Analytical Review of Ravens at Giants

The Baltimore Ravens traveled to the Big Apple for a second time this season to take on the Giants. Unfortunately, traveling to the Meadowlands was not as fun as the first time when the Ravens handled the Jets in the opening game of the season. The team yet again blew another 4th quarter lead to drop to 3-3 on the season. The Ravens outgained the Giants by nearly 200 yards, they also averaged 7.0 yards per play while the Giants only manage a putrid 3.8 yards per play, yet New York won the game. This is the third straight game in which Lamar Jackson has been underwhelming. After starting the season red hot by throwing 10 touchdowns in the first three weeks, Jackson has only managed three touchdowns in the last 3 weeks. Between Lamar’s costly turnovers, ill-timed team penalties, and big plays allowed in crucial situations by the defense, The Ravens yet again lost a game in which they had no business losing. It is becoming worrisome that this team cannot close games after preaching they will learn from their mistakes after every bitter loss. With all that being said, they still remain atop of the AFC North due to their win over the Bengals. But they need to be better in the fourth quarter if they want any chance of competing in January. Below I will highlight some of the Players who played well and some who underwhelmed according to PFF.

Highest Graded Player of the Week: Mark Andrews

Andrews comes in as the highest graded player of the week, finishing with a PFF grade of 87; his second highest graded game of the season. What more can you say about this guy? He simply does it all for the Ravens in the receiving game. He had yet another monster outing and the Giants had no answers for the All-Pro. He had a season high 106 yards on 7 catches while being targeted 11 times. He also added one touchdown and dropped another one that hit him squarely in the chest. To be fair, the ball was tipped so it more than likely disrupted his concentration but it was still a very catchable ball. Andrews also had 2 contested catches on as many targets. For the season, Andrews now has 10 contested catch targets and has snagged 9 out of the 10. Truly a security blanket for Jackson. Also, all 7 of his catches went for first downs. The elite Tight End has a juicy home matchup vs the Browns who just surrendered 300 passing yards to Bailey Zappe.

Second Highest Graded Player of the Week: Patrick Queen

For the second straight week, Queen is one of the highest graded players of the week. He finished with the highest defensive grade of the week with a PFF grade of 81.9. Queen ironically enough had the same grade last week. But no complaints here. Queen put together yet another solid game. He had 4 tackles but more importantly he did not miss a tackle. He also had 2 pressures and added a sack. He was also solid in coverage, only allowing 2 receptions. Queen has really been playing on fire for the last 2 weeks now. The defense has played much better over the last 3 games and Queen is a big reason why. He’ll be needed once again as The Browns and their elite running back, Nick Chubb, come to Baltimore in a pivotal division game.

Third Highest Graded Player of the Week: Malik Harrison

Harrison rounds off this list by finishing as the third highest graded player of the week. Harrison finished with a PFF grade of 81.4. Harrison must’ve earned extra playing time due to his performance last week, he finished with the highest-grade last week but only played 19 snaps. This week he had a bigger role; he played 36 snaps and took advantage of his opportunity. He finished with 5 tackles with zero missed tackles and 4 stops. He was also impressive in coverage; on 15 coverage snaps he only allowed 1 reception for 5 yards. Harrison has slowly been improving his PFF grade this season with a couple of very good games as of late. Harrison and Queen have received a fair share of scrutiny from Ravens fans but they’ve been their two best defensive players over the last two games. They’ll both been needed to slow down an elite running game next week when they face the Browns.

Other Notable High Grades:

Josh Oliver: 90.8 (highest graded player but did not have enough snaps)

Geno Stone: 81 (4th highest graded player of the week)

Lowest Graded Player of the Week: Jason Pierre-Paul

“JPP” comes in as the lowest graded player this week by finishing with a final game grade of 30.3. Pierre-Paul was just simply a non-factor this game. He only managed 2 pressures on 25 pass rush snaps, and zero tackles on 21 run defense snaps. After an impressing showing last week vs the Bengals, Pierre-Paul was simply stymied by rookie, Evan Neal. The Ravens simply need Bowser and Ojabo to get healthy. The lack of an edge threat is becoming a real problem with this team. The Ravens are currently using Oweh and JPP as their main pass rushers but that is all they have. The Ravens need Houston, Ojabo and Bowser to come back and provide some relief in the pass rushing department. The secondary can only hold up so long before the opposing QB finds an open player. But the 3 aforementioned players are all trending positively and Baltimore should have at least two of them back soon. Ojabo might be back later than Bowser and Houston but he is at least practicing.

Second Lowest Graded Player of the Week: Odafe Oweh

Like JPP, Oweh was simply invisible in this game. Oweh finished with a final PFF grade of 41.7. Oweh had 20 pass rush snaps and only managed one pressure. All of the pressure Baltimore generated was by the interior linemen and via the blitz by Patrick Queen. Through 6 games, Oweh only has one sack. He needs to be better as he has acknowledged. He is getting all the playing time and is not making the most of it by any means thus far. He is currently graded as the 104th edge defender out of a possible 115 players. He is also 85th overall amongst all edge players in terms of pass-rush productivity. To be fair, he is being asked to play a lot due to injuries to other key edge players but he simply is not winning his one-on-ones at even a league average mark. He’ll look to rebound next week vs the Browns and Jedrick Wills.

Third Lowest Graded Player of the Week: Marcus Peters

Peters comes in as the third lowest graded player this week by finishing with a final grade of 42.9. Peters was mostly good in this game, he only allowed 2 catches for 18 yards. But his grade was brought down by the defensive holding he had at the end of the game which let the Giants ultimately score a touchdown to take the lead. Even though the grade was low, Peters still played a decent game. He is the least of the problems on this defense. He and the Secondary will host the Browns next week and he’ll look to rebound vs Jacoby Brissett who’s already tossed 5 interceptions in 6 games.

Other Notable Low Grades:

Damarion Williams: 29.6 (fifth straight game with under a 55 PFF grade)

Tyler Linderbaum: 62.4 (dragged down by team low 24.3 pass blocking grade)

After another blown fourth quarter lead, the Ravens will now look ahead to hosting their rivals, The Cleveland Browns at 1 o’clock next Sunday afternoon. This game will be a measuring stick of how the team will respond. They are playing an average QB (Brissett) and one of the worst defenses in the league thus far. The Browns defense is allowing 27 points per game which is third worst in the NFL. The offense needs to make a statement by taking advantage of a porous defense. Lamar and the passing offense have looked mediocre over the last few games and there is no better opportunity than playing one of the worst defenses in NFL, at home. The trade deadline is looming and I hope DeCosta will try to trade for a Wide Receiver or Edge player to bolster the roster. But that’ll be wishful thinking. The Ravens open up as 6.5 favorites.