Big hit by Ray; Bigger win for the Ravens

Ray Lewis helped the Baltimore Ravens move to 2-0, with his 4th down tackle on Darren Sproles with 30 seconds-left.

The tackle itself was impressive, even more so when you listen to Lewis in the post-game talking about how he made that play because of his film-study.

As impressive as that play was, the win was that much more important.

Make no mistake about it, leaving San Diego with this win, has long-term implications.

The Chargers should win the AFC West. If Baltimore is able to win the AFC North, this game could help determine home-field in a potential playoff match-up. The idea of the Chargers having to play in Baltimore, in mid-January weather, and dealing with the crowd-noise – sounds more appealing than the Ravens having to make a return trip to San Diego.

To those Ravens fans who are sick to their stomach tonight about the 400+ yards passing from Philip Rivers, I suggest you are missing what matters.

I thought before this game that San Diego would have success spreading the Ravens out, and using their height advantage against the Ravens corners. I said before the game that the Ravens would need to have a consistent pass-rush up-front to counter that.

Seeing the Chargers make big-passing plays should not have surprised anyone.

Unless the Ravens are suddenly going to face teams that have a Rivers at QB, a Gates at TE, or Jackson at WR (not to mention Sproles, Chambers, & Floyd) every-week; all the crying about the pass-defense can cease.

Washington, and Foxworth are good cover-corners, who are going to get beat occasionally by bigger, stronger wide-outs. Just accept it as reality, and move on. When they are not facing a 6’5 230lb receiver like Jackson, they will be fine.

That does not mean I am looking forward to watching Manning, Brady, Roethlisberger, Palmer, and Rogers spread the field against the Ravens; just that I think the Ravens have a better chance against the personnel of those teams. Outside of Arizona, there probably is not another receiving core that would pose as difficult a match-up for the Ravens as San Diego.

If you want to point any fingers at the Ravens defense, point it at the lack of a consistent pass-rush so far. With the Center, and Right Guard out for the Chargers, the Ravens should have had better success controlling the line of scrimmage.

Again, I think this is short-sighted though. I question how much Pryce has left in the tank, but I certainly believe with the defensive-line strength, plus Suggs, Barnes, and Krugers that the pass-rush will improve.

Those of you pointing your fingers at Mattison, should go back and listen to Rivers’ post-game comments. Rivers talked about the success the Charger passing-game had, but also how the Ravens relentlessly blitzed, and how differing, and sophisticated the looks he saw were.

Ultimately though, if you are a Ravens fan, and your take-away from this game is being scared about the secondary; you are missing what matters.

What matters is that Baltimore was able to travel 3,000 miles west, consistently move the ball, and find a way to win against a talented conference opponent. If you want to preface that by noting the injuries to Tomlinson, J. Williams, and the Charger offensive-line, more power to you.

Now for the Good, the Bad, the Ugly.

The Good:

1) The Ravens moved to 2-0, beating a likely division winner in their home-stadium.

2) Flacco only had 190 yards passing, but had 2 TD’s, and was in-complete control. He makes plays with his arm-strength that few if any in the NFL can.

3)McGahee averaged 5.3 yards per carry, and had 2 TD’s.

4) Gaither won the match-up of former University of Maryland players, by basically eliminating Merriman. The second-touchdown for McGahee saw Gaither standing in the back of the end-zone as he had pushed the defender completely out of the play.

4a) Oher was also strong on the right-side. Aside from jumping early once with the crowd-noise, Oher was also strong on the right-side.

5) Todd Heap caught another TD pass, and forced a pass-interference at the goal-line.

6) Washington had 4 more big receptions today, giving him 7 for the year. Pretty astounding production for a player who had 20 catches combined during the past three-seasons.

7) Chris Carr was much stronger today in the return-game, averaging 27.4 yards a return.

8) Frank Walker made a clutch play late in the game, knocking the ball out of the hands of a San Diego receiver in the end-zone.

9) Ray’s tackle at the end of the game was a hit to be remembered.

10) Outstanding punting by Koch today, and Webb made a great-play to down a ball at the Charger 1 yard-line.

The Bad:

1) The Ravens were credited for 2 sacks today (1.5 for Suggs, .5 for Ngata), but if Rivers was correct that Baltimore was blitzing nearly every-down, they should have brought Rivers down more-often.

2) Sproles averaged 32 yards per return today. How did that happen? The Ravens had to have identified not allowing him to obtain larger-returns and field position as a priority. Credit Sproles for making some-plays, but I think assignments had to have been missed.

3) When the Ravens were not able to consistently get to Rivers with the blitz, I think an adjustment could have been made earlier to give Safety help to the Corners against Jackson, and Gates. To often the Ravens corners were left on an island, trying to defend receivers.

4) Clayton and Heap only had 2 combined catches, disappointing a bit after last-week. D. Williams went a second-straight week without a catch.

The Ugly

1) After scoring a TD to open the 3rd Quarter, the Ravens were leading by a score of 28-16. With San Diego on the ropes, Hauschka kicked-off out of bounds, allowing the Chargers to start at the 40 yard-line. San Diego used that as momentum, and marched down the field to score. It is inexcusable for the kickoff to go out of bounds.