From beginning to end, 2025 was a pretty miserable year to be a Baltimore sports fan.
The Orioles and Ravens both entered their respective seasons with strong expectations, which were not met.
Both teams had a myriad of reasons – some more legitimate than others – for their respective failures, but failure is the apt descriptor for their 2025 seasons.
Watching the Orioles over 162 games was frustrating.
The O’s used 70 different players over the course of the season.
There were injuries, and non-performance.
The off-season entering ’25 was not good enough, and the vibe felt off immediately.
By mid-May, Manager Brandon Hyde had already been fired.
By Memorial Day, they were 15 games under .500, and the season was over even with 105 games left on the schedule.
When the Ravens season kicked off September 7th in Buffalo, they were the prohibitive Super Bowl favorite.
After last night’s loss vs. the Patriots, the Ravens have an 11% chance of making the playoffs.
While technically mathematically alive*, Baltimore is a shell of the team we expected, and effectively their season has ended before Christmas Day officially arrived.
(*Pittsburgh is 9-6, with the Ravens now 7-8. The Steelers travel to Cleveland this week. The Ravens would need to upset the Packers in Green Bay, and have the Browns upset Pittsburgh, to make the Week 18 game in Pittsburgh matter.)
Watching a team with expectations stumble and bumble, and fail over 15+ weeks is excruciating.
It’s particularly grating when factoring in the state of the AFC.
There are a group of solid teams. There are no world-beaters.
The implosion this year is the definition of wasted opportunity.
I’m not going to spend excessive time speaking about Terps Basketball, or Terps Football here; but go ahead and add them to the mix of this horrible 2025 Punch Bowl.
To be fair, Terps Basketball was a fun watch in their ’24-’25 regular season. But the Sweet 16 run was hard to enjoy with the background Kevin Willard drama.
That was followed by the departure of the entire roster, and Buzz Williams having to pick up the pieces while swimming up-stream.
Williams has already put together a strong recruiting class for 2026, and I think he’s going to have success at MD quickly; but this ’25-’26 season has been tough.
Too many injuries in camp, which carried over into the season. At best, this current group was going to be hopeful of being on the right side of the NCAAT bubble.
As things have played out, it looks like it could be a very long remaining 18 games in Big Ten Conference play.
Terps Football? The ’25 team had one of the easier schedules they’ll face in a given year, but weren’t able to capitalize.
After starting 4-0, MD ends the year on an 8 game losing streak.
That eight game losing streak, started with a particularly painful to watch three game stretch against Washington, Nebraska, and UCLA.
Maryland lost each of those games by a combined 10 points, and things fell apart.
Coach Locksley has again added a talented recruiting class led by Baltimore’s Zion Elee, and received good news that QB Malik Washington is returning.
But all eyes are pointed to the 15 day portal window which opens January 2nd.
Will Maryland be able to keep their other best players like Sidney Stewart, and Zahir Mathis?
Can Locksley keep his core talent, and add enough in the portal for MD to take a step towards relevancy in ’26?
We will get back to Maryland Basketball & Football another day.
Let’s focus more on the Orioles and Ravens.
If there is one positive for the Baltimore sports fan as ’25 ends, it’s that the Orioles have been aggressive in addressing their limitations in the closing weeks of this year.
Pete Alonso, and Taylor Ward add power and depth to the lineup.
Ryan Helsey, and Andrew Kittredge add legitimacy to the bullpen.
The acquisition of Shane Baz gives the rotation a young power arm with team control.
Clearly Orioles Owner David Rubenstein does not want his second full year of Ownership to look like his first.
And Orioles President of Baseball Operations Mike Elias clearly feels emboldened to add, and give his existing core group every opportunity to maximize their window.
That’s exciting, and something to look forward to.
Pitchers and Catchers arrive in Sarasota February 11th.
So just around the corner we have baseball returning, and growing hopes for this coming year.
With the aforementioned additions here before Christmas, there is further anticipation that Elias will obtain the additional Starting Pitcher the roster still needs.
So, kudos to the O’s for turning the page. People were pretty down on where things were heading for the O’s when their season ended September 28th.
Now here we are in late December, and I think Oriole fans are collectively optimistic about 2026 possibilities.
Hopefully the Ravens will similarly be able to shake off a lost 2025, and retool for 2026.
The starting point is identifying what went wrong.
Lamar Jackson had an off-year, which I think is nearly completely attributable to the various injuries he suffered from the end of Training Camp onwards.
If your highly paid MVP QB is not playing like an MVP, or isn’t even available sometimes; you aren’t going to meet expectations as a team.
There is no way around that in a Salary Cap sport.
A lot of Ravens fans this morning aren’t happy that Jackson left the game last night.
They would have liked to have seen him be more of a warrior and reenter.
I don’t like making those proclamations myself from my couch.
I don’t know what Jackson has been dealing with each week, and how hurt he was last night.
I do see that he’s listed as day-to-day and hopes to play Saturday in Green Bay. So, I do think it’s correct to say he was more hurt vs. injured last night.
I do know that Jackson has rarely looked like Jackson this year, and I think the various injuries explain that more than a belief he had a rapid deterioration of ability.
The 2x MVP was 1st Team All Pro last year.
The team is built around him.
If he isn’t playing like an All-Pro, there is no escaping that.
Him not having his caliber of year in ’25 doesn’t mean he can’t rebound in ’26.
2021 and 2022 saw Jackson limited to 12 games each year.
That was followed up by fantastic 2023 and 2024 seasons.
Yes, he’s now that much older, but I see no reason to believe he can’t again be excellent in ’26.
Getting past the Jackson discussion, it will be interesting to see if Ravens Owner Steve Bisciotti tells his GM Eric DeCosta, that it’s time for a change with Head Coach John Harbaugh.
If Harbaugh were to leave, what’s the move?
The Ringer listed their Top 30 Head Coaching candidates, who excites you? (Joe Brady, and Marcus Freeman would be my early favorites.)
If Harbaugh is gone, I think you’d also anticipate a change from OC Todd Monken, and DC Zach Orr. (Note, on that Ringer listing, Monken was 7th!)
Neither are particularly popular in Baltimore right now.
Monken has had major success previously of course, and that has to weigh more than my annoyance that Derrick Henry didn’t get a touch on the Ravens second to last series last night.
Orr is apparently well liked in the Castle and amongst his players, but the fanbase has been nearly universally out on him.
The Ravens Defense did finish the ’24 season ranked 6th overall in Defensive DVOA, but that didn’t buy Orr any fans.
Losing Nnamdi Madubuike was a real blow. Not having pass rushers that can win at the point of attack without scheming pressure, is a glaring issue, that doesn’t fall on Orr.
Still, there is a feeling the Ravens Defense underachieved this year vs. what they should have done with the talent which existed.
Either the talent wasn’t as good as advertised, or Orr didn’t put what existed in the best positions for success. Pick one.
So, again we start with hoping (expecting) Jackson returns to better health and performance in ’26.
We will then see what happens with the Coaching staff.
After that we get back to the rest of the roster, and salary cap realities.
Improving both the Offensive and Defensive Lines would be my focus.
Rubenstein and Elias are clearly motivated to shake off ’25, and give their core a chance to rebound in a major way in ’26.
Bisciotti and DeCosta should feel similar pressures and desires.
2025 was not good enough.
2026 has to be better.
DeCosta has to maximize the remainder of Jackson’s prime.
That means when Training Camp comes around next July; we’re going to want to collectively believe the Ravens have a chance to win a Lombardi in February 2027.
Will he decide to largely run it back in ’26 with the team which entered ’25 as the Super Bowl favorite?
Or will he figure more wholesale changes are needed?
Next Wednesday is the last day of 2025.
It was a bitterly disappointing year.
Here’s to turning the page to 2026 and looking forward.
Owner
Chris Stoner founded Baltimore Sports and Life in 2009. He has appeared as a radio guest with 1090 WBAL, 105.7 The Fan, CBS 1300, Q1370, WOYK 1350, WKAV 1400, and WNST 1570. He has also been interviewed by The Baltimore Sun, Baltimore Business Journal, and PressBox (TV). As Owner, his responsibilities include serving as the Managing Editor, Publicist, & Sales Director.