When the defense is 32nd against the pass, it can’t get any worse. But, as Luke Jones and Nestor Aparicio point out, the Ravens heading to Los Angeles to battle the Chargers comes amidst a strange holiday schedule with lots of time off and short rest weeks en route to January as John Harbaugh tries to beat Jim Harbaugh one more.
Nestor Aparicio and Luke Jones discussed the Baltimore Ravens’ upcoming game against the Los Angeles Chargers, emphasizing the importance of a strong defensive performance, particularly after a subpar outing against the Pittsburgh Steelers. They highlighted the need for Lamar Jackson and the offense to rebound, noting the Chargers’ improved offense led by Justin Herbert. Concerns about the Ravens’ short rest schedule and the potential impact of injuries, especially to Roquan Smith, were raised. They also touched on the importance of Justin Tucker’s performance, given his recent misses, and the need for consistent kicking to avoid further setbacks.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
Ravens road ahead, Chargers game, Lamar Jackson, defense progress, Roquan Smith, Justin Herbert, Monday night football, AFC North, short week, injury concerns, kicker issues, Thanksgiving week, crab cake tour, Baltimore positive, Ravens schedule
SPEAKERS
Luke Jones, Nestor Aparicio
Nestor Aparicio 00:01
Welcome home. We are W, N, S, T, am 1570 Towson, Baltimore. We are Baltimore positive. Set a spot on your dial. Make sure you’re subscribing, clicking on me doing all that fun stuff. We had a great, great merrily crab cake tour stop at one of my favorite places. It’s one of Luke’s favorite places as well, because I have lots of pictures of both of us together there with Steve Smith and CJ Mosley and Marshall yonder Zach or just went down the list, Pat Ricard, all sorts of fun stuff we did at Green Mountain station on Thursday, I reunited with the first person who ever did Luke’s job, which was being a Ravens reporter out at training camp in 1998 handing cell phones to rob Woodson and and Ray Lewis. It’s all brought to you by our friends at the Maryland lottery. We get together and do these crab gate tours and these crabcake tours. And I just released a holiday schedule. It does not have Mariah Carey music under it. I would go for a Burl Ives, especially after the snow globe game on Thursday night out in Cleveland. Also our friends at Jiffy Lube multi care I got my little ding ding thing 10 bucks. Get the off the oil change thing. It’s time. My little orange lights on Jiffy Lube. Always around the corner, always doing it right, and always local and power and Luke up, back and forth, not just to Pittsburgh last week. Weird week, dude, right? Hardball versus hardball franchise here is a little wobbly right now, just a little bit. I mean, they still got the quarterback. They got health for the most part, we’ll talk about roquan, but extra day and a half, they’re going out to Hollywood early that could get Chris McAllister in trouble back in the day, I was on that trip, um, and I seven and five on Tuesday morning. Short week eagles. Whoo, but flying 3000 miles and going to beat your brother out there when things aren’t going great here and like, Man, this is, this is a Monday night football game. Lucas Jones, yeah.
Luke Jones 01:48
Well, we know it’s a Monday night football game, but plenty on the line, certainly an opportunity to close the gap in the AFC north with Pittsburgh having lost in Cleveland. A reminder there that it’s a FC North football, and it’s one reason why most of my frustration as I looked at what happened last Sunday in Pittsburgh was not really the the implications of the standings. I didn’t think the Pittsburgh Steelers were going to run the table. I wasn’t saying I was necessarily expecting a loss for them on Thursday night, but I don’t think they’re that kind of team that was going to run the table or win all but one game the rest of the way. So for me, it was much more the big picture of the Ravens losing the Pittsburgh again, rather than what it meant in the standings in the here and now. But to your point, you need to go out to Los Angeles and take care of business on Monday night. This is a chargers team that is playing much, much, much better football as the year goes on. Their offense is playing at a higher level. Justin Herbert has been red hot here in recent weeks. We know they under new management. They are under new management, as Patrick Picard caught it earlier this week. It’s like the LA Ravens. You know, we’ve been talking about that storyline going back to what January, I guess, February. So certainly a lot of familiarity to your point, the horrible, you know, Jim versus John, which I think is a story that there’s more interest outside of Baltimore than locally, just because we’ve lived that before on a much bigger stage than Monday Night Football, but certainly there’s interest there, but the urgency is there. I think I’m working on this right now. As you and I speak at Baltimore positive.com Lamar Jackson and this offense have earned the benefit of the doubt to expect them to rebound, to bounce back after an off day in Pittsburgh, right? I think we all feel that way. The numbers don’t lie, right? You don’t just throw all that away because of one performance against the Steelers for the defense, which was the silver lining, the bright spot in Pittsburgh on Sunday. I’m much more of the thought of show me that again. Show me the progress that you made against the Steelers defensively. Do that again, because Kyle Hamilton was the first one who mentioned this, you think back to what the Ravens did in week four that Sunday night game against Josh Allen and the bills, where they just dominated. That had been their best defensive Performance of the Year. What did they follow that up with? They went to Cincinnati and gave up a season high for points the next week. So I think there very much is a sense of, okay, maybe they’ve figured out some things on the back end of the defense and some shuffling. There are Darius Washington, starting now, Kyle Hamilton playing off the ball a little more frequently this past Sunday than what we’re accustomed to seeing, out of necessity, because safety has been such a problem for them. But if you go out to LA on Monday night and the Chargers score 30 plus on you. What did that Pittsburgh outing really show? Right? What did that really prove? So I think for me, all eyes are really on the defense. In terms of this team making progress, I expect Lamar, and even if Lamar and the offense don’t light up the scoreboard. Necessarily, because the Chargers have a good defense as well. I’m still very confident in that group in a big picture sense. But for the defense, I want to see it again. It was encouraging. Hey, you held Russell Wilson and the Steelers to no touchdowns, right? I mean, they, they obviously gave the Ravens a chance to win on a day where the offense was really off. But I need to see some stacking of some consistent, consistent performances here, and it’ll be a good test. Because, like I said, this chargers offense, which earlier in the year, was kind of struggling to find its way. It kind of looked, you know, the the scale version of a Greg Roman offense. You know, running the ball somewhat well, but not doing a whole lot else. They’ve really come on here these last few weeks. And like I said, Justin Herbert is playing at a high level, so ravens defense, the back end of that defense, is certainly going to get a test on Monday
Nestor Aparicio 05:52
night Lucas. Here, you can follow him out at Baltimore Luca all weekend and into Monday Night Football. And we’re serving up a whole bunch of music classic so if your timeline is getting hit on that, you know, click on the Billy Joel thing or go listen to the black crows thing. I actually heard the black crows thing in the car the other day, and I almost, I almost want to get under the dashboard myself. It’s some of it’s a little awkward, but sort of cool to have it 40 years later. But so the Rock and Roll stuff is out. We obviously, we’ve talked a lot of baseball around Marty Conway joined us our friends at COP and we talked a lot about leadership this week, and we did our crab cake tour. We’re doing a whole holiday thing, but for the ravens, and I think for for NFL teams, and let’s big picture this for one minute. You hate Thursday night football. I hate Thursday night football, and that’s because we know football players, and we’ve been in that locker room on Wednesday to see what they look like on Wednesday after Sunday and no, and you’ve been doing it 15 years. I did it for 27 years, like it’s just, if there were anyone medical or not being countery, or even just talking to coaches or doctors or football player, anyone, they would tell you, this is a horrible idea, right? Like Baldinger told me 30 years ago, fruit fly every seven days. We play seven days. That’s what the body needs. That’s like, just where it’s at, right? Like, race horses, they every, every spring, I get Dick Gerardi. He’s like, Yeah, they used to run the rate, the horses every two weeks, and they started killing them. Now, the horses that are worth 10 million they only run them every four weeks, and that’s why the Preakness gets screwed, right? Because these people are judging animals and realizing it’s a bad idea, and these are humans, and we see Thursday night for the preparation for the sloper, and then the snow comes, and then Pittsburgh’s vulnerable in the road, and everybody should have bet on Cleveland, and I’m an idiot, and I would have made a fortune so, but I’m not a rambling gambling man. The Ravens now are going to be short rest this week. This is the weird part. I looked at their schedule for you and me, like, hey, when’s Luke and I going to work Christmas and how are you? They play Christmas night. We we’re gonna, we’re gonna 26 in the morning Saturday night games. They play Pittsburgh Saturday night on a holiday weekend. And like, they are their timing and their calendars are going to be not normal any of the rest of the way playing what was Wednesday night football a couple of years ago, which is Wednesday night football again this year, after Saturday night football. Like, I’m concerned about that part of it. And if I were out there asking John and John MCCA fall and I get some dumb answer on the podium, but like, I think behind the scenes, when they see a schedule like this and look up, we’re gonna get back from LA at eight in the morning, you know what I mean, on Tuesday, and have to play the eagles on like and it was mentioned here earlier this week about flexing that game, the Steelers couldn’t flex Sunday because they were already playing Thursday. So they couldn’t even get what they wanted on television, which is Baltimore, Pittsburgh. Baltimore, Pittsburgh and ratings and like all that, because they got to get these games in, um, this scheduling of all of this, for me, is a concern and something that should be talked about, and I’m sure has been talked about a ton in that building, where they’re measuring, you know, every eyelid and how much rest they’re getting, and they’re going out to LA early this weekend. We’ll see how that helps them on Monday night. I’m not convinced they’re the better team on Monday night all the way around, based on the body of work that I think. I don’t want to yell overrated at them, but right now, so far, I mean, they need to do more work, but the rest of this schedule is way more daunting. Even with the off time they have, they have a lot of off time. They have these weird we don’t play and then we’re going to play three times in 11 days, like I, you know, speak to that? Or Is anybody out there speaking to that?
Luke Jones 09:31
Well, I mean, there’s only so much. I mean, they’re not going to just sit there and say, Woe is me, right? And that serves you no purpose as an athlete either, right? I mean, you’re not going to sit there and just moan about it. Probably the time for them to do that was back in May, when the schedule came out, right? I mean, that’s probably when they really did that. But it’s a challenge. There’s no question about it. I think what really helps, and you just alluded to it, is you do have the December 8 buy you have this late buy week that I think is going. To be very beneficial for them. And it’s not because they’re so injured right now, it’s just the wear and tear, right? I mean, these guys have been at it for close to three months now without a week off, and that just takes a toll. So speculated
Nestor Aparicio 10:14
about Lamar three four weeks ago, when he skipping practices, he didn’t look as fast like the most important guy to get a couple, you know, like, give him 10 days off and and you probably do some wonders. Yeah, well, I
Luke Jones 10:26
mean, he’s the headliner, but everyone needs it. I mean, the guys up front protecting Lamar needed the guys that are catching the football from Lamar needed the defensive side of the ball. And we’ve talked about Travis Jones, for example, who’s still on the injury report, playing through this ankle injury that he suffered back in week seven. You know, it’s week 12 now. So we’re talking about someone who’s been dealing with that and playing through that, and missing practices and being limited, and having some games where he’s played a whole lot, and other games where he hasn’t played much. I mean, he’s just played through it. I mean, that’s the reality with so many of these injuries and and I don’t need to tell you Nestor. I mean, as much as we poke fun at the injury report. We also know that of the 53 guys on the roster, there are probably 40 guys who have gotten treatment at some point in the last couple weeks, even if they don’t show up on the injury report. So I think that bye week certainly helps. But yeah, when you look at what’s to come, you know, you mentioned the the Philadelphia Game Six days after the Chargers. Everyone talks about Thursday night, I think if you look at it, and I haven’t seen recent numbers, but I’ve seen numbers in the past when you talk about a Monday night road game and then the turnaround for a Sunday game, that that’s a challenge. I mean, go back to earlier in the year. Now this was different because the Ravens went to Cleveland, but what happened on the on the back end of the game in Tampa for a Monday night, the Ravens lost in Cleveland six days later, right? So we know that that can be a challenge, especially when you’re talking about a cross country flight. So I think the only silver lining about the scheduling for the Eagles game is that it’s at least a 425, late afternoon game. So maybe, you know, you you don’t worry so much about kind of sleepwalking through the beginning of the game, but it’s a challenge. They go to the Giants after the bye week. There’s nothing tricky about that, right? I mean, the Giants just benched Daniel Jones, which may or may not make them better. I don’t even know. I mean, that’s just the state of the giants right now. They’re a mess. So nothing to be concerned about there. But once again, short week Steelers coming to town six days after that game. You know, fair to point out that they’re going to be in the same boat. They’ve done this scheduling deliberately from the standpoint of, you know, these these four teams that are kind of in that pod for Christmas Day. They all play the Saturday before, so it’s not as though they’re going to go up against the Steelers or against the Texans with a disadvantage. Both teams are going to be in the same boat in that way. But it’s tough, especially if you do have some injuries, where you look at it and say, Okay, on a normal week, this guy would be ready to play, but when it’s four days after the previous game, maybe not. So I think it’s a challenge, yeah, but this is also why everyone makes so much money in the NFL, right? They do these kind of things, and I think everyone understands that. So if you’re John Harbaugh, if you’re these players at this point, it serves no purpose whatsoever to dwell on it or to moan it or moan about it or lament it. It really is just a matter of, okay, what do we do? Scheduling wise, to try to maximize our rest time, maximize recovery, do all the things that we need to do to be ready physically. There’s also a mental challenge to this that I know a lot of players, especially veteran players, who maybe have a better idea of of how to take care of their body. They’ve acknowledged this, where they’ve said, look, the short week is a given. It’s a challenge for all of us, but it’s a challenge for the other team too. But a lot of these guys have often talked about the mental side and just being prepared and knowing Okay, a Pittsburgh game on a short week, that’s not as much prep. These teams know each other so well, but when you’re going on the road to face the Houston Texans on Christmas Day on a weird Wednesday game, yeah, that’s a little bit different, and it’s the same for both teams. Again, it’s not a disadvantage, but it’s just a challenge. And when you’re a team and and you alluded to it. I don’t know if I’d say the ravens are overrated, because, I mean, you are what your record says you are. I think we all look at them from a talent level standpoint, from a potential from a ceiling standpoint, and say this team looks like it could win a Super Bowl. I don’t think anyone looks at them and says there’s no way in heck that they can win a Super Bowl. I don’t think anyone says that, but you’ve got to be consistent, right? You’ve got to go out there and play to whatever your talent level is. And Thursday night was a great case study of that, where you see Cleveland and Pittsburgh and putting aside the snow even earlier in the game, you kind of look at those. Teams. And I don’t know about you, Nestor, but I look at them, and I say the Ravens lost to both those teams really like from a talent level standpoint,
Nestor Aparicio 15:08
with the overrated part, or just not being nice to the Ravens based on their schedule, and looking at it and saying Bucha guys were better than this in a general sense. But you know, we’ve gone through the penalties, the bad part of the defense, the pass rush being leaky when Derek Henry’s not running the ball. Well, what happens then? Yeah, oh, you know. And then Lamar has not a great game the other day. And you’re like, oh, Lamar, well, he had to be perfect every week, and he’s been perfectly perfect for two seasons as an MVP, so I can’t get down on him, but at some point he’s going to give a game or two away, throwing picks and doing stupid stuff. Because quarterbacks do that. I see all of them do that, um, because there’s so much on them. And yeah, this is, this is not where they want to be Now that being said, Pittsburgh backed up. They’re back in a position to win the division again, like in a real way. But they have tougher games. I mean, and I look at the whole schedule going down to Houston on Christmas, seeing his brother, Monday, everything we’re talking about for next week. I mean, they could lose Monday and Sunday next week. They’re not markedly better on the road than the charges are. There’s not gonna roll the ball out there. They’re to play a lot better than they’ve been playing. Yeah, I
Luke Jones 16:22
think that’s fair. I mean, you’ve got to go play winning football. You got to go beat a quality team on the road, you know, in prime time. Now, I don’t think the atmosphere is going to be daunting. You know, there aren’t enough there aren’t enough chargers fans in LA so, I mean, I would, I don’t know how many Ravens fans will be out there, considering they just did that trip last year on a Sunday night game. So is there quite as much juice for Ravens fans to travel? We’ll see. I mean, it’s Thanksgiving week. It’s kind of an odd time to do a trip like that. So we’ll see what the crowd looks like. But it’s a team that’s playing good football, and I think for as much as I kind of I made mention of my interest in seeing how the Ravens defense performs against the Chargers offense because of what we saw last week in Pittsburgh, the changes in the back end of the defense. I mean, is roquan Smith going to be available or not? What does linebacker look like if he’s not available? How do you how do you juggle a rotation of Malik Harrison, Trenton, Simpson and Chris board I think Kyle Hamilton probably wears the green dot helmet. Then under that scenario, because I don’t think any of those linebackers play every snap under that scenario, if roquan is out, but bring Patrick Queen back. He
Nestor Aparicio 17:31
already played twice this week, you know, like, but I’m like, this is where you really are. Like, whoa. We’re really downgraded with no Patrick queen from where we were last year. And now roquan Not being great and then being injured. You. I mean, we go back to April, we say, well, we’re gonna lose roquan Smith and Patrick queen. Let’s go play football. It wouldn’t look
Luke Jones 17:50
very good. No, of course not. And look, we’ll see what happens there. I mean, I think one of the more frustrating elements of Smith’s hamstring injury on Sunday was he was having his best game of the season. I mean, that looked more like 2023 2022 roquan Smith before he had to exit early in the fourth quarter. So we’ll see. They haven’t ruled him out at this point in time. I do think he’s one of those guys that you you take it right up to game time, but it’s it’s on the turf. You still have to to your point the schedule coming up, big game against Philadelphia. To follow this, you got to be careful. You don’t want roquan Smith having a bum leg the rest of the year. I would
Nestor Aparicio 18:32
think you could lose a game real easily on Monday night without roquan Smith. You know what I mean, what Jim Harbaugh likes to do, what Justin Herbert’s going to do the running game, what they’re going to bring just throwing over the middle of the field, yeah, just which was never good to begin with. To your point, might be an upgrade. I don’t want to say that about roquan, but
Luke Jones 18:53
they don’t have an upgrade. When you kind of look at it through that lens, it’s like, okay, I get it. Roquan hasn’t been very good in coverage this year. How much of that is him, how much of that is what Trenton Simpson is doing next to him, how much of that is scheme, how much of that is the safety play behind him on those over routes.
Nestor Aparicio 19:09
I mean, all of those facts, some of that scheme, by the way, I think,
Luke Jones 19:12
I think it’s all those things I don’t think. And let me be clear, I’m not, I’m not giving roquan Smith a pass either. Let’s be very clear. But I don’t think it’s as simple as roquan was great and now he’s bad in coverage. I think it’s two or three of those variables at work at the same time.
Nestor Aparicio 19:28
I think taxing him to some degree too. I think it’s sort of he’s not what he used to be. You know, we’re not worried about him in that way. And if we pick on him once, we’ll pick on him twice. But let’s be honest, let’s not worry about him. Let’s go the other side where, you know Brandon Stevens is over there, like they had other options, but he was no longer. Let’s stay away from roquan. He plays angry, you know, like, because I think five, six weeks into the season this year, we all looked at it with the defense suffering on the back end, and saying, where’s the suffer? And then you and I started saying, Is he a liability? Be out there and pass coverage.
Luke Jones 20:00
Well, I mean, it’s just whether, again, whether we’re talking him individually, or just that area of the field, the middle portion of the field, has been so problematic. I mean, I’m stating the obvious there that, you know, short, okay, fine, anything in front of them, it hasn’t been that big of a problem. But that intermediate, those over routes, over the linebackers, in front of the safeties, and then obviously the deep balls have been a massive problem. And again, how much of that’s roquan? How much of that is Trenton Simpson next to him, how much of that is roquan Trying to account for an inexperienced inside linebacker next to him? Maybe spacing and different things along those lines get out of whack, as I mentioned, when you’re in zone coverage, linebackers need to take a deep enough drop, but you also have to trust the safety coming up and behind you and understand that the spacing needs to be right there. So if the safety is not doing his job, what impact is that having on the linebacker? And from a perception standpoint, when guys like you and me don’t know what the assignment is on any given play, someone might look like they’re the one who messed up, when it might be someone else, right? So, so there’s all of that going on, but there’s clearly discord too, right?
Nestor Aparicio 21:08
Let’s throw that in that what’s going on with Marcus Williams and Eddie Jackson and John no speaky and like it’s entering a little bit right now in a way that I wouldn’t have predicted, if they had stayed healthy, and they’ve been pretty healthy, that it would teeter in this way. But to your point, and I will echo that, if roquan Smith’s not there anything they have is a real downgrade. No matter what you think of him, the rest of it, it’s a downgrade. If he’s less than 100% with a hamstring, if he can’t run, he can’t play. Yeah. I
Luke Jones 21:40
mean, it’s, it’s challenging. I mean, you’re talking, okay, Malik Harrison will spell him in early down situations playing the run. I think Malik Harrison’s a perfectly capable linebacker playing the run, but asking him to do anything beyond that, oh, that, that’s not going to go well. And then you’re talking about Trenton Simpson, who has had his moments in past coverage, but he’s also looked like a second year player in his first year as a starter lots of other times. And I mean, we even saw in Pittsburgh, Chris board, who’s a, you know, a veteran special teams guy, actually seeing some time in some obvious passing situations as a linebacker. Even before row Quan got hurt, he was actually replacing Trenton Simpson on a few plays here and there. So that’s messy. And then couple that with all of that with the fact that Kyle Hamilton was playing off the ball more so in Pittsburgh, because they benched Marcus Williams and Eddie Jackson didn’t even make the trip, and wasn’t playing much before then anyway. And so now you have our Darius Washington and Kyle Hamilton playing more of your two deep safety looks, which I agreed with. I’m not disagreeing with that or criticizing that, but there very much is the scenario here where Kyle Hamilton not playing closer to the line of scrimmage as frequently. I mean Nestor, that’s a robbing Peter to pay Paul principle, right there where Lamar not to run, right exactly, so you could, and there are times where, out of necessity, you’re saying, all right, that’s the prudent thing to do, but that’s probably going to hurt us in some other ways, and that might hurt our upside. But, well,
Nestor Aparicio 23:13
they lost the game.
Luke Jones 23:14
Oh well, they but, but not because of the defense on Sunday. I mean, the defense played very well, but over the long haul, especially, you know, if Hamilton, and let me be very clear, Kyle Hamilton’s still going to play closer to the line of scrimmage plenty, but that was a season high number of snaps he took as a deep safety in Pittsburgh. If we see that trend continue, I’ll be interested to see how other offenses now try to attack that. Will that will that? Will the Ravens be a little more susceptible against the run, which, by the way, I don’t think is necessarily a bad thing if it means they can clean up the back end of their defense. I will give a little bit more on the ground if it means you’re going to limit the big plays in the passing game. Mike McDonald, flat out, you know, flat out, admitted that at different times over the last couple years. So I think for me, I look at what’s been an elite pass defense and with some of these changes, and specifically to Monday night, if roquan Smith doesn’t play, if Kyle Hamilton, once again, is playing off the line of scrimmage more frequently, not all the time, but more frequently, then yeah, it might cost you a little bit against the run, but if it means I can eliminate the big plays and get off the field in obvious passing situations a little more frequently and all of that, then I’ll gladly take JK Dobbins and Gus Edwards getting a little more on the ground. Now, to a point, I’m not at all suggesting that you can allow a team to cash you on the ground, but I think there’s a middle ground here that the ravens, I think they’re cautiously optimistic. Maybe they found some things in Pittsburgh, but like I said, I need to see that on Monday night. I need to see that against the Eagles next Sunday, in terms of whether this defensive performance against Pittsburgh was truly a breakthrough. No, or was it No? Let’s call spade a spade. The Steelers aren’t a great offensive football team, and I think we even saw that even before the snow took over in Cleveland on Thursday night. I think that’s still a team that’s limited offensively. Russell Wilson has his moments, but he’s not the Russell Wilson of a decade ago, and that running game is good at times, but other times it lacks some efficiency. I mean, they had some short yarded situations, they flat out failed. So, you know, it’s not as though Pittsburgh’s a juggernaut offensively. So, yeah,
Nestor Aparicio 25:30
let’s see what this would have been a lot better served to play better in the first half. Oh, yeah, no question. Okay, then it’s
Luke Jones 25:37
a coin flip. Yeah, you have no idea what’s going to happen then, right, right. Right. So, but when
Nestor Aparicio 25:43
it was three, nothing, I looked up toward halftime. I’m like, oh boy, and I saw the forecast, and then the snow man, the snow. That was fun. That was fun. I went from zero to 100 I mean, the Minnesota game here a decade ago, one of our all time favorite events, like that Cleveland thing. It went from nothing to a lot real quick.
Luke Jones 26:01
Oh, it did, no question about it, so. But I think for the Ravens again, what happened in Pittsburgh defensively was something to be encouraged by, even in the defeat. But if you go out there on Monday night and Herbert throws for three or four touchdowns, and you know, it’s a they’re scoring in the 30s even, even if you find a way to win, you know, you’ll take the win gladly. But all this optimism about the defense will kind of be back at square one, right? I mean, I think, you know, right now it’s Hey, ardarius Washington’s back in the lineup, and they finally benched Marcus Williams, and Eddie Jackson’s going to be benched. And hey, this all worked, and the Steelers didn’t score a touchdown against them, and that’s all and that’s all well and good, but you got to start stacking. And that’s why Kyle Hamilton, he said it before anyone else could. He said, Look, we all kind of thought this after buffalo, you know, when we held the bills to 10 points and then, well, we saw what Joe burrow and the Bengals did against us the following week. So, big game, important game, to your point, because of the loss to Pittsburgh, the standings feel better, even though, you know, one and a half games wasn’t insurmountable by any stretch. But you know, you want to, you got a chance to to gain ground here. Do it? You know, especially knowing that you are going to have that short week to follow with the Eagles, who are also playing really good football here of late, coming to town. So this is a, this a big one to state the obvious, right? And that’s part of what you were saying. I mean, when, no matter what you think about this team’s potential and its ceiling, and I still think it’s very high overall, there’s seven and four, which is playoff good, but it’s not top of the league, oh my gosh, you’re amazing, good, you know, seven and four is, you know, they’re, they’re up from a record standpoint, they’re a top eight, top 10 team, rather than a top two or three, bad, good
Nestor Aparicio 27:49
team. As you say, I’m gonna start using No, no, I want, not, I don’t. Oh, okay, bad,
Luke Jones 27:53
good team.
Nestor Aparicio 27:54
There are four seaters a team.
Luke Jones 27:58
I mean, a bad, good team is that’s kind of what I’d call the Steelers the last couple
Nestor Aparicio 28:03
years. Ah, fair enough, but they were first place. They for yesterday. So, you know, well, I
Luke Jones 28:07
said the last couple years, but yeah, I mean, we’ll see. Hey, again, they’ve got to go out and show that this defensive progress that they made in Pittsburgh, albeit in a defeat, is real. If they do that, I have full trust in Lamar Jackson, in this offense to get back on track, right? I do January and all that. We’ll talk about that when that time comes. But in terms of just getting back on track, the offense was due for a bad day that again, that’s why it was disappointing that you still get a one if Justin Tucker makes his kicks, you know, something as simple as that. So you know, you gotta move, move on and look ahead. And you know, this is a good football team. They’re playing the Chargers. And for them, on the flip side, I’ll just make this final point, they’re trying to show how real they are. You know, they haven’t exactly beaten a juggernaut slate of opponents to this point, so this is a big game for them as well, nationally televised, to go out and beat one of the perceived heavyweights in the AFC. Well, I
Nestor Aparicio 29:06
would say Jim’s never beat his brother. So he had to. I would think that that, you know, underneath of all of that, I I know them both, I still like one of them, last thing and and we’ll reconvene, you know, on all of this, and certainly Tuesday morning, we’ll be up early after all of this, even though it’s Thanksgiving week, all the music, classic stuff’s out there, the crab cake towards schedule, all that’s out there. Justin Tucker, um, I don’t know. We’ve never had to discuss this, right? There’s been a miss here and again and whatever. But like the fact that there’s blood in the water and the lack of trust and missed four field goals into four losses. And, like, where are you on this? I haven’t given you oxygen on it, because we’re always talking, like, after a game and but like, between games on all of this, you know, I don’t know that the operation smooth. I don’t know that the whole. Or the old wolf pack, like all of that, you’re out there, you’re you see him. I see him sell chicken, and I see him sell royal farms coffee and drink Starbucks constantly. But other than that, I don’t, I have no emotion about it, or his Hall of Fame status, or his singing, or his Dr Pepper. I don’t have any of that. Other than if you can’t make the kick this week, like I don’t, you’re not Justin Tucker, Hall of Famer, to me, you’re the kicker who needs to come in and kick 50 something yard field goals. Because that’s what become accustomed to. That’s what we’re paying for. That’s what the league wants. And if, when we replace you, it’s not going to be to find Matt Stover again and find somebody that can kick 42 yarders regularly. Um, it’s been weird dude, because I think the last five or six years, I don’t want to say he’s been shielded in some way because he made Hall of Fame kicks and all that they scored touchdowns around here. You know what I mean? He hasn’t. This isn’t the Flacco thing when he was younger, where he could come in and steal three points with a 56 yard field goal in the first quarter because Flacco stalls, or somebody jumps off sides, or whatever the thing would be in 2015 1617, 18, when they weren’t winning, but he was building that resume of I’m going to kick 68 yard field goals. I don’t know where the future is, but I know you look at it and forget His names, Justin even if you like him or don’t like him. And that’s immaterial for me. It’s just 35 year old kicker. The profile of all of this the money, and he’s going to have to make big kicks, right? Like, this isn’t they’re not going to bring anybody else in. Games are going to be on the line. Snow’s going to be falling, as it was, you know, like, the rest of the way, how do you feel about him, and how do they feel about him?
Luke Jones 31:44
I mean, I think I would tend to agree with what John Harbaugh said on Monday when he was asked the question, and the simple fact that he was asked this question speaks to where we are right now, where he was asked if the Ravens consider bringing in any competition, anyone for a look, see anything like that. And he said, and he did provide the caveat at this point, no, our best bet is to get Justin Tucker back on back on track. And I agree with that. I mean, if the if the next Justin Tucker is out there right now, he’s probably kicking in college right now. He’s probably not sitting out there on that 33rd kicker out on the street. Yeah, right. Exactly because, because we go, look, go, pay attention sometime over, you know, go, go back and look at the Tran NFL transaction wire over the last two months, and you’ll see how many kickers are signed and released and signed to practice squads and cut no but
Nestor Aparicio 32:41
if he’s the eighth best kicker in the world or the 10th best kicker in the world, you’re gonna have to suck it up buttercup. Go with him and look,
Luke Jones 32:49
I mean, right now, he’s been worse. He’s been worse than that over the over the first half of this season. But all that being said, I think you have to ride this out at this point now. I think it’s worth noting, and we talked about this a lot. Part of what was so unnerving about what happened this past Sunday was Justin Tucker kicked at the place formerly known as Heinz Field, been better than anyone there. He’d missed one kick in his career. It was his rookie year. You know, he hadn’t missed a kick there in 12 years, and he’s kicked plenty there over the years. So that was unnerving. However you’re going to a dome, you’re going into an indoor stadium on Monday night. Conditions should be perfect, right? This should feel this should be the game for him to get, right. This should be the kind of game where, if he can have a three for three, and not that you want the ravens to settle for field goals, but let’s say, you know, he hit, he hits one from 52 he hits one from 46 and let’s say there’s a 33 yarder or something like that. I don’t know, you know, I’m just throwing it out there. He does that, and he hits all of his extra points. Suddenly you’re feeling a little bit better. Not that everything’s fixed, but you’re feeling better. And for me, it’s just that incremental get better. Just don’t let this thing go sideways, right? I mean, and we’ve talked about this, it started out early in the year that it was the 50 plus thing, and then he started missing from just inside 50. And you know, he missed from 47 this past week, missing extra point the week
Nestor Aparicio 34:09
before point during his time in the league has gone from nothing to something, right, something Sure, sure. And
Luke Jones 34:15
you know, we saw, and look, let’s be clear, Justin Tucker has as amazing has he’s been. He’s had some stretches in his career where it hasn’t been quite as great. It’s just maybe it wasn’t magnified at the time. In 2015 go back and look at his numbers in 15, they weren’t, they weren’t all that great. But you know why? You know what? No one cared, because the Ravens were terrible that year, because that was the year they were injured like crazy. And you know, sugs at the beginning of the year, Flacco in what, late November, or whatever it was to say before he was going to do the show with me. Yeah, exactly, right. So, so it’s not as though he’s never gone through this, but this is as an ex, as an extensive struggle, you know, an extensive period of time where he struggled, as we’ve seen. So I. I’m not at the point yet where you’re bringing other guys in, or you’re thinking about cutting them or anything like that. But you know, if he misses three kicks on Monday night, then then maybe we’re talking about it. I I noted this in my 12 ravens thoughts after the Steelers loss. I agree with John Harbaugh. I will say this behind the scenes, and I think this is going to be a much more notable storyline for this off season and next summer, potentially, depending on that, all depends on how he finishes out right, the Ravens should definitely be updating the Rolodex as in terms of kickers and looking at kickers and scouting guys and paying attention in college and all that. Because if he has, let’s say, his season kind of continues on the rest of the way, where it’s, you know, the kindest way of putting it in consistent up and down, you know, maybe has some good games, still has a couple more shaky games. Whatever. I would say at the very least, you’re bringing in someone to compete with him next spring and summer. I think that’s fair at the very least so. But that’s next summer. In the interim. In the meantime, the here and now, I still think your best bet is to try to get him right. And I think the biggest challenge right now is not Randy Brown and Chris Horton trying to work with the overall mechanics of the operation. I think at this point it’s between the ears, I think, for anyone. And Justin Tucker has never lacked for confidence. But as we said, he’s never had this prolong of a period of struggle where I think the confidence is a question, and I’m sorry, only he can figure that part of it out, right? I mean, ultimately, when you’re talking about a confidence issue for for an athlete, you can bring in a sports psychologist, or you can talk to someone who’s done it before or been through it before, and those things can help. But ultimately, it’s got to be you that that feels like yourself, you know, like you can go out and do it in the way that you have for so long. And I think that’s where the ravens are. They haven’t lost all confidence. But, and he’s, as John Harbaugh said after the game, when I asked him about it, he’s like, tucks got to make kicks. He knows that. I mean, he’s, we got to have those. I mean, it costs them a game on Sunday. So you know that? That’s kind of a long answer for saying, you know he I think he’s still your best option. But,
Nestor Aparicio 37:19
and they’re playing in a dome on Monday, and he’s gonna have to do some kick, well, get, well, I’m gonna eat some chicken. He’s gonna do some get, well. Game, yeah, that’s a kick. Well. Game, kicking inside. I’m gonna do the Monday night royal farms thing all night long. Because, like, whoever put that on the social media at halftime was freaking brilliant. You know, more kicking, less chicken, less chicken, more kicking. I don’t know. I’ll eat all the chicken. I mean, Robbie over Robbie’s first base disparaged gas station food on his timeline the other day. And I, we’re going to have that I was shocked by fried chicken up. I’m like, I just spent more chicken and Western fries. For me, that’s what that means, getting at the Royal farms, uh, Luke Jones is powered up by Royal farms, as well as our friends at Jiffy, Luke MultiCare, getting back and forth to training camp and Raven camp. I should say we did some baseball around here. We’re kind of holding our breath on that we’ve got Thanksgiving. We’ve done music classic to the nth degree. I haven’t even released the modern stuff. I haven’t even gone back into the archives and whipped out ZZ Top and Paul Stanley and a whole bunch of Rock and Roll Hall of Famers that I have on earth. Joan Jett, a whole bunch of stuff. So heart, just stuff I’m finding in a box that’s all going to be coming out through Thanksgiving. So make sure you’re checking that out at Baltimore. Positive. Luke can be found at Baltimore. Luke, I can be found anywhere the Maryland crab cake tour will be and is going. I was in Carroll County last Thursday. Tim Watson, I did an unbelievable segment. Chris Richards came on. We talked about gambling and football and the OTB and his license up there with BET parks also had a great, great segment with my friend Karen Faulkner, who is a leadership advisor, just a friend of mine in the real world. Through networking, been meaning to have her on. She lives in Amsterdam. We had a great story. She spoke a lot about mental health and a lot about physical health and the important things to power us all up through the holidays, especially when it gets dark at four o’clock. At least it gets dark at four o’clock on Monday and we have Monday Night Football. It’s the horrible we’re going to be doing the Maryland crab cake tour December 4 at Coco’s. Marcella has already told me that she’s ripping up the eggnog, the special eggnog out there, and I’ll have the cocoa nut shrimp. I think we’re six going to be out with us on December 4, December 5, we’re at the BMA at gertrudes with John shields and Dan Rodricks. On December the 12th, we’re back at fade, and he’s at Lexington market. Two weeks for Christmas. Get all the shipping and the orders in order from everywhere, ordering from Costas. On the 18th, we’re going to be there for Christmas, for China shock, and on the 17th of December, I have added a special non crab cake related crab cake tour stuff. You know, they probably put a crab cake on the Italian menu down at Oh, me, cheese won’t be there on the 17th. And I, I’m gonna be tearing into everything down the meatballs. And we have chicken Lorenzo. I’m gonna have the. The calamari, Luke, I don’t know if you noticed, but amicis, but they, year round, have a baseball standings like staying above the bar, and it’s completely wooden, and it’s like the old Wrigley Field. They put up the numbers. They put up the standings every single day in the American League East, and in the off season, there are special messages on the wall at amici. So I’m I don’t know what the message is going to be, December 17. I hope it says, Welcome to Birdland. One Soto. Maybe that is that you’re laughing at me. Why are you great? It’d be great. I’m
Luke Jones 40:38
all for that. I’m not fighting with you about that anymore, because it implies I wouldn’t want them to sign Juan sono, so I’m just not as you and I had an
Nestor Aparicio 40:46
honest to god fight about baseball in the air this week. And I would just say, from my heart of hearts to you on the Stockholm Syndrome reference for all of you, raise your expectations on what this could and should be. Don’t live in Angelo’s land until Rubenstein shows us that he’s Angelo’s like, let’s live more, like the Cardinals or the Padres or the Phillies or teams that could afford the sign players. And that’s where I would say on Thanksgiving, you know, as we sit around here, I’m thankful that we have a different baseball owner, but I hope it’s not like a who song, you know, meet the old boss. Same as new he’s Luke. I’m Nestor. It’s Happy Holidays. We’ll see you on Monday talking football around here. You.
