The Ravens are a cleaning soap opera.
We’re not even a full month into the offseason, and they’re offering a number of storylines per week. They can’t get a contract extension finished with quarterback Lamar Jackson. They employed a brand new offensive coordinator, Todd Monken. They parted methods with their power coach, Steve Saunders, who has since been criticized by a number of former gamers. General supervisor Eric DeCosta criticized himself for previous failures in drafting broad receivers, after which present wideout Rashod Bateman took a shot at him.
Is Rome burning? Nah, however it smells dangerous.
After two years of contract negotiations, the nationwide media has lastly discovered that the Ravens are critical about presumably buying and selling Jackson. The group has most likely already engaged in backroom offers or dialog with different groups, which is an ordinary mode of operation within the NFL.
If the Ravens can get two first-round and two second-round picks for Jackson, then it’s bye-bye. If the Ravens designate him with both the unique or nonexclusive franchise tag earlier than Tuesday’s deadline and he returns for one more season, then coach John Harbaugh has a number of restore work to do within the locker room with Jackson’s teammates — particularly after the injured quarterback failed to affix the group within the wild-card-round playoff loss to the Cincinnati Bengals.
Under no circumstance ought to the Ravens supply Jackson a totally assured five- or six-year contract, particularly after he missed the ultimate 5 and 6 video games, respectively, the previous two seasons with accidents. It’s been reported that the NFL Players Association has been concerned with Jackson through the negotiations, which is not any shock. They’ve most likely been whispering in his ear ever since quarterback Deshaun Watson signed his five-year, $230 million absolutely assured contract with the Cleveland Browns final 12 months.
But I might be shocked if Ravens proprietor Steve Bisciotti provided Jackson an analogous assure. So, except Jackson takes the cash the group is keen to supply, he’ll most likely transfer on. Either means, the Ravens want to come back to some decision quickly as a result of every day invitations extra media scrutiny and hypothesis.
Both Harbaugh and DeCosta took many questions on the Jackson scenario this week on the NFL scouting mix in Indianapolis, and each continued to challenge optimism that the 2019 NFL Most Valuable Player will stay with the group. DeCosta was additionally requested about evaluating receivers, and his evaluation was sincere.
“It’s a challenging position to evaluate in different ways,” DeCosta mentioned. “If I had a solution, which means I might most likely have some higher receivers, I assume. We preserve attempting. I believe there are a number of issues that go together with that place. Sometimes it’s tied to the quarterback, and I believe it’s tied to issues like sturdiness; it’s tied to a number of issues.
“We’re going to keep swinging. There have been some guys that have been successful players for us that were draft picks. We’ve never really hit on that All-Pro type of guy, which is disappointing, I would say, but it’s not for lack of effort.”
An sad Bateman, although, took umbrage in a since-deleted tweet.
“How bout you play to your player’s strength and & stop pointing the finger at us and #8 [Jackson] …blame the one you let do this…. we take heat 24/7 . & keep us healthy … care about US & see what happen..ain’t no promises tho … tired of y’all lyin and capn on players for no reason”
Both are appropriate. There is not any celebrity like Stefon Diggs or Justin Jefferson on this roster. Jackson has been inaccurate and reluctant to throw to exterior receivers in a poorly devised passing scheme created by former coordinator Greg Roman.
But final 12 months, Ravens receivers didn’t appear to acknowledge whether or not they had been taking part in towards zone or man-to-man protection. They didn’t assault your complete area, both.
As for Bateman, his feedback are comprehensible, however he would have extra credibility if he hadn’t missed 17 of 35 video games over the previous two years due to accidents.
The strangest feedback got here from Harbaugh, who was requested if he had watched Georgia’s tape to get a really feel for Monken’s fashion of offense.
“We watched a little bit of it,” Harbaugh mentioned. “It was more in the context of him expressing his vision for our offense going forward, so we watched some of their tape doing it. I didn’t sit down and break down Georgia tape; I didn’t have time. It would have been nice, probably, but I didn’t feel like we needed to.”
Huh? Excuse me, you didn’t have time? This franchise has been inept on offense from the time it arrived in Baltimore in 1996, and the top coach couldn’t discover the time.
Wow, that’s a secret Harbaugh ought to have stored to himself.
No one can preserve quiet over at The Castle lately. Former gamers have publicly blasted Saunders, who departed per week earlier than a survey carried out by the NFLPA gave the Ravens’ power employees the bottom doable grade, an F-. While 27 of the 32 NFL groups bought at the very least an A- for his or her power employees, the gamers’ evaluation of Saunders was “markedly negative.”
Veterans have complained about Saunders ever since he took over in 2016. It was neglected again then as a result of Saunders got here in with robust calls for and gamers generally insurgent towards change. But the criticism was fixed, and he ought to have been fired as a substitute of suspended for a month in 2020 after sources mentioned he didn’t routinely put on a proximity tracker or masks, as required by NFL guidelines, and didn’t report potential COVID-19 signs as he labored with gamers.
When you see and listen to issues like this about participant discontent, you begin to surprise in regards to the state of the franchise. At least with Monken, you anticipated a number of adjustments on the offensive employees, not a partial home cleansing.
But the Ravens are beginning to enter the world of the weird. Every day there’s extra destructive information. It’s not simply coming from the present gamers, however the former ones as nicely. The NFLPA hasn’t finished the Ravens any favors this week both with their reported participation within the Jackson negotiations and the discharge of the group report playing cards.
Everywhere I’m going on the town lately, I get requested if the Ravens will signal Jackson. It is as in style of a query in Baltimore as “Who Shot J.R.?” again within the days of the outdated TV present “Dallas” almost 40 years in the past.
I assume these are the times of our lives, at the very least for Ravens followers, till some order is restored.
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Source: www.bostonherald.com