ExtremeRavens Posted yesterday at 12:47 AM Posted yesterday at 12:47 AM Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti made the right decision in firing John Harbaugh as the team’s coach. It was time. His message had become stale among the players, and there really was no other choice. In the previous 18 seasons, Harbaugh, 63, had fired or allowed several defensive coordinators to leave, such as Don Martindale, Dean Pees, Greg Mattison and Chuck Pagano, and he also parted ways with offensive coordinators such as Marty Mornhinweg, Marc Trestman and Greg Roman. But this was about Harbaugh and a disaster of a 2025 season with, on paper, the most balanced lineup in the team’s 30-year history. I’m pretty sure Bisciotti considered the amount of injuries the Ravens suffered early in the season when the team slipped to 1-5, but this wasn’t just about injuries, not after Harbaugh spent 18 seasons as the coach. It was about a new voice, a new direction and a team that failed to get out of its own way even after it seemed to have found itself with a strong running game late in the season to make a playoff push. Harbaugh never lost the respect of his players in the locker room. That was always his strongest selling point, which allowed him to build teams. The problem is that the charisma had faded, and it was time for the team to build and move on. We’ve been through this before in Baltimore. The Ravens gave coach Brian Billick, Harbaugh’s predecessor, a contract extension before he was fired at the end of the 2007 season. Bisciotti signed Harbaugh to a three-year extension nearly a year ago, and he fired Harbaugh in the middle of that deal, too. A contract means nothing in the NFL. Harbaugh had his shortcomings throughout his tenure here in Baltimore. He became too much of a gambler during crucial in-game situations and his clock management decisions were poor. He wasn’t very creative, especially this season. There were no double reverses, no fake punts and no flea flickers. The offense was predictable, and the Ravens forgot about running back Derrick Henry in the postseason. Those were unforgivable sins. On defense, the Ravens were a disaster. With young coordinator and first-time play caller Zach Orr the past two seasons, the Ravens were extremely mediocre in the front seven and horrendous on the backend. It was easy to blame offensive coordinator Todd Monken or Orr, but this was Harbaugh’s team. He was the coach, the leader on the field. Maybe the biggest tipping point was the Week 16 loss to the New England Patriots, when Henry never carried the ball in the final 12 minutes of regulation despite Baltimore owning an 11-point lead. Harbaugh declared that it was basically a coaching decision based on the rotation of Henry and backup Keaton Mitchell. Really. Privately, the players complained about the lack of a running game, even though they never said anything publicly. On defense, the Ravens were simply a disaster going into the Pittsburgh game Sunday night with the No. 27-ranked unit overall and tied for No. 29 in pass defense, allowing 245.3 yards per game. Everything was just starting to add up. Would Harbaugh have saved his job if the Ravens had beaten the Steelers on Sunday night? Probably not. It was Super Bowl or bust. It had to be hard for Bisciotti to fire Harbaugh. The tandem got along extremely well, and it was Bisciotti who pointed out that the Ravens wanted longevity in a coach, much like the Pittsburgh Steelers have had with Chuck Noll, Bill Cowher and now Mike Tomlin, the longest-tenured active coach in the NFL. The Ravens achieved that with Harbaugh. There were a lot of criticisms about Harbaugh, some of them rightly deserved. But overall, he was a righteous and good man. His love for the Bible and his respect for his players were incredible. The Ravens will find a good coach to replace him. When they hired Ted Marchibroda for the start of the 1996 season, he was the right coach at the right time. The Ravens came to Baltimore with no money, and Marchibroda wasn’t about to complain. Plus, he had ties with the Baltimore community coaching the old Colts in Baltimore in the 1970’s. Billick was the perfect choice to replace Marchibroda, the face of a franchise that needed someone loud, talkative and extremely effective. The Ravens were in dire need of direction. No one had even heard about Harbaugh, a former Philadelphia special teams coordinator, but he had magnetism. He wasn’t afraid to get in the face of players, especially early in his career. Harbaugh never backed down from a challenge, regardless if he was facing Tomlin or Kansas City’s Andy Reid, his former mentor. But there was speculation circulating for about two months that Harbaugh’s tenure was near its end. Early in the season, when the Ravens were 1-5, they struggled which wasn’t unusual, but that team quit in those contests. That was a sign of possible things to come, even though the Ravens were without prominent starters like quarterback Lamar Jackson, middle linebacker Roquan Smith and offensive tackle Ronnie Stanley. And let’s address something here: There is this belief that the Ravens could have hired current Seahawks coach Mike Macdonald, who is 24-10 in two seasons and an NFL Coach of the Year candidate after leading Seattle to the NFC’s No. 1 seed. But few teams have ever replaced their coach after losing in the AFC championship game, which is the situation Baltimore faced with Harbaugh and Macdonald, then the defensive coordinator, after falling to Kansas City at the end of the 2023 season. The Ravens will find a good coach and move on. It might take them a year or two to rebuild, but the Ravens are a good organization with sound management. They still have things to work out with Jackson and his new contract as well as the draft and signing some free agents. But after finishing 8-9, they made the right decision. It was time to move on. Have a news tip? Contact Mike Preston at epreston@baltsun.com, 410-332-6467 and x.com/MikePrestonSun. View the full article Quote
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