision to bail by saying he wanted to make sure it wasn’t a Tampa 2 coverage — when the middle linebacker would drop to the deep middle of the field — compared with a traditional Cover 2, when the safeties would be responsible for the deep halves of the field. Then there was the third-and-8 from just short of midfield midway through the fourth quarter when Cincinnati brought one of its many Cover 0 blitzes and Jackson threw incomplete to a covered Flowers over the middle. Both Andrews and DeAndre Hopkins were uncovered underneath, and Andrews, who had about 15 yards of green space in front of him, threw his hands up in disgust. Is Jackson seeing the field the way he expects and wants to? “Yes, I feel like I’m seeing the field pretty good, for the most part, but I just have to be consistent,” he said. Scar tissue Among the consistent things — aside from Jackson’s inconsistency this year — are a lack of discipline and degree of carelessness that have permeated the roster from the quarterback down, especially in big moments. In the fourth quarter of the 2023 AFC title game loss to the Chiefs, Jackson threw an interception at the Kansas City 5 that ended any chance of a comeback from the 17-7 deficit. Earlier that same quarter, Flowers also had a costly fumble at the goal line. Then, in last year’s two-point divisional round loss to the Buffalo Bills, Jackson had an interception and a fumble. Andrews also had a fumble and infamously dropped a 2-point conversion pass in the final 93 seconds that proved to be the difference. The stakes weren’t as high against the Bengals, but that also makes it all the more concerning. The Ravens’ woes used to reside in the postseason. Now that they’ve crept into the regular season, making the playoffs will be that much more difficult, especially if Jackson isn’t close to his best, whatever the reason. Still, the Ravens have plenty of belief — in each other and especially in their quarterback. “We learn to rebound, grow, learn, and not long ago we were 1-5. We’re 6-6. We’re going to be all right,” Andrews said. “We just have to keep fighting, keep clawing, keep being humble, being thankful, and I’m certainly thankful for him.” Have a news tip? Contact Brian Wacker at bwacker@baltsun.com, 410-332-6200 and x.com/brianwacker1. View the full article Quote
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