ExtremeRavens Posted 9 hours ago Posted 9 hours ago When it comes to the Ravens’ draft strategy, general manager Eric DeCosta is fond of invoking “The Loser’s Curse,” a 2006 study by a University of Pennsylvania professor and a Nobel Prize-winning economist. The theory is relatively straightforward: Top draft picks are overvalued in a manner that is inconsistent with rational expectations and efficient markets, and consistent with psychological research, the paper states. Put another way, most teams don’t perform markedly better than the next at drafting players, so trading up rarely makes sense. There is no guarantee that a coveted pick will yield a superior player — and more often than not, the prospect a team covets will drift down the board anyway. “Everyone seems to be drafting the same players,” DeCosta said in an interview with the team website last offseason. “So it’s like going to a restaurant with 20 of your best friends and there’s 20 things on the menu, but all 20 of you are ordering one of the same three entrees. You’re all getting the steak and you’re all getting the pasta; maybe a few guys are getting the crab cakes; but nobody’s going after the vegetarian option and nobody’s getting the lamb. Everybody’s eating the same things. That’s kind of what the draft has become in some ways.” The analogy captures why DeCosta has long preferred to hoard draft selections with almost compulsive zeal, an organizational ethos he absorbed under his predecessor, Ozzie Newsome, and one he has amplified since assuming the role in 2019. Yet there sat Baltimore’s brass last week in South Florida, meeting with owner Steve Bisciotti and attempting to orchestrate a landscape-shifting maneuver — even as it contradicted their own long-held convictions. In theory, the thought of pairing a game-wrecking edge rusher like Maxx Crosby with the Ravens felt almost inevitable, the sort of snarling defender who conjures echoes of the franchise’s most bruising eras. It seemed a question more of when, not if. In reality, see: the Ravens’ organizational philosophy. But reality was cast aside Friday night when Baltimore sent not just one but two first-round picks to the Raiders in exchange for one of the league’s most relentless sack artists. DeCosta has also said he doesn’t subscribe to the notion that franchises operate within rigid championship “windows.” This move, however, suggests otherwise — a tacit acknowledgment that the moment to pursue a Super Bowl with an expensive, immediate difference-maker alongside two-time NFL Most Valuable Player quarterback Lamar Jackson is now. It was the first time in the franchise’s 31 years that it dealt a first-round pick for a veteran player. There is at least a compelling argument that the pivot was warranted. Following an underwhelming 8-9 season that resulted in missing the playoffs for the first time since 2021 — a final regression that culminated in coach John Harbaugh’s firing after 18 years — the status quo was no longer sufficient. As dynamic and versatile as All-Pro safety Kyle Hamilton remains, the Ravens have not possessed a true defensive destroyer like Crosby, who has 69 1/2 career sacks and four seasons of at least 10, including last year — since the era of the franchise’s all-time sack leader and two-time Pro Football Hall of Fame finalist Terrell Suggs, which is, perhaps not coincidentally, the last time Baltimore hoisted the Vince Lombardi Trophy. While Hamilton is the type of defender offenses must account for, Crosby is the type they must actively scheme to stop. Last season, Baltimore tied for the third-fewest sacks (30) in the league. Crosby, meanwhile, reached double digits for the third time in the past four years, and his 10 sacks in 15 games were twice as many as Baltimore’s leader — defensive tackle Travis Jones — recorded in 2025. Also, in the past five years, the Ravens have blown more leads in the final five minutes of the fourth quarter (16) than any team in the NFL. That included a collapse against Crosby’s former team in Week 2 in 2024, when Baltimore squandered a 10-point fourth-quarter advantage at home in what was one of just four wins for Las Vegas. Crosby recorded six tackles in the game, including four for loss and two sacks — one of which came in the fourth quarter — along with a pass deflection to earn AFC Defensive Player of the Week honors. Crosby, a five-time Pro Bowl selection who will turn 29 in August, represents the sort of defensive presence Baltimore has lacked for nearly a decade. If Jackson is the whirring engine that propels the Ravens’ offense, Crosby is the closer — the kind capable of delivering the abrupt finality of a prime Mike Tyson uppercut. That presence should also ease the burden on Baltimore’s star quarterback, sparing him from having to play Superman every Sunday, a demanding assignment even for a player of Jackson’s otherworldly gifts. At 29 and entering his ninth NFL season, Jackson has guided Baltimore to just one AFC championship game appearance in 2024. That run required his second MVP-caliber campaign and a historic defense engineered by the scheming brilliance of Mike Macdonald, now the coach of the reigning Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks. Now the Ravens will lean on Crosby, alongside the omnipresent Hamilton, Pro Bowl inside linebacker Roquan Smith, perhaps even injured Pro Bowl defensive tackle Nnamdi Madubuike, and first-year coach and former Los Angeles Chargers defensive coordinator Jesse Minter to restore Baltimore to its defensive roots and propel the franchise toward what has become an elusive third championship. It is a gamble to send a pair of first-round picks to Las Vegas for a player with an extensive resume as both a dominant pass rusher and elite run-stopping edge defender but whose past two seasons have been curtailed by injury. Yet even within that latest setback came a revealing glimpse of Crosby’s competitive desires. When the Raiders — their season spiraling toward the No. 1 pick and the chance to draft Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza — informed Crosby that they planned to shut him down for the final two games of the regular season because of a nagging knee injury that required surgery, he stormed out of the building in frustration. Crosby wanted to play. He wanted to finish what he started. That sort of intangible edge, combined with the tangible reality that he routinely logs nearly 100% of defensive snaps, should noticeably raise the floor and the ceiling of Baltimore’s defense. Crosby, a fourth-round pick in 2019, leads all defensive linemen in tackles for loss during that span, ranks second in quarterback pressures and hits, and fifth in sacks. Relentlessness radiates from him. Eric DeCosta is betting that Maxx Crosby is worth the draft pick haul. (Michael Conroy/AP) It is also an expensive maneuver in draft capital and contract. Crosby’s current deal includes a salary-cap hit of more than $30 million, though it can be restructured to soften the immediate impact. It will likely have to be, particularly with uncertainty surrounding Jackson’s contract. The organization hopes to sign Jackson to an extension, but might instead need to reshape the deal with additional void years to reduce his looming $74.5 million cap hit roughly in half. Other needs persist as well, including along the offensive line, where Pro Bowl center Tyler Linderbaum, who is an impending free agent, appears almost certain to depart for a team willing to exceed $20 million per season. Depth is also needed at cornerback and wide receiver, as well as guard and defensive line. But the Ravens, long steadfast in their confidence to build through the draft, will not (at least for now) possess a first-round pick this year or next with which to do so. Instead, DeCosta is wagering on a philosophical pivot. The 14th pick once netted him Hamilton, who unexpectedly slid down the board in 2022. Baltimore already had two quality starting safeties but selected him anyway. Soon enough, we’ll discover whether Crosby was worth that and more. DeCosta is betting that he is. 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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