There’s no question that division foes work a lot harder to scheme for the unique Ravens offense after seeing it more regularly. Luke Jones and Nestor discuss the Browns defense of Jim Schwartz and utilizing special talents like Myles Garrett and Za’Darius Smith to slow down Lamar Jackson and Derrick Henry in a bad beat in Cleveland.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
Ravens offense, Browns defense, third down struggles, Lamar Jackson, Derek Henry, Justin Tucker, offensive line, play calls, Jim Schwartz, Jameis Winston, Mark Andrews, Isaiah Likely, Zay Flowers, pass protection, defensive pressure
SPEAKERS
Luke Jones, Nestor Aparicio
Nestor Aparicio 00:01
Welcome home. We are W, N, S, T am 1570 task Baltimore and Baltimore positive. We are positively into the week where we’re going to complain, and the week that I’m happy I don’t take phone calls. You know, after the game, I should say this, Luke, on Sunday night, I actually got in the car and went over to Pizza John’s, picked up some pizza. I did everything we talked about there two weeks ago. I got the chicken parm, I got the rigatonis, I got stuff that. I got the stuffed shells, because they told me they were great. And you know what? They were really great. So I did. I did not get a cheesesteak. I did not get any pineapple on my pizza. Be very proud of me, but I did listen to the post game. Poor Keith mills. I wrote a note to Keith’s girlfriend. I said, poor Keith. I don’t have Keith’s number anymore. Poor Keith is all I could say. And taking phone calls, we’re not taking phone calls here, but we are taking suggestions. I should say, you can find Luke’s work, obviously, out of Baltimore, Luke and everything we do. Luke W nst.net, I’m Nestor, Baltimore positive.com. Throw us a note. Everybody hit my social media I am famous for. The Baltimore Ravens are blank even when they’re winning. I put that up. The Baltimore Ravens offense is blank. Tell me, Luke, where are you on the offense? Because they, they didn’t get it, they didn’t do enough to win, and certainly dropping balls another part of this. Where was Derek Henry, just thumbs down on the whole effort. I’m with you on that. They’re five and three, but the offense we expected them sort of saved the day, I think on Sunday,
Luke Jones 01:31
yeah, look, this is still a great offense. This is still an elite offense, for my money. It’s still the best offense in the NFL. But did they have their best day on Sunday? Of course not. We talked about this. I mean, for all of the hand wringing in Cleveland about Deshaun Watson and their offensive line and the transition from Kevin Stefanski offense to Ken Dorsey’s and the fact that Stefanski was still calling plays and it was kind of square peg, round hole kind of scenario. It was
Nestor Aparicio 02:00
a weird week for them, too. They had all dysfunction going on,
Luke Jones 02:03
no doubt, but, but through all that, I think there was still an acknowledgement that that defense, while underperforming, was certainly very capable. I mean, that was a defense that was neck and neck with the Ravens defense in a variety of statistical categories last season, and had not performed at the same level, but still largely the same defense that it had been a year ago. So I think there was still an acknowledgement there that perhaps the Browns would give them more problems than the Ravens have faced from opposing defenses here in recent weeks. And we’ve talked about this, and I’ve said it somewhat flippantly, but also sincerely, who was going to stop this ravens offense? And let’s be clear, as much as they struggled, they still scored 24 points on Sunday, and Justin Tucker missed a 50 yard field goal, and they had dropped passes. And I mean, for me, really, I go back and look at they were bad on third down. And I said this to you recently. You know, this is a point I’ve made on a lot of occasions, and I cited this in my 12 ravens thoughts going into Sunday’s game, the Ravens had been excellent on third down offensively, I think they were second in the league going into Sunday’s game, entering week eight at 50% but you also look and see that they were near the bottom in terms of third down opportunities. And why is what I tell you, the best offenses avoid third down altogether. They didn’t do that on Sunday. And worse than that, they did not find themselves in very many third and manageables. When you go and look, I mean, they were two for 10 on third down, I’ll just give you the yardage to go on those third downs. Nestor five, okay, that’s not outrageous. 21 not getting that very often. Third and 9/3, and 14/3, and 5/3, and six followed third and one and Lamar Jackson and Isaiah likely, you know, pulled out their magician hats to bail out Todd monkin, after that third and one call that ended up resulting in a false start with the Kohler play, then they did convert a third and 11 and then third and eight, nope, third and 14, the Bateman drop, third and 10/3. And long is not where you want to be in any offense. You know, put aside the ravens and Lamar is a pocket passer, and this this offensive line in true pass sets. You don’t want to be in third and long. Most offenses are going to really struggle if you’re in third and long week by week, even the best offenses are going to struggle. So
Nestor Aparicio 04:33
by the way, my first tweet of the day on Sunday was second and one, written out SC 01, second and one because the first run of the game they were in second and one bats. That’s magic for them. Third, anything’s not good. Third not manageable. Really puts a different stress on their offense, because it turns them into a passing offense
Luke Jones 04:54
well. And think about that first drive they did not get into third down. Until they were at third and five from the Cleveland 11. You know, they had gone first down, second down moved the chains, first down, second down moved the chains, first down, second down moved I mean, that’s when this offense, or any offense, again, this isn’t something that’s unique to the Ravens. Be be good on third down. Yes, but avoid third down is the formula for any offense, whether you throw the ball, whether you were on the ball. I mean, that’s what you’re good on first and second down, enough to work. Enough to worry about third down exactly, exactly. It’s not, it’s kind of a no duh statement. But go, look at how many teams find themselves in third down constantly. And I’ll tell you that’s an offense that probably might, might even be good, but isn’t going to be elite, because it’s just really difficult to do that. I mean, that’s, that’s that’s one thing you’d probably point out about Kansas City this year, amidst the fact that they’re undefeated, we know that their defense has done the heavy lifting, and okay, they scored some points Sunday, but they find they have found themselves in a lot of third down scenarios. And even for Patrick mahomes, that’s not what you want so, but they just, they didn’t do well in early downs. And really, we, of course, can talk about the drops and Bateman had, you know, a couple of them, and they certainly did not, you know, they squandered some opportunities. There’s no question about that. We can get into getting way too cute on the play calls of, I don’t know why you ever, ever, and I like creativity, and I even like creativity on short yardage. I don’t know why you ever, ever want to take Lamar Jackson out of the out of the equation in a third or fourth and one scenario at that, just that makes zero sense to me. You’re talking about the greatest running quarterback in NFL history. And you know you want to split them out and do a direct snap to Derek Henry, or you want to have them back there doing nothing in the tush push kind of scenario that they did with Kohler. I mean, that’s overthinking things, but they’re offensive line is that area Smith and Miles Garrett were credited with a combined 20 pressures by pro football focus. You know, Ronnie Stanley had been great, but he had issues. Roger Rosengarten absolutely had issues on Sunday, so their offensive line didn’t play well. So I mean, it was absolutely a down performance for the lofty standard that we’ve seen for this offense. And again, you can’t keep expecting to score 30 plus every single week without having some hiccups here or there, so I wasn’t shocked by that, and that’s why I still put way more of Sunday’s loss on the defense than anything else, even with the injuries, because, again, you were facing a guy who hadn’t started the game in two years. But that doesn’t mean this offense is absolved. They they weren’t good enough. And you know, even Lamar Jackson, who I thought played well in the second half and was let down. Lamar threw some very interceptable passes in that first half. I mean, he wasn’t, he wasn’t as sharp as we’ve seen him look at time. So and again, you can’t expect him to be perfect every week. He’s still right there as an MVP favorite at this point in time, in my opinion, for what that’s worth, through eight weeks. I mean, we got a long way to go one way or the other. So, but, but that said, this definitely wasn’t the best performance from this offense. And as much as I think Todd monkin has done a fantastic job with this group, they still mix in. You know, last week, it was the lateral play, you know, that was, and obviously they didn’t execute it, but that was just a strange time to run that anyway, and that’s how I thought about this. I didn’t mind them going for fourth and one on the opening drive. I really didn’t. I do mind the play call, though. I don’t take Lamar Jackson out of that equation. You can hand it to Derek Henry, but Lamar should still be
Nestor Aparicio 08:37
what is Charlie Kohler doing? And Lamar was like, set back as a half, right?
Luke Jones 08:41
I mean, yeah. I mean, he was in, you know, he was kind of, like, what you would call that the personal protector when you’re in victory formation, right? I
Nestor Aparicio 08:48
mean, she’s the idea that, are they going to pitch the ball back to him? What are they going to do? No, what was the play? I mean, what was the play? That was just the tush push.
Luke Jones 08:55
I mean, it’s, it’s what Philly does. But I
Nestor Aparicio 08:58
just, you’re going to tush push with 10 guys instead of 11? Well, you’re gonna have Lamar pushing guys.
Luke Jones 09:06
Probably not okay, but that’s the that’s the structure of the play, though, is what I’m saying. But why? Why you have Derek Henry, you have Lamar Jackson, who can do an over a variety of things on fourth and one, I just or third and one, I just a coach would call that you’re getting too cute after is what it absolutely was. It absolutely was in both instances. So again, I don’t mind a direct snap to Derek Henry, if it’s second and goal from the two. But because you’ve you still have outs at that point, I do mind it when you just take Lamar, you remove Lamar from the equation on a play like that, I just, I don’t like that.
Nestor Aparicio 09:44
Can I story tell here? Because I want to do one by storytelling. Because, to be really honest with you, I don’t equate Jim Schwartz with the with the with the browns. You know what I mean when the like, I don’t know that. I thought about Jim a whole lot during the week. I did, but I didn’t. And and then on I wrote my little solo on Sunday morning, and then I saw him all silver haired Fox on the sidelines. And I’m probably closer through my lifetime with Jim than I am with anyone else I ever mentioned here, Marvin, Brian. I mean, I’ve stayed in Jim’s home multiple times. We’re friends. We haven’t connected as much since he was in Detroit. He’s not around as much. His kids are grown. He’s wife’s in Nashville, like all of that kind of I mean, they’re Baltimore people, right back when the Titans beat Anthony Wright in the playoff game that off season, I flew to Nashville, and Schwartz picked me up at the airport and took me over to the Allers facility, the cafeteria in Tennessee stole was all Oilers memorabilia in history, so he wanted me to dine there, at least he told me. And what he really wanted to do was lock me in his office and shut the door and show me the film of the game he made me re watch it, probably, I don’t know, 810, weeks after that. It’s probably like in May, April or May, that this happened, and I sat in there for three hours trapped in his room watching how he bottlenecked Anthony Wright in that game. That seems easy, right? And so much what he talked about. And, dude, we’re how when was that? Oh 504,
Luke Jones 11:23
playoff game that was 0303
Nestor Aparicio 11:26
so we’re talking with three season, 21 years ago. Since then, he’s done nothing but Coach, 21 years in the league at the highest levels, running the lions. He went back and he ran the bills for a minute, then he ran the Titans above he was off the field, but involved. And then he went to Philadelphia, won championships, and right. So he’s been everywhere. He’s prepared for Lamar a couple of times now, right in Cleveland, with the personnel. What was his game plan? Because when I saw him there, very, very obvious to me. And Solomon Wilcox talked at length about this three weeks ago when he was here on the show about how you rush Lamar and how you don’t rush Lamar. And what everybody knows is contained. Keep him in the pocket. Keep him in the pocket, keeping Don’t let him get out. Don’t let him get out closed. And the one time late in the game, Cleveland over pursuit in the end zone, around the backside, and gave Lamar the lane in the middle, and Lamar gladly took it. That’s what’s going to give Jimmy a coronary when that happens, and they won the game. But I think of him as a genius, because I’ve known him since I was 27 and he was 28 and he used to be the quiet kid in the corner with a with a bag lunch with me and Marvin in 1996 97 watching Ike booth play to his knees and Stefan Moore. Steven Moore, it was not Stefan, that’s what Tom Mattie called him Steve on Moore. Um, Donnie Brady, I’m just thinking of the guys on those teams, right? Tim goad, you know, providing the rush, and Schwartz has come so far in how to stop this. And when we talk about these NFC teams, players not seeing it, 22 and one against the NFC, I don’t think we take into account how many times Mike Tomlin has seen it now, even Zach Taylor’s people in Cincinnati, and for Schwartz specifically, being the dean of all of this. I mean, all he’s ever done is called defenses for 25 years. I mean, going back to imer dinger and and Jeff Fisher and the, you know, home run throwback, for crying out loud, right? We’re talking last century. Schwartz is really good. And if you give him miles, Garrett, and you give him pieces, you give him to dairy Smith, give him a real pass rush, guys that know what they’re doing a little bit, the defense won the game. I mean, he’s their defense won the game because they figured out how to slow down Lamar, and they really figured out that Derek Henry, that first run around the end that put them in field goal position, and they still squandered it. I mean, you mentioned first down, second down, first Well, that’s how you stay in first down. You give the ball to Derek every runs 45 yards, right? That all disappeared. And I want to tip my cap to my friend Jim Schwartz and his defense, which is still one and 16 quarterbacks, hurt. Fans cheering it. Skies falling. They’re in Berea. World’s against them. Best quarterback on earth come into town, best running back going to the Hall of Fame. Everybody’s bringing them flowers. They got zay flowers. And I want to tip my cap to Jim Schwartz if I’m writing from the Cleveland side. If I’m writing in the cleveland.com and I’m Mary Kay Cabot, I’m in there talking to Schwartz, saying, What is it about being able to stop Lamar or slow it down a little bit to get it to 24 points to give Jameis Winston a chance to win a game for you, Jimmy, you got Jameis Winston on your side. Jimmy would. Love to prepare for Jameis Winston, because you almost want him to throw the ball, because he throws it enough, he’ll throw it to you, then you got to catch it. Kyle, yeah.
Luke Jones 15:07
I mean, he’d probably tell you while the Ravens defense stinks, I mean, in all honest, I mean, I hear what you’re saying, and look, they did a nice job at the same time, but they’ve
Nestor Aparicio 15:15
seen it before, though, is what I’m saying. They’ve seen it plenty of time, sure, and that’s a real factor that Tampa doesn’t have going for it once, once they see the speed, and they don’t know how to they don’t, they don’t know what to do with it. I mean, but you still
Luke Jones 15:28
have to be able to play. I mean, Cincinnati’s seen a plenty in The Raven scored 41 points a couple weeks ago against them, so I but I Well, Cleveland, Cleveland’s two and six, and that defense has underperformed this year. You know, it’s still good, and they’re still capable of playing well, you know. And they lost one of their best job. But again, I, you know, I didn’t think they did anything. I think their their pass rush was too much for the Ravens offensive line to handle. I think their pass rush, really, and I do, I would agree. I think for the most part, they did a nice job of not letting Lamar leak out, you know. Because, you know, we’ve also seen times where Lamar can scramble for 100 yards because, so they did a nice job in that way. Do I think they did anything so impressive that they, you know, stopped them? Well, Justin Tucker makes a field goal in the Ravens convert fourth and one on the opening drive. They’re, they’re over 30 points. So we’re not talking about Cleveland’s defense doing that good of a job. So they, at times, and I will, I’ll wholeheartedly agree, they did a really nice job on Derrick Henry. I mean, he had what, 11 carries for 73 yards. Over half of that came on one carry, the other 10 carries, 34 yards. I mean, that’s why Derrick Henry really didn’t get going in the way that you’d like the way that he’s been able to in these games, because they didn’t have a lead, right? I mean, I’d say this, if I’m going to compliment Cleveland’s defense, I’ll compliment them way more for how they performed in the first half, because, let’s face it, I mean, the Ravens were in a position where they were going to go in trailing. And it was very much, you know, they had, they had one field goal to their name. They were going to go into the game trailing six to three before Kyle Hamilton strip sack, put them on a short field. So, and when you think about how the Ravens have played all year, and this goes back to even talking about the defense, their formula for winning has been scoring a bunch of points and then holding on tight on defense late in the game, because they can’t stop anyone late in the game. Date, they scored 10 points in the first half, and they’re, they’re, you know, Cleveland’s defense, basically or not, Cleveland’s defense. Ravens defense gifted them that touch. As much as we complain about the defense, Kyle Hamilton made a huge play in that spot. Weird was dumb play calling on Cleveland’s part, third and long. I don’t know why you’re doing with that, with Jameis Winston that late in the first half, just run the draw, run run something underneath and pump the ball. I mean, really, they kind of lost their mind there, but, but, yeah, the Cleveland defense specifically, in that first half, they did a nice job. I mean, they really did, but at the same time, penalties drops weird play calls in certain spots. I mean, just like we’ve talked about with the defense, you know, the offense self inflicted mistakes there. And again, the offensive line, as much as we’ve been singing their praises, they had their issues on Sunday. There’s no question about that. And look, miles, Garrett and zadarius Smith are, you know, especially in the case of Garrett, I mean, you’re talking about someone who’s going to be in the Hall of Fame. You know, that’s not shocking that that happened, but it’s all the more reason. Going back to my original point about them not being good in early downs, setting up third and long. I mean, those guys can just tee off on your offensive line then. And as we’ve talked about, this offensive line and most offensive lines out there, when you put them in third and long, your offensive line is going to have a tough time, right? Because they need to pass protect longer, because you need to run routes that are further downfield. You need to give your quarterback time, yeah? And even if it’s not a drop, and you’re, you know, you’re just from the shotgun, it’s going to take more time to develop, you know. But if you only need three yards, that’s a quick route, right? Or that’s a run, but on third and long, you need more time for your routes to develop, and the defense knows you’re throwing the ball in those scenarios. So it does become more more difficult, and you can’t use play action in that same spot that you can on third and three. So yeah. I mean, they did. They did a good job. It wasn’t elite defense. And again, the Ravens still scored 24 points and left mean on the bone. So it’s not as though they shut them down, but considering the way this offense had been firing on all cylinders here in recent weeks. Yeah, give Cleveland credit. And as we alluded to before the game, this is still a talented Browns defense. And to your point, you know, they lost Denzel ward. They lost J Okay, you know when he strapped to the backboard and carted off. So they lost some elite defenders over the course of that game. And you. Know they still did enough, even though, I again, they were better in the first half than they were the second half that that put them in a position to give their offense a chance to do what they did. And certainly their offense did it against this Horace ravens defense.
Nestor Aparicio 20:14
Well, J Okay, was kind of wrecking them before he got injured in that way, and in listening to the Post game show, which I did on 98 rock you know, the callers were, why didn’t? Why did Derek camery run the ball more, you know what? And I’m thinking, when you look back at it, you say that, and you say, well, they weren’t running the ball well, but that RPO and the stretch and the sleight of hand and linebackers hips, they had it going early in the game, as you saw with Henry has the big run. Then they just kind of stopped feeding the ball a little bit. And you say, well, they’re playing from behind, but it wasn’t as such that three point game, six point, you know, wherever it was early in the third quarter, you still want to play it straight and still play it your best way. I still think they’re gonna be better running the ball than they are passing the ball in general, though you continue to give me the Lamar as a passer thing, and that’s fine, but I don’t think that’s what they what they want, but that’s not what they want to do. They want to
Luke Jones 21:14
be multiple. They want to be multiple. No, it’s not. They want to be
Nestor Aparicio 21:17
when they can’t disagree, then they have to do it the other way, and when and when they don’t run the ball, it’s either don’t or can’t, right? Like in the Kansas City playoff game last year, they didn’t, they didn’t try. I they sort of abandon, is the word. They abandon the run. That’s what, that’s the sports guy word. But in the framework of a game that’s tighter. You’re down 14 points, I think you need to be a little bit more quick strike. But when you’re in a game like that, on the road, in a slog, you just need to get to the sticks. You need to control the ball a little bit. And they couldn’t do that, you know? They couldn’t do that on the ground, or they didn’t believe they were going to do that on the ground and thought it was better, more prudent, to do it in the air,
Luke Jones 22:02
yeah, but, but they are there. But you can also go back and look, and you can find some examples where they ran the ball on first down and they got a yard, right? You know? I mean, it just they weren’t good enough passing or throwing the ball. They weren’t good enough in early down situations. And when you put yourself in third and long, you’re predictable, and you put more pressure on an offensive line that has played admirably well. We know it’s a young, inexperienced offensive line, right? And part of you know, we’ve talked about this, the Lamar effect, the Derrick Henry effect, that that does a lot, that goes such a long way. And again, even with them not playing well on Sunday, you know, their offense collectively, they still scored 24 points against the defense that’s really talented, so it speaks to what the group is overall. But it also does speak to when you don’t do as well in those spots, then yeah, it can put you in some third and not so manageable, which again, does not work well for any team. Kansas City doesn’t want to be in third and long and and look at some of their games this year. It’s why they’re winning on the on the back of their defense, you know, they’re eight. No, they’re not eight. No, because of Patrick mahomes and their offense, they’re, you know, they’re in that position, or seven, and, oh, because of their defense, you know, largely so, you know, it’s just they, they it wasn’t as clean and efficient as we’ve seen it be in recent weeks. And yeah, I agree with you. Credit Jim Schwartz and that Brown’s defense for having a big hand in that. That said, You still look at some of the the what was left on the field with some drop and some bad spots Justin Tucker. I mean, I don’t, I still don’t really know what that was. I mean, I guess the wind was really challenging on those but still just looked odd. So, you know, their offense didn’t play at the same level, but that’s, I’ll continue to go back to, at some point in time, their offense was going to come back to earth a little bit. And that doesn’t mean that they won’t hang 40 on Denver this week. You know? I mean, they’re, they’re capable of doing that against anyone. You know, I really, truly believe that about the offense, the defense at this point, I don’t, I don’t know, at this point, I don’t know what to think, right, in terms of where the improvements coming or where the ceiling is, because it’s just happening on a weekly basis, over and over and over, right? That’s their identity, the offensive, the offensive identity. They deviated from that on Sunday in terms of just not being as efficient, not being as clean and productive. On first down, their offensive line didn’t play as well. Still got, still penalties. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I mean, you have some of that, and again, you’re going to have some of that over the course of the year. But that’s why I said, even in a game where the offense didn’t play well, they still scored 24 and that’s where I look at the defense and say, I get it, you were banged up, but you know you weren’t going up against Patrick mahomes there or Joe burrow. I mean, you got to do better than they did against Jameis Winston and that offense that has been awful all year, so, but yeah, this was every phase of the game let down at. Some point in time, over the course of 60 minutes on Sunday. I mean, this was not one person, this was not one phase of the game. They all had a hand in it, right? It’s never just one person. It’s never just one thing. It’s collective. Good teams recognize that. Good teams understand that. That’s why you don’t throw each other other under the bus, because you know that at some point in time, yeah, you’re going to have a game that doesn’t go quite as well. So you know my frustration and and fans venting about the defense, it’s because that’s happening every single week at this point, what we saw from the offense on Sunday, again, disappointing, but it that, if that’s their quote, bad game, they’re still going to win way more than they lose, right? So that’s where I do look at the offense. And I’m I’m not nearly as concerned by what I saw on Sunday, in terms of what it means going forward for this ravens offense. Lou
Nestor Aparicio 25:57
Jones is here. He is Baltimore, Luke. He is powered up by our friends at Jiffy Lube MultiCare. We’re getting powered up by our friends at the Maryland lottery as well, getting the Maryland crab cake door back at alert, just last thing on the offense. Because I, you know, I mark Andrews and the tight end situation, whether it’s Kohler out there taking snaps or catching passes, we see Patrick Ricard running around catching passes, and then Isaiah likely, who has had really two seasons of effectiveness as a number two, while Andrews has been sort of lessened in all of this, flowers has emerged. Bateman’s a real threat when he catches the ball right? Aguilar, you know, they target him. We’ve seen tylen Wallace catch some balls. But the tight ends as a collective and what they’re trying to do, what monkin really would like to do with this when they are in third and six, when they are in third and eight, maybe on a first down plates that are running the ball, which still, to me, Lamar running, or Derek Henry running, is still your best play. Lamar running still the best play, the play that has the most potential in the offense, but Andrews and the sort of it spots and sputters at this point, right? Like, I forget he’s on the team sometimes, and then he catches a touchdown pass, and I’m like, and I still think, Well, is he still hurt? Why don’t we see more of him? Because he was such a featured part of this thing when Lamar was building the reputation of Lamar in 1920 21 during the plague, all of that, I don’t know. Maybe it’s a 30 year old tight end at this point. Maybe it’s the fact that they want likely to be 30 40% of it and not have Andrews be 90% of it the way he was before. Maybe it’s the fact that they do have a running game that they really haven’t had since Mark Ingram, that they could count on. That to your point, all world offense, greatest offense ever. If I bring Aaron Schatz on, he’ll dva Amy to death and like pro football, focus me on this. If they could just get the offensive line together. They’re a road they’re scoring 40 points a game and all that. I’m still, just still trying to figure out the tight ends and figure out where we are with Mark Andrews, because I still think he catches six balls for 98 yards and two touchdowns. So on Super Bowl Sunday, if they’re going to win
Luke Jones 28:15
it, yeah, I mean, I think it’s, I just think it’s, they’re not playing fantasy football, right? I mean, they’re, they’re not going into a game saying, Oh, Mark Andrews must get this many targets, and we want them to get this many yards and all that. I think, early in the season that, I think there was a fair theory, if not just, you know, just looking at it, you know, in some kind of subjective way that, you know, he, you know, my sense, even before he had the car accident in mid August, was that he was a little banged up, you know, I kind of had gathered that. And, you know, the same thing had kind of happened the year before that. It was just late training camp kind of stuff. So that, coupled with the car accident, which you know, wasn’t significant in terms of, like his life being in you know that he was in peril. But anyone who’s been in a car accident, there’s no such thing as a minor car accident, right? You still feel banged up and not great for a little while. I mean, that’s typically how it works, whether you have whiplash or whatever. So I think there was some of that going on, and I also think there was some of trying to feel out the best way to mesh Derek Henry into this operation, knowing he’s always been better with a quarterback under center, knowing the ravens and Lamar have always been better with, you know, playing out a shotgun or pistol. So, so I think there was just a feeling out the first couple weeks and and Andrews kind of got lost in the shuffle there. You know, he for as much as he was in absentee in September. Go look at his numbers in the month of October, they’ve looked much more Mark Andrews like so, you know, I thought it was interesting at the end of the game, you know, here in the broadcast team and Ross Tucker, and they were kind of opining what you do on third and fourth and 10 from the 24 yard line. And they made many. Question to mark Andrews. And my only thought with that was, you know, they probably needed to be at about the 15 yard line to really make Mark. Mark Andrews the most viable option there, they were a little too far out. So I had no problem with Lamar going to zay flowers in those spots. I mean, it’s just, hey, it’s low percentage when you need 24 yards in one play. I mean, that’s just, so it’s reality. You know, for every time Jaden Daniels completes a Hail Mary, how many Hail Marys fall by the wayside, you know, even from much shorter distances. So, so that wasn’t shocking, but, but, but when you look at it collectively, I mean, their tight ends were targeted a total of 11 times. They caught 10 passes for it was 92 yards. I think it was so okay. Wasn’t as much pushing it down the field, but still very efficient. So I just think it’s a case of maybe Andrews is a little bit older, and you know that that ankle injury was bad last year. I mean, you don’t always come back and you’re 100% of what you were. You can be healthy enough to play, but sometimes it takes a while to you till you really get back athletically to that point. You know, we talk about that a lot with ACL and Achilles injuries, with speed, you know, skill position players, so there’s some of that. And yeah, you want to get Isaiah, likely the ball. And yeah, in the case of Charlie Kohler, it’s not that you’re targeting him in traditional pass sets, but when they’re running that 22 personnel and he’s on the field as a blocking tight end. You want to do some of that going against tendencies to throw, because that just the defense and even more conflict, knowing that, okay, even when Charlie Kohler and Patrick Ricard are the blocking tight ends and the Ravens gonna run the ball more often than not, they can still throw play action in that spot. That’s why, you know, I liked how they really how they started this game. First two plays, Charlie Kohler and Justice Hill. I mean, it speaks to they just want to, they want to spread the ball around. Again. This is not about fantasy football, and that’s frustrating for anyone who has Mark Andrews as their tight end or or at times, a flowers is one of their wide receivers in fantasy football. Because you just know, even though Zay, over the last four or five games, has very clearly emerged as their top target guy. You know, there still are going to be some stray games where that doesn’t happen. I mean, last week, he turns his ankle early in the game and wasn’t much of a factor, even though he still continued to play. So they just want to spread the ball around, and that’s why I pushed back to you when you know, when you talk about how much they want to run, yes, they want to run, but you know what so much of that is, and Derek Henry go look at the at the splits. So much of that still comes down to having a lead in the third and fourth quarter, and then you just lean into that like crazy. So you still have to get to a point where you build to that. And the problem Sunday was because they did not do well on third down, and that was the result of not doing enough on first and second down to get to either avoid third down or be in third and short. That didn’t allow them to fully lean into what that what really has been the difference. And we’ve talked about this in recent weeks. Derek Henry, go look at his numbers at halftime in some of these recent games. Go look at his numbers through three quarters in some of these recent games, he’s he’s gone up to 150 200 yards, largely the Buffalo game kind of being the the exception to that. It’s largely been what he’s done late in games. And they just, they didn’t build that kind of lead to to lean into that. So they’re a much more balanced football team overall. They were that way last year too. You know, I one thing that I kept telling people over and over and over about that AFC Championship Game was go back and look at their pass run split for early down situations when the game was close throughout the season. They were one of the past heaviest teams in the league in that specific instance. And the the only difference was against Kansas City was they never built a lead, so they didn’t get to a point where they got to their running game to that degree. So we can always nitpick plays or here or there, or say they should have run in this spot and they shouldn’t have thrown in this spot. Oh, here that you could second guess every single team and find, I don’t know, probably 10 different play calls over the course of a 60 minute game and do that, and that’s fine, you know, as we said, I absolutely thought they got way too cute with the fourth and one play and then the Charlie Kohler sneak that resulted in a false start. So we can always talk about that. But collectively, you know, their shortcomings to me on Sunday, their offensive line wasn’t good enough. And you know, they really gave up a lot of pressure, and they just, they weren’t as good on first and second down as we’ve seen them be. That they just, they found themselves in a lot of third downs that weren’t so manageable. And yeah, even some instances where they had a chance to convert, they didn’t catch the football. So it all adds up. You know, again, it wasn’t just one thing, but, yeah, it was a down performance for this offense. But, you know, at some point in time, the streak of 500 plus yards and 30 plus points, I mean, they were going to come back to Earth. At some point in time, I was hoping their defense could rise to the occasion a. Little bit more than they did on Sunday. But, you know, I guess that was too much to ask against Jameis Winston and this Brown’s offense that hadn’t scored against anyone all year.
Nestor Aparicio 35:08
So much for the Power Rankings last week. You know, I mean, you go from the penthouse to the powerhouse really quickly when you go to Cleveland and lay a turn, uh, ravens plaguing, uh, playing the Broncos this week, Luke will be out knowing smells all week, all the powered up by our friends at Jiffy Lube multi care. We’ll have the Maryland lottery scratch Austin, the ravens to give away when we power up the crab cake tour. I have a whole schedule I’ll be putting out by the end of the week through the holidays. I got some dates set at Cocos. We’re going to be at Gertrude, at the BMA with Dan Rodricks for the holidays. Set up my Costas holiday show. We’re going to be there Christmas week so I can invite some friends by and have some proper crab cakes for the holidays. So we’re going to have crabs for Christmas, is what we’re going to do. And have some crab cakes as well. I am Nestor. He is Luke. We got the oyster tour in progress. All of that brought to you by friends at curio wellness and foreign daughter, as well as liberty, pure solutions. One 800 clean water is the way to to do that. And if you can find all of our work out of Baltimore, positive, Luke’s going to be writing all week. We’re watching the World Series as well. Had some great guests. Had a really cool show on Friday at mama’s on the half shell with Finn McCusker. Did a lot of talk about Scotty McCusker, who was the original Nacho Mama’s guy. This is his son. They opened this new location. It’s beautiful that Mama’s at the half shot, blown away by how beautiful it’s like date night, beautiful out knowings mills. So that was on Friday, and my buddy Howard chair stopped by, and we sang the clippers and the skip Jack’s fight song, same song, and we honor Jeff amder, and actually brought out my skip Jack’s pennant clock that I bought for 30 bucks on the avenue in Hamden. So we had a little show and tell. Did some skip Jack’s talk as well. We got plenty of baseball here in the off season. We’re doing all sorts of stuff. It is a political week. Pam wood from the the Baltimore banners going to join us. Josh Kurtz is going to join us. We’re going to talk about the Senate race. We’re going to talk about the presidential election. We’re talking about a lot of things around here, in addition to anything to get me away from talking about the Ravens laying a turd in Cleveland, it’s fine for me. I’m Nestor. He’s Luke. We’re going to come back to come back do some more football. We are wnst. Am 1570 Towson, Baltimore, and we never stop talking Baltimore positive, even during the negative week. You.
Browns limit Lamar and King Henry to frustration in Cleveland
Baltimore Positive
Baltimore Positive is the vision and the creative extension of four decades of sharing the love of local sports for this Dundalk native and University of Baltimore grad, who began his career as a sportswriter and music critic at The News American and The Baltimore Sun in the mid 1980s. Launched radio career in December 1991 with Kenny Albert after covering the AHL Skipjacks. Bought WNST-AM 1570 in July 1998, created WNST.net in 2007 and began diversifying conversations on radio, podcast and social media as Baltimore Positive in 2016. nes@baltimorepositive.com
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