Edc has tried though.. oweh, mike green, kept jmad around, signed van voy, peebles still learning, drafted ojabo.. we drafted a good center, kept stanley, when you all thought he would actually move RR to LT. Wasnt RR drafted in the 2nd? He has in fact tried, shit just hasnt worked out. Its rare that a good pass rusher or good oline will fall so late in draft at our picks
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The Embarrassment, the Blowout and the Coaching
- Thread starter rossihunter2
- Start date
rmcjacket23
Ravens Ring of Honor
I agree the effort is there. My point is when you see that what you're doing isn't working out, either change the way you grade/scout these players, or change your strategy for how to acquire them. I like that he will sign the Van Noy's of the world, but they're also dirt cheap, aging veterans.
And I think it can be difficult to go out in the market and sign a pass rusher for $20-25M a year when you made commitments to the Roquan's, the Henry's, the Oweh's and the Andrews of the world. It comes down to how you manage your $.
With the way the season is going, I'm also rethinking my "who gets an extension" strategy. I still think Linderbaum gets one, but I'm not sure it makes a ton of sense to be giving Likely $15M a year at this point. I would think it'd be glaringly clear that keeping or signing more "weapons" long term doesn't really matter if you can't block up front for the franchise. Henry looks irrelevant with the way we're run blocking right now. Likely is an afterthought in a game where you have a backup QB in there and we're only throwing it 20 times.
Agreed.. love todd and hope we keep him around.
I don't think swinging and missing is the problem because that happens to every single team and every single GM. I think the bigger problem is seeing the issues and not doing anything to address them. I'm not a Faalele hater by any means but the fact that he and Vorhees were essentially just handed the jobs is a problem. And on the DL, everyone knew we had Madubuike, Jones, and a bunch of nothing after that. Our solution to that was 36 year old John Jenkins.
JO_75
Hall of Famer
Ravens trolling on Twitter. Starts a Tweet with Steve Biscotti.... thinking that could be the announcement of Biscotti forcing Harbaugh to fire Orr. Or that Biscotti is firing everyone including scouts and hiring anyone from the Eagles & Lions coaching staff and scouts who know how to build in the trenches properly.
It was just some announcement about a field being dedicated to Dick Cass lol.
It was just some announcement about a field being dedicated to Dick Cass lol.
Agreed…. the likely situation will be tough but i think we should keep him! I dnt even know what it would look like not having a guy like andrews or likely to help lamar out.
rmcjacket23
Ravens Ring of Honor
I think in an offense where you want to run the ball, and have Flowers and Bateman, TE will start seeing less targets.
It's less to do with Likely as a player and more to do with the fact that the Ravens seem to be able to find quality TE play at will in the middle rounds of the draft. So if there's a position where I can get somebody viable in mid rounds, and pay next to nothing for it, I'm doing that.
Plus its just the overall premise of "what's the fix"? If people think firing John is the only thing that needs to happen, so be it. I'm suggesting we could easily see wholesale personnel changes if this season continues down the toilet. In which case I'm not sure there's really that many guys who are "I've got to bring him back" on a team that's picking early in the draft.
drjohnnyfever
Pro Bowler
A quality TE on a Ravens team will always see comparable targets to the WR room. They are not going to go away from that, it's a source of savings on contracts and they still have a really good scouting eye on that position AND it is still a position that is often overlooked by a lot of teams. The Ravens under Ozzie and EDC see that as something they can exploit. I think you could make the same argument about Safety and I wish they would try harder on TRUE ILB's.
That said, we are not looking good. I had to chuckle coming out of the half when JH said he was hoping for some of the fill-ins to really step up. This is actually something that just irritates me about John. Of course that's what every armchair fan watching the game is thinking too, but what evidence has there been over these game that the guys spelling the starters are any good? Very little, really. The idea that a HC is waiting for guys who have thus far shown little ability to take the place of starters are suddenly going to put it together is just wishful thinking. It was then I knew it was just going to get worse. Not that it really had any chance to get better because we had the squads we had and our hand was basically forced because of injury.
Raven Forever
Practice Squad
I'm very disappointed and fear the coming game greatly. We have good players but our coach comes from the last century. Head coach is not a lifetime appointment. We need a change and the longer we wait the further away we are.
rmcjacket23
Ravens Ring of Honor
OK so they're literally actively going away from that. TE usage in the passing game is way, way, down in 2025 compared to prior years, and I don't see a reason why that would change (even with Likely back). TE target share is currently 20%. Roughly five targets/week in the whole group.
It was 30% last year.
John Harbaugh's comments about the defense being further along now than they were last year are somehow less puzzling than they are disheartening.
We currently have 6 sacks through 5 weeks this year, one of the lowest totals in the league. Kyle Van Noy had 6 sacks alone to this point. Oweh had 3 and a half and was getting to the QB. They were the 2nd highest graded pass rushing duo in the NFL. 16 team sacks to that point, and 29 QB hits compared to 19 this year.
The biggest issues from what I recall, and please add on them if I'm omitting anything, were on the backend among Marcus Williams and Eddie Jackson, and with Roquan Smith regressing while having to think for himself and Trenton Simpson. It was a mess in its own right, don't get me wrong. But there were more positives to hang your hat on moving forward. Frustratingly, it was then fixed without any external additions, meaning the solution was there to begin with. Some of it this year has been bad luck. Missing Van Noy for a stretch and Madubuike for most of 2025 has been super impactful. The unit against the Texans was as bare bones as it gets. But even if you take out the Houston game, we gave up less points through 5 games last year than the 4 prior. And we managed to win, stay afloat. The state of these units are in different places despite retaining most of the talent, or supplementing the ones lost from then. Our team's belief in our defensive coaching has been bafflingly unmerited. I am praying the message is different and more urgent behind the scenes.
We currently have 6 sacks through 5 weeks this year, one of the lowest totals in the league. Kyle Van Noy had 6 sacks alone to this point. Oweh had 3 and a half and was getting to the QB. They were the 2nd highest graded pass rushing duo in the NFL. 16 team sacks to that point, and 29 QB hits compared to 19 this year.
The biggest issues from what I recall, and please add on them if I'm omitting anything, were on the backend among Marcus Williams and Eddie Jackson, and with Roquan Smith regressing while having to think for himself and Trenton Simpson. It was a mess in its own right, don't get me wrong. But there were more positives to hang your hat on moving forward. Frustratingly, it was then fixed without any external additions, meaning the solution was there to begin with. Some of it this year has been bad luck. Missing Van Noy for a stretch and Madubuike for most of 2025 has been super impactful. The unit against the Texans was as bare bones as it gets. But even if you take out the Houston game, we gave up less points through 5 games last year than the 4 prior. And we managed to win, stay afloat. The state of these units are in different places despite retaining most of the talent, or supplementing the ones lost from then. Our team's belief in our defensive coaching has been bafflingly unmerited. I am praying the message is different and more urgent behind the scenes.
And last year's solution was simply replacing bad players with functional players. Other than the broad theme being zone, this defensive philosophy is almost unrecognizable from last year.
You've looked into the void, too. Some of this year's tape is inexplicable, difficult to put into words. And I know that bad plays from every team are getting cherry picked everywhere on socials for clicks, but we've had sequences of plays where its clear that our players have either no idea where they're supposed to be or where others are. You don't always know what the offense is doing, but you should at least know what your defense is meant to accomplish.
Grim
Ravens Ring of Honor
It’s weird because it’s almost like these guys suddenly forgot how to play football
Dom McRaven
Hall of Famer
Especially when we had the majority of this defense from 2023 when we looked insanely competent.
The stacking of the defense to one side and the opposing offense running the play to the other side because well... it's pretty much wide open is prevalent far too often
It's wild and I genuinely don't know what to make of it.
It's seemingly complex because these guys have no idea what they're supposed to be doing or where the ball is going and they can't stop a thing.
But then it's also vanilla as fuck because the schemed pressure (or lack thereof) is so obvious to spot 95% of the time.
I just cannot figure out responsibilities for the life of me. You have what looks like basic looks but then you have guys dropping to zones that are so far from what the standard look is. I've legit seen a LBer in what looked like cover 4 drop all the way to the deep boundary and I don't know if that's purposeful or a player just messing up that badly. But it's consistent enough to see those weird looks that it feels purposeful.
The zone coverage is also incredibly soft even when it is basic. CBs playing like 10 yards off and dropping to a deep zone. LBs trying to get out to cover the flats but the tape is obvious and teams are attacking that by hitting WRs quickly. It's almost a guaranteed 5 yards. Then you add the tackling issues and you can add on to that easily.
JoeyFlex5
Hall of Famer
I really don’t think Zach Orr has a clue what he’s doing. He played LB for a few years, and then coached LBs for a few years. Unless he was a SUPREMELY high iq player who understood what every defender was doing and how to compensate for it, and understood what offenses and play callers were doing, then I don’t even see where he could’ve gained the knowledge to scheme and playcall a nfl defense. And I really don’t think he was that player. We all had the same thoughts on Orr as a LB, he chases the guy with the ball and tackles them well, he wasn’t exactly intuitive or instinctive. Not to say he’s not a smart guy or a competent positional coach, but we had these exact fears when we hired him and it’s all turned out to be exactly the case, he just isn’t experienced in coaching enough to call an entire defense at this level.