Over the ultimate few weeks of what could be his last season in Baltimore, Don “Wink” Martindale, all the time good for a quote, discovered himself speaking about TV and flicks. Maybe it was as a result of they have been higher than something his injury-depleted Ravens protection was placing on tape, perhaps it was as a result of he figured everybody wanted amusing, however each different week or so, the coordinator would drop a pop-culture reference from out of nowhere.
Before the Ravens’ Week 15 loss to the Packers, Martindale in contrast Green Bay’s Aaron Rodgers and Davante Adams to Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro. After the Ravens’ Week 16 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals, which they’d entered with over two dozen gamers on both injured reserve or the reserve/COVID-19 checklist, Martindale joked, “I don’t know if we’re playing football or the ‘Squid Games,’” referring to Netflix’s common present that options contestants competing in kids’s video games with lethal stakes.
And earlier than the season finale towards the Pittsburgh Steelers, in the end his final sport in control of the Ravens’ protection, he considered a comic who finds humor in brutal honesty.
“It’s been quite a season; we could probably write a book about it,” he stated in early January. “It’s like a Larry David episode.”
On Sunday, when Martindale welcomes the Ravens (3-2) to MetLife Stadium, the jaunty theme music for David’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm” wouldn’t appear too misplaced. On one sideline: Martindale, restoring the New York Giants’ protection to respectability with a ragtag group of gamers and an unflinching dedication to stress. On the opposite: John Harbaugh, the coach who changed him this offseason with Mike Macdonald, a former defensive assistant beneath Martindale, nonetheless trying to find the success that his predecessor often loved.
On the road: an opportunity for a marquee win, and an entire lot of delight. As far as storylines go, it’s fairly, fairly good.
“Wink is a great coach, a great guy. Love him,” Ravens defensive lineman Calais Campbell, who performed beneath Martindale for 2 seasons, stated Wednesday. “He’s definitely going to have the troops riled up. I know this means something to him; it’s only natural. … When you go somewhere else, and you come back or get to face your old team, it definitely just gives you a little bit more of an edge. So I know this was circled on the calendar, and it’s going to be a big game.”
The Ravens’ resolution to fireside Martindale in January, with a 12 months nonetheless remaining on his contract, was shocking, even to these across the facility. Harbaugh had questioned Martindale’s aggressive play-calling after a Week 13 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers — “You go to the well too many times,” he stated, referring to Martindale’s “Cover 0″ blitz schemes, “and they get you” — and the protection had struggled mightily amid accidents and sickness.
But earlier than bottoming out final season, ending a franchise-worst twenty eighth in Football Outsiders’ effectivity rankings and final within the NFL in cross protection, Martindale’s defenses had been constantly among the many league’s finest, a rarity in a high-variance period. From 2018 to 2020, the Ravens ranked within the high 10 in total effectivity annually and led the NFL in scoring common (18.2 factors per sport allowed) and complete protection (307.8 yards per sport). They additionally tied for first in defensive touchdowns (12).
In the assertion the Ravens launched asserting Martindale’s departure, Harbaugh praised Martindale’s “major” contributions to the group’s protection as a place coach and coordinator. But Harbaugh stated it was the “right time” to “move forward in separate directions.” On Wednesday, he stated he had “nothing but respect and love” for Martindale, who joined Harbaugh’s workers in 2012 and was promoted to coordinator six years later.
“I know how much he loves Wink personally,” proprietor Steve Bisciotti stated on the NFL house owners’ conferences in March, acknowledging his personal shock on the transfer. “When he called me to tell me that he was going to make the change, I was shocked — and I mean, as an owner, not as a fan. I was just like, ‘Wow. OK.’ When things get stale and you want to change, it’s very hard for John to come to that conclusion.”
Harbaugh didn’t have to go looking far for Martindale’s alternative. Macdonald had joined the Ravens’ workers as an intern in 2014 and labored his means as much as defensive backs coach by 2017. He was coming off a celebrated turnaround of Michigan’s protection in his first 12 months as a university coordinator. When Macdonald, then solely 34, was launched in January because the NFL’s youngest defensive coordinator, he acknowledged that he and Martindale “see a lot of things the same.”
But over the Ravens’ offseason and erratic first 5 video games, Macdonald has distinguished himself from Martindale — and never simply together with his buttoned-up information conferences and close-cropped haircuts. Ravens defenders have raved about Macdonald’s method to educating his protection, how he expects gamers to be interchangeable and the way simple he makes it to be taught.
In idea, Macdonald’s protection could be nearer to Martindale’s than some other within the NFL. Ravens inside linebacker A.J. Klein, who spent a few days on the Giants’ observe squad, final week referred to as them “the same defensive system.”
But in observe, their approaches on sport day, at the least early this season, have diverse vastly. According to Pro Football Reference, the shocking Giants (4-1) lead the NFL in blitz fee (43.4%) beneath Martindale, a perch the Ravens occupied in Martindale’s first three years because the coordinator in Baltimore. Under Macdonald, the Ravens this season rank twenty first (24.4%).
As a part of their extra conservative method, the Ravens have performed extra zone protection this season. According to The thirty third Team, opposing quarterbacks have confronted zone appears to be like on at the least twice as many drop-backs as they’ve confronted man-to-man appears to be like in each Ravens sport this season. Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow was blitzed simply thrice and noticed simply 4 man-coverage snaps in Cincinnati’s loss Sunday to the Ravens, an method that at instances appeared anathema to Martindale.
Other tweaks have been subtler. According to Sports Info Solutions, the Ravens have run a “Cover 0″ blitz — no deep safeties, man protection throughout the board — simply six instances this season. That’s as many as Martindale despatched after Las Vegas Raiders quarterback Derek Carr in final 12 months’s season opener.
With fewer defenders dedicated up entrance, Macdonald has diversified the Ravens’ appears to be like within the again. On Sunday, the protection appeared to shift right into a “Tampa 2″ protection shell, by which a linebacker or extra central defensive again drops right into a deep-middle zone, at the least twice. Inside linebacker Patrick Queen estimated Wednesday that the Ravens had referred to as a Tampa 2 play perhaps thrice within the earlier two seasons.
Macdonald’s additionally relied extra on two-high-safety appears to be like, becoming a member of a wave of coordinators across the NFL keen to sacrifice some integrity of their run matches for improved safety towards downfield passing performs.
“It’s just less stuff that we’ve got to worry about on our plate,” Queen stated. “I think it’s more, ‘We can try to stop this, but if we get something else, then just play ball.’ As far as Wink, it was like trying to find a key for everything, trying to find a way to stop every play.” He referred to as the 2 defenses “very, very similar, but very different at the same time.”
“When you have carryover, you’re still” reinventing your schemes, Harbaugh stated Wednesday. “You’re not just throwing the same playbook out there. You just can’t do that in this league and last.”
Slowly however certainly, Macdonald and the Ravens are discovering their footing. Despite accidents of their secondary (cornerback Kyle Fuller and security Marcus Williams) and alongside their entrance (defensive deal with Michael Pierce and out of doors linebacker Justin Houston), the protection enters Week 6 having held the Buffalo Bills and Bengals effectively beneath their typical output. After rating twenty first in defensive effectivity after Week 2, the Ravens are as much as 14th total, based on Football Outsiders, buoyed by one of many NFL’s finest takeaway charges.
Macdonald final week acknowledged that, in his evaluation of the protection’s movie, he’d discovered performs the place he regretted not placing gamers in higher positions. But within the locker room, his public help hasn’t wavered. Cornerback Marlon Humphrey stated final week that Macdonald’s play calls have been “perfect,” spoiled sometimes by poor execution or miscommunication. Change, the Ravens consider, has been for the higher.
“We have a new defensive coordinator, some new pieces to the puzzle, a lot of the guys that haven’t been here long,” Campbell stated Sunday. “Not that I have any excuses or whatever, but we should get better with time. That’s just how it goes. The more we do it together, the better we’ll be.”
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Source: www.bostonherald.com