ExtremeRavens Posted 18 hours ago Posted 18 hours ago Ed Reed showed up unannounced. That’s how the Ravens legend and Pro Football Hall of Fame safety rolls, often appearing out of thin air but always around the ball, the same way he played for a dozen NFL seasons and has lived his life since retiring. As the franchise’s all-time interception leader, his access to the team’s practice facility in Owings Mills is, of course, permanently unfettered. Reed’s presence at last Friday’s practice, it turns out, was also stimulating. “I was starstruck,” Baltimore’s rookie safety and first-round draft pick Malaki Starks said. “You know how Allen Iverson feels about Michael Jordan? That’s how I feel about Ed Reed. It’s just like, ‘wow.’” So, apparently, was the message that he delivered. It began unscripted and unfiltered. As cornerback Marlon Humphrey described on his eponymous podcast, it was “raw” and “uncut.” It started with the defensive backs, including individually with Starks and each of the others on the sideline, then to the entire defense, followed by the whole team. “It was different,” Humphrey said. “I don’t think he planned on talking to us. It just happened.” Whether on the field or in the meeting room, the avidity and magnitude was palpable. Baltimore had what Humphrey dubbed a “ridiculous” Friday practice, the ninth-year veteran said. As he left the facility, he told one of the coaches that he went “way too hard” and was sore on a day when the intensity of the session notches barely above a glorified walkthrough. “The game and the team is only as good as your weakest links,” Reed bellowed in a clip on Baltimore’s social media channels after coordinator Zach Orr gave him the floor in the defensive meeting room. “You’re either coaching your teammates or you’re allowing it to happen. In here, we watch the film together. We all break down the film throughout the week or after the game. Are you critiquing your teammate the same as you critique yourself?” Coach John Harbaugh described the delivery as “reinforcement” more than anything, adding that Reed’s clips are included among the team’s film sessions because in the 30,000-foot view of the defensive scheme not much has changed, and who better to learn from than one of the league’s best-ever players? “So, you get a chance to watch Ed do it, Ray [Lewis] do it, or Haloti [Ngata] and Jarret Johnson,” Harbaugh said. “You get a chance to watch all those great players do what they do – Terrell Suggs – you can just keep naming them. It’s just incredible.” That’s what all of the players The Baltimore Sun spoke with this week naturally think about Reed, the NFL’s Defensive Player of the Year in 2004 and a Super Bowl champion in February 2013, the last time Baltimore won the the title. “It was just good perspective from someone who everyone in that room is chasing,” said practice squad cornerback Amani Oruwariye, who added that it took him a moment before he recognized the salt-and-pepper haired and bearded Reed. “He was as real as it gets. He wasn’t trying to sugarcoat nobody. He wasn’t trying to put on a front. He was just speaking from the realness of everything he went through and everything it takes to get there. He’s a living testimony of that.” The impact was notable. “I think everyone kind of sits up straight when he comes in,” safety Alohi Gilman said. “He came in with a lot of energy, talking about the standard that we set as DBs, the type of energy we need to play with and being commanders on the back end.” Two days later, the Ravens blew out the Cincinnati Bengals, 24-0, with Gilman putting the exclamation point on the victory by returning Kyle Van Noy’s interception of Joe Burrow 84 yards for a touchdown after the outside linebacker handed him the ball. It was a perfect homage to Reed, who’d made similar plays on several occasions through his college and professional career from the early 2000s through 2013 — though usually far more brazenly. Born in 1997, Gilman was a young boy at the height of Reed’s intrepid prowess, but the performances have stuck with him all these years later. “He was constantly around the ball,” Gilman said. “I feel like he was playing Pop Warner football with grown men. Then, he was just entertaining to watch.” To a man in the locker room, so was the Ravens’ complementary play against the Bengals in a game Baltimore had to have to continue to keep its playoff hope alive. That the Ravens shut out Burrow for the first time since his college days at LSU was the cherry on top. “I think we all kind of felt like we had to raise our level a little bit more in terms of everything,” Gilman said. “Communication, energy, play style. Having a guy like that walk in and preach to us about what it means to play for the Ravens, and second of all how to play, I think that’s what it brought to the room.” Gilman added that the touchdown is one of those plays you dream about it. It also extended beyond his own gratification. “I think it was cool because it shows us coming together as a unit and everyone being selfless and one of those plays you remember as a unit,” he said. “We all celebrated because we did it together.” Ravens safety Alohi Gilman celebrates with cornerback Marlon Humphrey and safety Ar'Darius Washington after breaking up a pass Sunday against the Bengals. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster) With the Ravens a game back of the AFC North-leading Pittsburgh Steelers with just three to play and the most likely path to the postseason through a division title, it’s something that also isn’t lost on the group, from players on the practice squad to starters. “Even just hearing anything about him working with corners, being on the same page, being able to almost read each other’s minds because they were so tied in,” Oruwariye said. “that just makes us look ourselves in the mirror and think, ‘How much more can we do to be that much more connected?’” The answer will come again Sunday against the New England Patriots and then against the Green Bay Packers and finally the Steelers. No matter the scenario, the Ravens must win in Pittsburgh in Week 18 to make the playoffs. Perhaps Reed’s words will end up being the spark. “You could see guys that day with the connection piece,” Starks said. “It was like something clicked. “The biggest thing is we gotta be together. It starts with the connection that you have in the secondary and as a defense. If you’re gonna go all the way, you gotta go all the way together.” 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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