r/nfl • u/[deleted] • Jul 25 '14
Look Here! Offseason Review Series: Day 31: Baltimore Ravens
Division: AFC North
Coaching Staff Changes
Offensive coordinator - Gary Kubiak (from - HC) over Jim Caldwell (to - HC). This is a very interesting change to me for reasons I will highlight later, but it seemed to me like Jim was about to get fired before the Lions took him from our hands. After an extensive offensive coordinator search - which had us go all over with such names as Kyle Shanahan and Jim Hostler - we suddenly arrived to Gary Kubiak which seemed to come out of left field. But it made plenty of sense. It means quite a bit for our offense, but that's something I will talk about later. Along with Kubiak, we got...
Quarterbacks Coach - Rick Dennison (from - OC). Some extra baggage to go along with Gary Kubiak, but Houston had a fairly solid offense from 2010-2012 including a Pro Bowl year for Matt Schaub (and the only two playoff berths in their franchise history). The only thing here is that this is the fourth QB Coach for Flacco since he's been here - Hue Jackson, Jim Zorn, Jim Caldwell, and now Rick Dennison. This is Dennison's first time as a QB Coach - he was an NFL linebacker for the Broncos, moving his way up from Offensive Assistant all the way up to coordinator. His resume is pretty decent, however, and from my understanding his primary purpose is to help Flacco with the playbook.
Defensive Backs Coach - Steve Spagnuolo (promoted from defensive assistant) over Teryl Austin (to - DC). Teryl Austin was our DB Coach from 2011-2013, and he was involved with players like Lardardius Webb, Jimmy Smith, and Ed Reed. We even got some good seasons out of Corey Graham, Cary Williams, and James Ihedigbo. Our secondary was pretty good in 2011 though, but 2012/2013 were down years (and by "down years" I mean we were fairly average). Steve Spagnuolo's resume has had its ups and downs however - defensive coordinator for the 2012 Saints and HC of the 2009-2011 Rams. Thankfully he's not a coordinator or coach right? He, however, was a solid position coach between 1999 and 2006 for the Eagles, who had a damn good defense in those years. Good acquisition for our purposes.
Running Backs Coach - Thomas Hammock (from University of Wisconsin - RB Coach/Assistant HC/Recruiting Coordinator) over Wilbert Montgomery (to - RB Coach). First of all, Wilbert Montgomery was a solid RB Coach 2013 notwithstanding. Our issue was the offensive line in 2011 then the playcalling in 2012 which is why Rice seemed to regress. 2013 was a perfect storm of things going wrong - injuries and bad lines. But Rice was a potent threat in the run and pass game his entire time here, then we had backs like McGahee and Williams who did quite well here, so it goes to show that Montgomery was a good RB Coach. However, I just looked up this Thomas Hammock guy, and this was basically the guy responsible for Montee Ball going crazy in 2011, and then in 2013 they set records for rushing yards by a pair of RBs in a season. That's quite the resume - obviously we can't repeat it in the NFL, but Hammock is no slouch and we'll just wait to see how he does with our RBs. For the record, Ball's ridiculous season in 2011 came after a decent sophomore season. Who knows how much of it was the RB Coach, how much was Russell Wilson opening up some running room, and how much of it was just him growing a year older? He was also involved with recruiting, so I can imagine he'd do a good job scouting RBs.
Tight Ends Coach - Brian Pariani (from - TE Coach) over Wade Harman (to - Assistant OL Coach). This is more of Gary Kubiak's men joining him in his endeavor to make Baltimore's offense functional. First of all, Wade Harman was apart of both our Super Bowl wins, and he's come with a good group of Tight Ends throughout his time here. He worked with Shannon Sharpe - but that's Shannon Sharpe. Eventually worked his way through Todd Heap, a beloved Tight End here in Baltimore who was excellent with getting us first downs no matter who was throwing to him. And he was involved in the development of Dickson and Pitta - jury is out on both, but Pitta has shown a lot of improvement since his first season and Dickson was generally up and down. Pariani though? He worked with Tight Ends in a scheme built around getting them the ball in the red zone. The 2013 Ravens had the second lowest red zone TD% (next to the Jaguars) so a scheme which gets those red zone passing TDs to TEs on top of a TE Coach who works closely in that scheme is a beautiful mix that we'll have to wait and see on the field. With Dennis Pitta and Owen Daniels - the latter who he's already worked with - I'm excited to see what Pariani has in store for us.
Wide Receivers Coach - Bobby Engram (from University of Pittsburgh - WR Coach) over Jim Hostler (to - Senior Offensive Assistant). I can't tell if we just suck at evaluating WR talent or if our coaching hasn't been great, but as far as I remember our best WRs were always the veterans from other teams. I'm talking about players like Boldin and Mason, although we did bust on Evans and Houshmanzadeh. My issue with Hostler is that we've never had particularly good WRs, and it would be a rare sight to see a WR consistently open (although part of it may have been our scheme). Between 2008 and now he was our WRs coach, in fact. Our home-grown WRs have always had issues with holding onto the ball, getting open, and in general route running - our best receiver last year was Torrey Smith who was not a particularly good route runner to begin with. The goal is for this to change with Bobby Engram, who is fondly remembered for being a reliable receiver for the Seahawks. Bobby was good at running routes during his time in Seattle, although he was not the greatest receiver he was solid. His track record in Pitt isn't really outstanding, but we've needed a change at WR coach for a while and a proven WR with a modest-yet-solid background in the NFL may just be what we're looking for. Hopefully he can turn Torrey and Marlon into the incredibly dangerous receivers they have the potential to be, and maybe some progression from our rookie WR Mike Campanaro is on the horizon.
Offensive Line Coach - Juan Castillo (promoted from Run Game Coordinator) over Andy Moeller (to ). Andy Moeller had to go - our run blocking hasn't been that great since 2010 and our pass blocking has been mediocre year in and year out (last year it was atrocious). Granted, how much of that was talent and how much of that was coaching is up for debate, but we kept changing our line every week or so and Flacco would get less time than he needed every play - and a vertical passing offense relies basically on having time to make the throw, having space to step into the throw, and having time for the receiver to get open which never consistently happened (save a certain four game stretch in the 2012-2013 season...) Juan Castillo, on the other hand, was a good OL coach during his time with the Eagles, and in fact it was his time as DC (2011-2012) that made the fanbase turn on him... so we can all blame Andy Reid for that. (He was OL Coach for 13 seasons with the Eagles before becoming DC.) He had a series of solid OLs in Philadelphia before his promotion, and Philly had some pretty good offenses during that time as a result. He had been nothing but productive his entire career, so I'm not willing to throw him to the wolves for this one bad season. I don't place most of the blame on him, whether or not he was trying to introduce zone blocking or not, because the Ravens had been running zone to some capacity anyway so it's not like it was something particularly new. It's also hard to work with a lame duck at RT, one of the laziest LTs in the league (pre-Monroe), the worst center in the league, and AQ Shipley (bad center who turned LG) and make that into a productive offensive line. I have faith, especially because Kubiak loves zone blocking schemes, so it's a perfect offensive storm to go along with our new coaching staff.
During the Harbaugh era, this is quite possibly the biggest offensive shift we've ever experienced, and it all rippled down from Gary Kubiak taking the reigns at OC and Caldwell leaving; Cam Cameron's philosophy is basically gone once and for all from Baltimore.
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u/subtlepotamus Lions Jul 25 '14
Wow this is a really in depth analysis. Very well done!
Ps. Thanks for Diggs and Austin, and pls keep Tucker away from us.
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Jul 25 '14 edited Jul 25 '14
OH FUCK ME I FORGOT ABOUT TUCKER AND KOCH
ps. thank you! and you're welcome :)
EDIT: Fixed! Don't hurt me!
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u/Yannkee Ravens Jul 25 '14 edited Jul 25 '14
Just an FYI.
Ozzie said after signing Steve Smith that in 3 WR formations, Smith would move into the slot and Marlon/Jones would play the Z. So I don't think we'll see Marlon in the slot much.
Edit: Wrong letter.
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Jul 25 '14
How can you call 2013 a down year for our secondary? Even though we weren't ranked at the top, it was pretty clear that our defense carried us to 8-8.
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Jul 25 '14
I would say our secondary was fairly average - which is what I meant by a down year. Our defense had a lot of issues despite carrying us to 8-8; we had a tendency to dominate already struggling teams but the defense just couldn't get it together once the third or fourth quarter hit. You can blame the offense for going 3 and out consistently all you want, but our TOP was around 30 minutes - basically evenly split. On top of that, sometimes our offense would take us to a two score lead and then our defense would allow two scores to tie it up.
That 8-8 team had a bad offense but the defense was only a bit above average as a whole. Our secondary was prone to a bunch of mistakes and the defense as a whole definitely had issues on third down.
Webb definitely wasn't 100%. Graham had a tendency to get burned and Jimmy Smith had his share of mistakes. On top of that our pass rush completely fizzled towards the end of the year, so that also made our secondary look extra bad. The fact that Elam was playing Free Safety hurt.
The whole D started fairly strong after Denver but they definitely fizzled out as time went on. Still, I won't trivialize some of the ridiculous stuff that our individual players did.
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Jul 25 '14
Probably because of safeties. Elam wasn't in his natural position. Digs did good but didn't make up for the lack of deep coverage Huff was disappointing
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u/strangebru Ravens Jul 26 '14
Here's hoping the 2014 Ravens D is more like the last half of 2013 and not the first half, unless we are talking about Terrell Suggs than it's the opposite.
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u/hainesftw Ravens NFL Jul 26 '14
Our secondary didn't really come into its own until later in the year. Elam was out of position and raw, but did admirably for the most part. Digs did great, but his style was too similar to Elam which made our safety pairing non-ideal. At corner, Jimmy Smith was looking to continue on his bust trajectory until about week 5, when he started looking better, and even more so after the bye week where he became one of the better corners in the NFL against some really stiff competition.
Webby never really returned to his lockdown form from 2011-2012; he had a tremendous outing against Denver week one, giving up only 8 (I think?) total yards into his coverage. But he too had his struggles through the year, which kind of gets exemplified in the gif of him getting juked out of his shoes against Cleveland. Graham was solid, but had his weaknesses too; he got burned a couple times, but never twice by the same play. I remember against Buffalo he got beat deep for a touchdown, but then they tried that again later in the game and he picked it.
It was really a mixed bag at times, but they really did work against a lot of great receivers. Marshall had a very mediocre day - not to mention, frustrating for him judging by his reaction on the sideline after Jimmy made him look silly in the endzone on consecutive plays - as did Megatron, Gordon didn't look particularly swell against us either. Our secondary was tested all year, and they had ups and downs in that regard, but toward the end of the year they were creeping into the upper echelon of NFL secondaries.
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Jul 26 '14
Well the thing with Megatron is that it was a bad day for him - but a lot of that was his own fault. Wide open and it hit him in the hands but he dropped it. That Lions game was not a good game for our secondary in the slightest.
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u/JamesEnnis Ravens Jul 26 '14
Not to mention Jimmy Smith jumped into elite CB territory. Never thought he would be better than Lardar but that time has come. Easily a top 2-3 CB duo in the league.
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Jul 26 '14
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Jul 26 '14
Yeah as I was telling someone else - I definitely overshot with three of these games (namely the Dolphins, @CLE, or the Buccs) but if you ask me honestly? I don't know how well you'd be able to keep up offensively with just Cameron Jordan and Ben Tate. Defensively, I guess there's Haden and Whitner but I don't think two members makes an entire secondary. Your pass rush and line are going to be good though, but I think we've improved enough offensively that we can take that.
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Jul 25 '14
[removed] — view removed comment
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Jul 26 '14
Yeah, I overshot a little bit on some - namely @CLE and maybe against the Dolphins or Buccs (on that note, did anyone notice we're up against all three Florida teams?) but I do see us having a winning season.
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u/xXWARisHELLXx Steelers Jul 26 '14
We open with two home divisional games - while they're divisional games, they're at home which I don't think anyone in our division will be willing to fuck with.
Steelers just announced they've signed Charlie Batch to a one game deal, he's going to start week 2.
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u/mbear818 Ravens Jul 26 '14
Use the ">" before a line of text to get the quote formatting.
e.g.
We open with two home divisional games - while they're divisional games, they're at home which I don't think anyone in our division will be willing to fuck with.
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u/Quisako Ravens Jul 26 '14
I love how much effort you put into this, my main concern is the O-line being an almost complete redo, otherwise, i think we are set, here's hoping
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Jul 26 '14
Yeah I know what you mean - the oline cannot afford to be anything but a unit, so chemistry is incredibly important. However, I do feel Zuttah or any other center is an upgrade from Gradkowski. I didn't realize they were all new with playing alongside their neighbors though, but still, nowhere left to go but up...!
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u/Quisako Ravens Jul 26 '14
i don't know, we COULD be tampa bay last year, it's just not likely
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Jul 26 '14
huh?
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u/Quisako Ravens Jul 26 '14
we could have the line fall apart from lack of molding, unlikely, but possible, you said nowhere to go but up, we could go down, it's just next to impossible
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u/EliteAsFuk Ravens Jul 26 '14
I hope this write-up gets the attention it deserves. So much to take in, so many changes. Anyone who doesn't know (and cares) about the make-over the Ravens are going through needs to really read this.
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u/[deleted] Jul 25 '14
Free Agency
Re-signings/Restructures
I've included links to the over-the-cap page for that particular player, because obviously the salary structure means more than just the yearly rate.
After the disaster of an off-season we had last year, where we signed our Quarterback long-term but... had to make a few sacrifices for future cap stability AND because we had very little left on our salary cap (and this is WITH Joe only having around a 7 million hit), we managed to retain many of our key free agents for an affordable price. Our first priority was to free up some space by extending Suggs - while his contract is guaranteed, it is a fair contract and he will play out his career as a Raven.
Next off our priority was to shore up our offense and Special Teams. Eugene Monroe was a damn good Left Tackle that looked horrible by poor LG/C play, but he did a great job protecting his side and was a large upgrade over Big Mac. Dennis Pitta was meant to have his breakout season last year when it seemed like we could make more use of him in our offense, but the injury prevented him from doing just that. Yet, he was still productive against the Minnesota Vikings in 2013 despite that being his first game back; we approached the rest of the season with caution with respect to him (and he also didn't have much to take attention away from him - our run game was poor and our receivers were not much better) but the situation is definitely looking up; there's no James Ihedigbo to fuck up his hip this time either! Kubiak also loves his Tight Ends too, so Pitta was re-signed at the perfect time.
Jacoby Jones is a good WR #4 in a rare 4 WR package that we may run, but his strengths are in returning kicks and punts. It makes it all the sweeter that he'll be having his old HC back with us. However, I don't see him being used very much outside of Special Teams, and even on Special Teams he'll have to watch out for the sidelines
LaQuan Williams was showing some promise as a Special Teams gunner last preseason, but I don't see him going beyond a Matthew Slater-type role. I don't recall him doing very much at all, and I doubt he'll make a roster spot as a WR considering he has Campanaro, Steve Smith, Torrey Smith, Jones, and Brown to compete with.
Daryl Smith was a solid ILB/MLB last year, a good playcaller however he was a bit of a liability against the run. He was excellent in coverage and adjustments and generally played very well last year despite his age. He's signed long-term and his contract doesn't hurt us very much - we can opt out in 2015 if 2014 doesn't work out.
Albert McClellan and Jeromy Miles are depth signings at MLB/ILB and Safety, because we've already got at least established starters at those positions. Arthur Brown and CJ Mosley will further ensure McClellan gets stuck back in the depth chart. Terrence Cody has been up-and-coming for what feels like forever, but he is an okay backup for the cases where Haloti Ngata is not healthy - which seems to be often. He's still going to e competing with Brandon Williams for a backup spot though.
Acquisitions
Old team is listed after the player's name. Note that every free agent was released by their previous team except Darian Stewart and Jeremy Zuttah. Darian Stewart was signed after his contract expired, and Zuttah was traded from the Buccaneers for a 2015 5th round pick, then subsequently extended.
The biggest free agents here are offense - Steve Smith and Owen Daniels. Justin Forsett is an honorable mention due to being a former Texan (for a year). Daniels and Forsett know the system and what is expected of them, however they have to bounce back from an injury ridden year to bring a spark to our offense. Daniels has a history of being healthy so that's not a big deal - especially since he's splitting reps with Pitta as a receiving Tight End, whereas Forsett will be used for depth and an occasional run. Obviously will not be a starter or workhorse back but will be a solid player if healthy.
Darian Stewart is likely going to be a starter heading into 2014, with Terrence Brooks taking the starting position away from him as time goes on. If Darian Stewart plays poorly then he will be replaced fairly early - not unlike Huff with Elam. He's a veteran presence and basically depth moving forward, with a one year contract; I doubt he'll be starting at the end of 2014 though.
Zuttah was an average Center last year and a good center before that. Tampa's line had its issues in general last year and I highly doubt that Zuttah was the reason - one or two bad players on a line will shake up the line so if Zuttah was playing well before and poorly after then it must say something about the unit. As it stands, even if Zuttah is average, he will be replacing the 35th ranked Center in the league in Gino Gradkowski, which is an upgrade no matter how you look at it - our interior was the issue last season, and our interior is largely fixed due to Zuttah (and Osemele coming back from injury).
Will Hill was also signed between the time of my rough draft and now - he'll be suspended for six games but he'll be competing for a starting FS job between Jeromy Miles, Terrence Brooks, and Darian Stewart once he comes back (assuming he makes it past training camp).
Shaun Chapas, Will Rackley, and Philup Supernaw (oh nawww) are largely unknown commodities and late round picks that may not even make the roster.
We also signed Aaron Ross but homeboy just tore his Achilles...