Ravens Lose Momentum With Pathetic Performance In Cleveland

In sports, you win as a team, and lose as a team.

The Baltimore Ravens certainly lost as a team today, as it felt likely nearly every Ravens player and coach helped contribute to the 29-24 loss in Cleveland.

With the loss, the Ravens fell to 5-3 overall.

The Bottomline

If you follow sports at all, you realize players aren’t robots.

While you’d like to see the players mentally focused each week; it just doesn’t happen.

It’s not overly surprising that on a short-week, in a road game against a division rival, that the Ravens faced a stiffer challenge than the gambling line suggested should be anticipated.

Throw in that Marlon Humphrey and Nate Wiggins were inactive, and then that the Ravens lost Michael Pierce, and Brent Urban to injuries in the game; and you could rationalize the loss even more.

I’m not going to do that.
Not today.
There is no rationalizing this loss.

The Ravens are one of a small handful of teams which are recognized as capable of winning a Super Bowl this year.
Playoff seeding is not the end all be all, but you want the best seed possible.
Baltimore entered this game 5-2, trailing 6-0 Kansas City (who also had the Week 1 head-to-head win).
Catching the Chiefs for the #1 seed was going to be difficult as is. The odds are that much longer now.

If catching KC isn’t realistic, then you want the #2 seed.
The Ravens have a head-to-head win vs. Buffalo, but the Bills can potentially get to 6-2 today if they win at Seattle.
Houston won today to improve to 6-2.

And oh yeah, the Ravens haven’t won the AFC North yet.
Pittsburgh is 5-2, and can take a 1 game lead in the division if they beat the Giants at home tomorrow night.

All the playoff take aside, it’s very frustrating that the Ravens weren’t ready to quickly knock out a Browns team which entered 1-6.
When teams are struggling like that, they’re always the same.
Hit them early, and they fold.
If you let them extend the game, and they find their legs; you can be in for a fight when they see an opportunity to actually find a win.

During the game, the CBS Sports telecast relayed comments Coach Harbaugh made this week.
Apparently Harbaugh said something to the effect that the Ravens were playing well, but not yet great.
Acknowledging there was room for improvement.

The Ravens can be as good as they want to be this year, but we have now seen the Ravens give away two games this season to inferior teams.
You can’t be great if you give away those types of games.
You can’t be great if you allow similar issues to creep up weekly.

Learn from today and adjust; or mistakenly look at today as an aberration?
That’s the bottom-line question for me.

What Happened Today? What Are The Takeaways?

The Ravens opening drive had a 4th and 1 at the Cleveland 7.
Coach Harbaugh elected to not take the Field Goal, and go for it.
The direct snap to Derrick Henry was stuffed, and we were off to the races with an annoying game.
Actually maybe the 2nd and 9 offensive holding at the 15 from Ronnie Stanley was the first indication this was going to be one of those games.

Cleveland took over on offense, and had a 14 play, 81 yard, 8 minute drive, ending with a 28 yard FG for a 3-0 Browns lead.

The Ravens second drive saw Baltimore have a 1st and 10 at the Browns 20.
That drive stalled when Stanley was beat and Lamar Jackson was sacked for an 11 yard loss on 2nd and 10.
On 3rd and 21, Jackson missed a wide open Zay Flowers in the end zone.
Justin Tucker made a 49 yard FG to tie the game, that went through the uprights, but looked ugly off the foot.

Down 6-3, Kyle Hamilton came off the edge and sacked Jameis Winston, causing a fumble recovered by Trenton Simpson.
Two plays later, Jackson found Nelson Agholor for a TD and the 10-6 halftime lead.

Cleveland got the ball to begin the 3rd Quarter, and immediately went on a 8 play, 70 yard drive to reclaim the lead at 13-10.
That drive had Cleveland pick two 3rd downs, and they scored when Winston found David Njoku for 23 yards.

The Ravens had to punt their next drive when Agholor dropped a pass on 3rd and 5 at the Browns 44.

On their next drive Baltimore reclaimed the lead at 17-13, finishing a 62 yard drive.
The Ravens were able to overcome a 3rd and 1 false start at the Browns 28, which was going to be a direct snap to Charlie Kolar.
Seemed overly gimmicky, when you have Henry.
Again, they did get past that, and finished that drive with a score (Mark Andrews from 7 yards out).

Just as Cleveland answered the Ravens score to end the 1st half, the Browns answered this Ravens TD with another drive (6 plays, 72 yards) to go up 20-17.
The TD coming on 3rd and 5 from the Ravens 22, when Winston found Tillman.

Baltimore had a 10 play answer, and were in position to tie the game at 20, when Tucker badly missed from 50 yards.
Could have been a shorter FG attempt, but there was a drop on 3rd.

Eddie Jackson could have made a pick on the next Browns drive, but wasn’t able to come up with the ball.
The Browns did punt.

The Ravens took over on offense with 11:31 left in the 4th Quarter, still trailing 20-17.
On 3rd and 2, Jackson missed a wide open Isaiah Likely, but a Browns penalty allowed the drive to continue.
On 3rd and 14 from the Baltimore 15, Jackson and Rashod Bateman were unable to connect, as Bateman lost his footing and missed a pass that hit him in his shoulder pads.

Baltimore was forced to punt, and Cleveland increased their lead to 23-17 with a FG.

Trailing 23-17, the Ravens got the ball back with 4:55 left.
Jackson was able to lead the Ravens on a 6 play, 91 yard drive, which gave the Ravens the 24-23 lead with 2:36 to go.

Cleveland took over needing a FG to lead.
The Browns got more than that, as they were able to go 69 yards over 1:37 for a TD and the 29-24 lead.
Hamilton was gifted a would be interception which would have ended the game, but he dropped it.
With new life, Winston took advantage, finding Tillman for 38 yards who got behind Jackson for the score.

The Browns scored so quickly, the Ravens were able to go back on offense with some time (59 seconds) left on the clock.
The Ravens got to the Cleveland 24, with 4th and 10 going incomplete to end the game.

Takeaways?
The O-Line struggled.
The Defense got zero pass rush unless they blitzed.
L. Jackson missed some opportunities.
The WR’s didn’t help Jackson with multiple drops.
Harbaugh gave away 3 points to start the game.
Offensive Coordinator Todd Monken got cute multiple times, when he has Henry. He also didn’t seem to adjust to find ways to give Jackson more time.
Defensive Coordinator Zach Orr had another game which left Ravens fans shaking their heads.

Cleveland’s offense was historically limited under DeShaun Watson.
In our NFL write-ups I’ve said numerous times, I thought they’d look better with Winston.
It’s still a limited group.
Seeing the Ravens give up 23 second half points to that group – even when factoring in the players the Ravens defense was missing – is pretty rough.
I liked the Ravens bringing in Dean Pees to assist Orr.
Orr is 32 years old.  He was well liked as a player, and he’s been well liked as a coach.
I don’t want to write him off.
On the other-hand, again this is a Super Bowl or bust year.
The Ravens Front Office has to evaluate if the issue is more coaching or talent.
I think the defense has a lot of talent; certainly enough to be better than they have shown.
If the Front Office agrees, do they have to make a change?
Is the analogy the Ravens 2012 Super Bowl season and the in-season change from OC Cam Cameron to Jim Caldwell?
If a change was to be made, is it Pees?
Rex Ryan is on tv each week talking about how he he still wants to coach.
He’s talked openly about how he wanted the Cowboys DC job.
Would he solve the issues we have seen?
I don’t know, but the Front Office and Harbaugh know him and are obviously familiar.
Ryan wouldn’t be surprised by anything he sees.
Each week it unfortunately looks like Orr is seeing something for the first time.
My biggest indictment on Orr might be that I don’t recall hearing Roquan Smith’s name once this year. That might be hyperbole, but it’s been a quiet 8 games for Smith.

Other Notes?

• Jackson finished with 289 yards in the air (2 TD’s), and he had another 46 on the ground.  He wasn’t helped by his WR’s today, but he missed several opportunities on his own.
• Henry had 11 rushes for 73 yards and a score. They didn’t forget to give Henry the ball more, it was largely game situation why he didn’t get more carries.
• The Ravens were 2 of 10 on 3rd down, while Cleveland was 8 of 15.
• Winston had 331 yards, and 3 scores.
• Four different Browns had at-least 5 receptions and 61 yards.
• Whether the Ravens make a change with Orr or not, they need to go find another EDGE, and another CB.
• The Ravens had to make a lot of self-inflicted errors to lose today.  It’s almost unfathomable how many mistakes the Ravens made.

Next Up? The Broncos Come To Baltimore

Denver is currently 4-3, and about to be 5-3 as they are leading Carolina 21-7.
The Broncos are 3-1 on the road.

ESPN’s Match-Up Predictor is giving the Ravens a 76.1% chance of winning.

Entering this week, the Broncos were 10th overall in DVOA, 24th in Offense, 3rd in Defense, and 2nd in Special Teams.

This should be a game the Ravens win, but Denver is better than Cleveland.
Sean Payton is having a strong second season at the helm. You can see they are improving.
Rookie QB Bo Nix doesn’t have big stats yet, but it seems like he’s generally progressing, and doing what’s needed to give Denver a chance week-to-week.

Ultimately next Sunday is not about Denver, it’s about the Ravens showing they learned something from today.