It was as impressive an effort as any in Ravens’ history. Five interceptions, almost flawless offense and a holiday win to make Santa Claus proud. Luke Jones and Nestor recap a glorious Christmas effort by Ravens in beating 49ers 33-19 in Santa Clara behind the art of Lamar Jackson and a defensive gem in befuddling Niners quarterback Brock Purdy.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
ravens, defense, year, niners, team, game, week, talk, interceptions, mike mcdonald, lamar, hamilton, nfl, purdy, win, players, ball, lamar jackson, monday night, terms
SPEAKERS
Luke Jones, Nestor J. Aparicio
Nestor J. Aparicio 00:01
Welcome back wn S T, Towson, Baltimore and Baltimore positive Happy Christmas. Merry Christmas. Happy New Year. Happy Festivus for the rest of us as the Baltimore Ravens continue their assault on NFL teams now leading after the two minute warning in every game and actually finishing a game against safedisc or 40, Niners on Christmas night. What a giveaway game for the 40 Niners and five pigs and the Ravens made it look easy and I know it’s not easy, it’s not going to be easy in a couple of weeks. They’re not going to be three touchdown leads and all that and a lot of these games but boy, the ravens are the best team in the National Football League, Luke Jones and whatever that means in December it needs the mean that in February as we get up on this, but they’re getting closer and closer to putting themselves in the perfect position to go win a Super Bowl.
Luke Jones 00:55
You just took the words right out of my mouth. I think back to the old NFL clips highlighted Brian Billick late in the 2000 regular season when the time is here, it’s time to go to a Super Bowl. I mean, what else do you want me to say about a 33 to 19 dominant win over the team that was I don’t know if I want to say universally regarded as as the best team in the NFL, but was the overwhelming consensus at the very least. And you know, there was so much talk this past week as far as disrespect and everyone saw the mike Florio rant. You know, it is what it is that the thing I’ll say about that is anyone who is picking the 40 Niners to win, as as I did, I picked the 40 Niners to win by four, it’s not disrespect. It’s not disrespect to pick the ravens to lose a football game. For me the first time since week seven that I picked against them. However, I will say this and then I’ll leave it at that because I don’t want to talk about Mike Florio all morning. Fans can do that on Twitter. But it was silly to look at the Ravens. And look at the Ravens for now two years. And look at anytime they’ve lost the football game with a healthy Lamar Jackson on the field. It’s been by a score, right? They haven’t been blown out with Lamar on the field haven’t lost by two scores. With Lamar healthy and upright since that Thursday night game in Miami two years ago. Now you have to go back to the Bengals game early in that 2021 season for a really really lopsided ravens loss with Lamar Jackson on the field. So I thought it was silly to think that the San Francisco 40 Niners were going to blow out the Ravens. But the Ravens went a step further than that, and not only won the football game, but they wanted an overwhelmingly dominant, impressive, best team in the NFL fashion. I joked about it on social media in the final moments of Monday night’s when that it’s no need to look at the power rankings. Today, tomorrow or at anytime between I guess now and Sunday, because that’ll be the next test against the Miami Dolphins but an absolutely terrific kind of strange defensive performance in the sense that they give up so many chunk plays, but the high leverage splash plays and making Brock Purdy look confused, rattled, whatever word you want to use. They made him look anything but the league MVP favorite, which he had been going into Monday night. And on the offensive side. This wasn’t Lamar Jackson’s most impressive, amazing football game, but he played went really well. And he made a ton of you know, he made a bunch of big plays at some at some big moments. But the difference between him and Brock party is state care that took care of them. Right. I mean, here the football and
Nestor J. Aparicio 03:41
the Ravens are capable of losing like this in a big game in the playoffs if they throw the ball around five. I mean,
Luke Jones 03:48
anyone is the city you know, I mean,
Nestor J. Aparicio 03:51
whoever anybody who’s a gunslinger, I mean, even Josh Allen. And that’s the one thing about Lamar from the very, very beginning. And look, you and I have been sideways. And if the fans pile on me, every time I say Lamar lost the game or whatever, and they have lost a lot of games this year. And in the games, they lost, they gave away and they were in winnable position. The 40 Niners did not put themselves in a winnable position with the with the turnovers and this is a case study of the 40 Niners being a very good football team, Mike Florio and all of that I got that stuff. I’m so old, and I’m so bored by that and the immaturity of the team all yelling his name, like that’s how horrible motivates them. God bless them they’re the best team in football so that’s all good but I’m that stuff really bores me. But the 40 Niners haven’t played sloppy like that. They haven’t given games away that look on Purdys face to your point after the third one and eight wins. Like I don’t care who you are, you know you start three picks. You’re going to be questioned the next time you throw the football especially when it starts to get lopsided and everything gets a feel gold buckle Bill touchdowns, and it it really starts to pile up on you. It was a cautionary tale for the 40 Niners but one for the Ravens as well as two. That’s a good team they be and Harbaugh sit up here and say that after they beat the Bengals, whoever it is that’s a good team over there the Jets. That’s a good team over there. That’s a really good team over there. And if they have to play that game again next weekend, I the 40 Niners approach it differently. I would hope that Brock Purdy is a better quarterback than what we saw, right? I mean, we’ve watched him run around for a year and a half as Mr. Irrelevant. It’s been the craziest story since Kurt Warner, right like it is. It’s It’s uncanny how good he’s been. But clearly Mike McDonald and the rush and the way he saw the field I don’t he was slinging first two drives. Everything was great. I’m like, boy, they’re for track me tonight. I mean, they they got players all the stuff we talked about all week. Samuel IOHK Kiddle. McCaffrey I mean, let’s all the way through. They had players they had weapons, but you know, the Ravens won the war and they you know, they they it was as impressive a victory. If we go back to 19 beaten the rams that night out in the light because anytime you fly three timezones I’ve done this for 30 years. I haven’t worn a suit quite like what Chad Steele put on TV after the game, but I’ve flown 3000 miles I know how tough it is. I know those long flights back after you lose a game that this This is impressive for the organization for what John has done to get these guys ready to play and what these coordinators and they were made stars of the game as well. Pretty cost himself the MVP the other night McDonald when he got himself a job right we were all talking about McDonald McDonald McDonald Now Joe Buck and Aikman are bringing him out on Christmas night the defense’s is bringing 30 year olds off the edge clowny, Van Noy all the things you’d want to say about? I wonder if those guys will still have little pep in their step, you know, late in the year, whatever. They answered all the questions, but it’s different. If they’re, you know, if they’re playing a lame team this week, they’re playing the Jets this week. We would just annoy now they have to go do it again on six days rest, come back home, play a track meet team defense, they just show up and look the same way. It was just such an impressive win because now they’re the hunted. Now the ravens are Florio, Florio Florio, they’re the best team, they better not go out and throw three picks second week of January, they better not play that kind of game and better be the cautionary tale for how a good team gets its ass kicked and, and falls out of the play. You only need to cost the Ravens the playoffs a game like that a giveaway game where they’re giving the ball away, because I think they’ve been so good. Over 15 games now, in every game where they are. I don’t see what happened to San Francisco happening to them. They could lose a playoff game field goal here there. But I’d be very, very shocked if a team came into Baltimore and did what the Baltimore Ravens went into Santa Clara. And then on Christmas night,
Luke Jones 07:54
they they went out there and they played like the best team in the NFL. I mean, it’s that simple. And I mean, going back to what you said as far as the reaction of Florida, the 2000 Ravens. Listen, they heard critics and they made note of guys that picked against them. So then I don’t think it’s an immaturity thing. I think that’s how teams motivate themselves. I think that’s how it works, especially in the social media era. It’s even more pronounced. But putting that aside, everything you just said, I mean, it’s time to go win a Super Bowl. I mean, it really is the only thing that you would point to and you know, we’ve talked about the offensive line. We’ve talked about the run defense at times, we’ve talked about things here and there that would potentially derail, not derail, but maybe sidetrack things that you would take pause about. It’s Lamar Jackson staying healthy. And to your point, the difference this year, compared to certainly the last two years, Lamar is healthy. But going back to 20. Going back to even 19. Dominant as the offense was that year, that defense, which did play well, when they got Marcus Peters and the rest of that year you look at them statistically, they were among the very best defenses in the league. But it was not this defense. I mean, how dynamic it is at every level. We’ve talked so much about Kyle Hamilton for weeks now, once again, that shows up Marlon Humphrey played his best game of the year, or certainly one of his two or three best games of the year. And he’s looking much better than he did a couple of weeks ago against the Rams. Row Quan Smith and Patrick queen, you know, we’ve talked about their dominance at the second level of the defense, I mean, the secondary, the secondary in general. Again, they gave up some plays. I mean, to your point, the 40 Niners are really good team. And if you’re going to be dismissive of that that’s diminishing what the Ravens did on Monday night, there are a heck of a team. But the Ravens went out there and showed that they were much better than them on Monday night. And when you do that, there’s nothing left on the schedule the rest of the way. And that doesn’t mean it’s gonna be easy to your point. You’re not gonna go out there and, and scores on seven straight possessions every week, because that was very 2009 Team like and the role that they got in but it you know it gives you the confidence and at this point the other thing that I was kind of thinking about late in the game was there’s no more eyeball test that matter yep beat the dolphins three to two if you have to beat the dolphin 63 Batum 41 to 40 you have the number one seed and now you’re looking ahead and you can rest some starters and week a team great it’s it’s still a very challenging gauntlet that they’re going to have to go through from the standpoint of Buffalo is looking like a top five team in the NFL and has for about a month now and Josh Allen while he turned the ball over a lot early in the season and he’s got that Brett Farr bent out mentality he’s uh he’s he’s having a quite a run of good football. So the bills coming in the Baltimore at some point. I’m not saying I’m picking against the Ravens in that scenario whatsoever. I’m picking the Ravens the rest of the way I’m telling you right now, I mean, that’s that’s where I am at this point with this team. Again, if Lamar Jackson’s healthy I’m picking the Ravens period and the discussion, but teams that could potentially trip them up. You have buffalo, as horrible, horrible as they looked Monday afternoon. It’s still Patrick mahomes and Andy Reid in January of Kansas City’s coming in here. You have Joe Flacco and the Browns if you’re looking for that underdog kind of scenario. That would just be unbelievable. From a storyline standpoint,
Nestor J. Aparicio 11:23
by the way, they lost it.
Luke Jones 11:26
I’m still dead out. I’m gonna say it and we’ll talk about this. So as we get closer as we get closer to Sunday, I’m not a big believer in them just yet, but hey, they are where they are. The record says what they are they have a great opportunity to come in and prove people like me wrong. I’ll sound like Mike Florio talking about them this week, not to that same degree, but it’s all right there. And when you play a game like they did on Monday night, there’s nothing left to say other than it’s time to go win a Super Bowl now, seven weeks to go. Lots can happen between now and then. And it can end very abruptly as we found in 2019 as a 2006 ravens found out against Indianapolis. So there’s nothing that’s guaranteed. But you do something like the Ravens did Monday night on the road against the precede best team in the NFL. I don’t know what else there is to say well, we’ll talk about little minutia from this game. And you know, a couple things here and there that you’d say oh, you know that that wasn’t the greatest but by and large, you’re talking about a two touchdown victory on the road against the best team in the NFC. Again, the ravens are deserved the title of best team in the NFL on Christmas night for whatever that’s worth and now it’s time to go finish the job over these next seven weeks. Luke
Nestor J. Aparicio 12:37
Jones is here he’ll be at camp all week long. The Ravens get ready for the Miami Dolphins. Good looking throwbacks they had the other day even though I’m not a Mercury Morris fan. We got to see Greece’s kid for a couple of minutes late at night on Christmas night as well. But the dolphins coming in impressive. I want to the park for the Ravens game. It’ll be Lamar Lamar, Lamar, and that should be the lead story. There’s no talk of Mark. Mark Andrews his name didn’t come up much the other night because Isaiah likely is out there. There’s not a whole lot of talk at JK Dobbins Justice Hill did a decent enough job her keep Mitchell’s name ones missing guys, Ronnie Stanley’s out there should I go in? Should I not Macquarie look like he got hit in the head? Hamilton this week, short week and getting guys ready for the field taking the ball away and pick sixes and defensive scores and sort of the Ravens heritage in doing that. And you know, even the years they didn’t they weren’t very good the every year with the Jets returns and all of that stuff when he was the MVP of the league. Taking the ball away and having that kind of defense is different than we’re going to rush your quarterback we’re going to make your punt. We’re going to make you throw passes into the dirt we’re going to hurt your feelings the interceptions in the game that’s something I don’t know that we’ve seen a lot of that from the Ravens lately we know it’s possible that you earlier in the year Gino stones got all these interceptions as a role player and and finding the ball against bad quarterbacks and against bad offense as they the first eight weeks of the season. They played two or three real NFL quarterbacks two or three real NFL offensive. But the last six weeks, eight weeks, I feel like the defense as much as the offense becomes the lead store in the defense as this were number one Cleveland’s number one and all that they’ve been great. But they haven’t won the game. Like literally just won a game. They won that game. I mean, and Lamar took care of it. Lamar Lamar is gonna be the MVP. I’ll give you all of that. But the defense won the football game the defense brought a bully bravado that I think ro Quan Smith would like to have every team when they come in. I think they’re getting bullied around a little bit defensively. I don’t know that this defense had that sort of reputation. I think it might after everybody watches them on Christmas night watches them get after Trevor Lawrence the week before they’re there now. Playing games where everybody’s watching them play. We’re gonna play a one o’clock game this week where, I guess, at 80% of the country will get that game like us who got the Redskins game the other day or the commander’s game the other day when Flacco is playing. But I would say for them the defense and taking the ball away and turning it into points. If they do that, in the division game in the championship game, they’re going to the Super Bowl. I mean, I don’t think has any questions about that if this defense takes the ball away, that’s different than three now playing good defense, you know, having good yardage numbers and all of that takeaways and points off the takeaways. That’s the magic elixir how to win and lose playoff games.
Luke Jones 15:47
Yeah, I mean, you have five interceptions, first of all, I mean, you don’t see that very often in the NFL anymore. I mean, it’s not like the days of even 20 or 25 years ago, where you’d see quarterbacks throw 25, or 30 interceptions mean, you just don’t see that. But Jameis Winston a few years back when he had that year with Tampa Bay, where what he had like 32 touchdowns and 30 interceptions. I mean, you just don’t see that very often. I mean, we talked about Josh Allen turning the ball over a ton and look at his interception totals compared to where someone would be as one of the leaders in the league even 15 years ago. I mean, it’s just it’s different in that way. But yeah, when you have that ability to turn the make the other team turn the ball over and I think with Brock Purdy specifically, that’s such a structured offense, that there’s so many anticipation throws, right? Not that it’s necessarily 100% predetermined where he’s going with the football pre snap but more of that for a quarterback like him, then I don’t know I’m a home so or thinking about it in terms of those guys that you kind of trust to sit back in the pocket. So, you know, I think for me, and I even included this in what I wrote in my 12 ravens thoughts going into Sunday’s game as I as I pointed out, I picked the 40 Niners away and I’m not gonna hide from that. But I did say that for all the talk about Brock Purdy that I think was unfair in terms of being completely dismissive of him. I did say that he hasn’t seen a past defense quite like this and talking about the pre snaps things they do the things they do post snap in terms of flipping their coverage in terms of changing their pre snap looked to something else. I think that was something that I was interested to see how Brock Purdy was going to respond to it. And I flat out said this. I’m reading directly from this was my eighth thought in that. Remember how well Jared Goff was playing before facing Baltimore. Earlier this year, when the lions came in? Jared Goff was one of those guys statistically looking like, not that anyone’s talking about MVP in week seven, but throughout, you want to throw them on the relatively short list of candidates at that point.
Nestor J. Aparicio 17:53
It’s quarterback playing very well made.
Luke Jones 17:58
Yeah, exactly. So I think, do I think if the Ravens face Brock Purdy again, in the Superbowl, they’re going to intercept Five Passes again, or I guess four and Sam darnold through the fifth, you know, to be complete, you know, to be technical. But do I think he’s going to do that again? Probably not. But do I think that he’s going to have all the answers against this defense, just because he’s seen them already? That’s where I don’t know. And that’s where I’ve said for the better part of about two months now. Look, the Cleveland Browns have a good defense. I’m not going to be disrespectful of them, just because they’re a division opponent. And Brown is going to brown and all the different things we’ve said about them. But is that defense, this ravens defense, I haven’t thought that for a while now. And I think this ravens defense just has dynamic playmakers at every level of the defense. And, again, it the run defense isn’t the 2000 ravens, for example. It’s not the best run defense they’ve ever had. But the complete product in terms of what they do, points allowed. You mentioned the takeaways, which hasn’t necessarily been their massive calling card this year. But they’ve just they can beat you in so many different ways. And we saw that on Monday night. And the pass rush, which had been a little on the quieter side, the last couple of weeks, certainly showed up in a big way as well. And it helped the Trent Williams left the game, you know, for the 40, Niners and wasn’t wasn’t right. You know, they didn’t have any. Yeah, they didn’t have any answers even with him on the field. If we’re being honest. But you know, you look at this defense. You and You said it, and I say this in no way to dismiss Lamar Jackson and the year he’s having, or Todd Monken or anything else they do on the offensive side of the football. But beyond Lamar just being healthy and being there and knowing that that has always given the Ravens a chance against anyone. I am in agreement in the sense of what’s different for this team this year, compared to 20 or 19. Is this defense being that dynamic? And to your point, I mean, again, the offense they played, you look at the final numbers and you say thumbs up, right. But yeah, it was a really choppy beginning for the for the offense, no doubt about it. But when the defense does what they did, and it’s so difficult to beat this football team, I mean, it really, really is. I mean, you just look at the different ways that they can beat you. And, and we’ve said it other than the Rams game a couple of weeks back where defense was not very good in that game period. But other than that, you know, a couple quarters at a time, you know, second half of the Cleveland game fine. You know, when Deshaun Watson with a broken shoulder was able to beat them and the Marlin Humphrey gives up the touchdown to Pickens in week five, you know, that coach ran on them more than you’d like to see, but other than some isolated periods of time, a quarter here, their defense has played at a championship level all year and do what you did on the road against the 40, Niners. There’s no reason to not just think, but frankly, expect them, you know, there’s no reason to not expect that kind of play the rest of the way because, you know, you can talk about offensive all you want, all those offensive that you might be talking about that could potentially be a problem for the Ravens. They’re all sitting there saying how are we going to how we’re going to beat this ravens defense because Mike McDonald just has this group firing on all cylinders, and really is a compliment to him and what he’s done schematically, going back to letting go of wink Martindale bringing him back after a year at Michigan. I mean, he is he’s at the peak right now in terms of defensive coaching around the league, and it’s growing more and more difficult envisioning a scenario, I guess other than them winning the Super Bowl and knowing that teams don’t wait it out. It’s growing more difficult not to see scenarios where he’s coaching for someone else next year because this defense has been that great. Look,
Nestor J. Aparicio 21:50
Jones is here. He’ll be around all week ravens playing the dolphins this week. Happy Christmas. Happy New Year to everybody. Hopefully, you’re eating all your leftovers. We’re getting too many leftover cookies around this place. So for me, I feel like a cookie monster this time of year. Thank God I got ROFO with a little coffee in my cup. I gotta even have like a little I don’t have my my cool roofing mug. I have my Dundalk mug today with the this was the this was the poop plan at East Point mall right there. So we’re gonna be down at fade Lee’s on Wednesday, celebrating the end of the year. It’s all brought to you by our friends at the Maryland lottery. I will have scratch offs to give away I still have a couple on the desk here. I’ve been cleaning things off my peppermint payouts, my Oh snaps, I have an absent purple. Oh, snap, they’ve been lucky, luckier. We’ll see how that goes. Luke’s gonna be out waiting for all things practice this week, kind of a short week. Look, I will see the biggest game of the year. But as big as big gets when you’re talking about playing for buy when you’re talking about the difference between losing this game and having letdown and somehow losing that somehow the dolphins are good. That somehow would be the defense doesn’t pick the ball off five times. And 30 doesn’t give the ball and instead it’s on buffalo is running around in there. They have an offense that’s going to challenge this defense in a new kind of way this week. And we’ll get to that. But I want to talk about taking the ball away. And Marlon Humphrey the backside of the secondary to pass rush all of this stuff. You talked about schematically what they did against birdie, the 30 seconds that happened with the two turnovers where the game went from. That’s a pretty good game. I’m tweeting out pretty good game tonight, too. It became a blowout very, very quickly. And I think for taking the ball away. And there are opportunities to do that early. They dropped some interceptions and stuff like that. The rest of the way this defense is gonna have a reputation. And like Marvin Lewis got hired you talk about Mike McDonald, that it’s schematic. It’s schematic when you have the pieces when you have the chess pieces, and Marvin Lewis had those pieces 20 years ago, there’s making movies about it right. And the players they have, I start to look individually at these players. And this isn’t the caster job to me to be bringing in Van Noy to find clowny guys that when they sign them, you and I were like, that’s nice. They, you know, cleaning was a player. He was a one one it was like, How much do these guys have left in the tank and seeing the older players on the defense. And you can see Ronnie Stanley, you can see older players get rundown and what it looks like when they’re banged up. But defensively this thing has been put together well. And you talk about having players that can that can play multiple positions at the drafting of Kyle Hamilton. The night he was drafted you and I were like safety Notre Dame. Why they decide they they just they just gave a whole bunch of money to Williams right. And the questions get answered in that way as to how multiple they are. But defensively this has been this is an organization when to me to create the depth that they’ve created defensively. I mean the tray for ro Quan Smith, how many organizations make that kind of trade in the middle of a year when they believe they can win the Super Bowl knowing that we’re going to have to give them $100 million. I don’t want to do revisionist history with you on a day when like Florida is getting beaten up but you didn’t love that ro Quan Smith contract right like literally like that’s a lot of money. And now that they give it Lamar a lot of money. This offseason, if they’re running around, showing off their ring, I guess it won’t matter if just a matter BK gets out the side door, or Patrick queen goes and gets paid the way Jamie sharper did or you know and it came herring, any of those pieces go away. If you win a Super Bowl, it doesn’t matter. But I think we’re going to look back and I’m not going to be writing Purple Rain three. That’s a promise that’s not a threat. But if I were to document how all these players got here, and the pipeline for what that defense did on the field, against the high powered offense on Christmas night on the road, all of that stuff, that the defense is something we’re going to talk about this week. That’s schematic by to your point to Costa hardball saying I want McDonald I don’t want wing goods not good enough. We want to do something else. Ro Quan Smith be sitting out in the market. And you and I were like, boy, that’s good trade, great player, but you’re gonna have to pay him a lot of money. I mean, that’s gonna, they have to build their whole defense around him. We set this 58 weeks ago, right? Like literally and now we see all these pieces together. And the difference is they’re healthy. I mean, they’re all in the field. Andrews Stanley Dobbins, some of these guys aren’t on the field defensively. The one thing they have going and cross fingers on number 14, because it wasn’t good see, and Hamilton out. They they’ve gotten their players on the field. And when an RO Quan Smith plays with an aggression and and Nast. I mean, him and Queen together in the middle. They can win this Team Super Bowl. Yeah,
Luke Jones 26:46
I mean, sorry, you’re cutting out a little bit on me. So I didn’t hear all of that. But I think the big key is you said it towards the end there is they are relatively healthy at this point. I mean, look, you’re gonna have guys that are gonna miss some games here. I mean, there’s no for and this isn’t a Ravens fan thing. But you see fans across the league, well, if this guy was healthy, and this guy didn’t go down with it like that, those things are gonna happen. But when you look at this defense in its totality, it’s intact. You have guys that are playing with some some things here and there. And I think the good news with Kyle Hamilton, first of all hardball, didn’t seem overly concerned in his postgame press conference. But you saw Hamilton on the sideline late in the game. He was smiling, and he’s on the sidelines, still in uniform wasn’t gonna go back in the game at that point. I think keep in mind, he’s been dealing with the left knee. It’s an MCL issue. And it was the same knee. I kind of wonder if it might have been the brace as much as anything, you know, as he kind of got rolled up but he was wearing that brace. But yeah, I mean, you just look at the depth that they have you look at the structure you mentioned, Eric to caster you mentioned John Harbaugh with bringing Mike McDonald in to run this defense. I mean, it really, you know, Ro Quan Smith was, I feel like ro Quan Smith. And even though Kyle Hamilton came before ro Quan, in terms of building, think those two guys really are really what’s made this thing from good, which it’s been good to great is ro Quan Smith kind of being the heart and soul of the defense at this point. But telling Yeah, I’m starting to wonder more and more if we’re not gonna be talking about Kyle Hamilton being the best player on this defense. And that’s not a knock on row Quan as much as just a compliment to Hamilton, but it’s not just a couple guys. It’s the ensemble effort that they have, where young guys, late round draft picks, trade acquisitions, I mean, you know, free agent signings that have been savvy I mean, you know, across the board Michael Pearson’s very, very well, our guys, they’ve done some things that kind of went against convention a little bit in terms of
Nestor J. Aparicio 28:49
Pearson urban or guys they brought back you know, that guys that know the system really know the system. Well.
Luke Jones 28:55
Yeah, no question about it. So I mean, it’s just, there’s so many different ways that this has been built. And look, we know they have free agents, we haven’t even mentioned just a matter BK, who had his sack streak was broken on Monday night, but it’s played all pro kind of football at the defensive tackle position. You know, they’re they have free agents. There’s gonna be questions about what Mike McDonald and other assistants who knows when you have a defense like this, so but for the rest of the way between now and you hope the Super Bowl in Las Vegas because that’s, you know, that’s the goal. There’s no no ifs, ands, or buts about it, but it’s not going to be built like this again, it’s not going to be all in place like this again, with the health depth coaching everything, you know, veterans young guys, you know, that mix, I mean, it changes but, boy, it it comes it’s come together in a way where I’m never going to sit here and really truly compare a Ravens defense to 2000 because it’s a completely different game. Now we know have that but it is as formidable as a defense as they’ve had since the days of Ray Lewis and Ed Reed, not at the end of their careers, but the heart of their career. Yeah, it’s as great of a defense as any of those non 2000 ravens, let’s say in terms of potential now, just like any of those other defenses the task will be carrying that over to January and continuing to do what this team was able to do on Monday night which is really really impressive.
Nestor J. Aparicio 30:29
Are we gonna take a break we’ll get to crabcakes Randy we’re gonna be fate leads this week so brought to you by our friends at the Maryland lottery in conjunction with a friend when donation 866 90 nation I’m interested in doors and 2024 You can learn more by calling them you get by to get to free 0% financing for five years. No questions asked on that. Also our friends at Jiffy Lube multi care, I still need to get my oil change up and running around the beltway. Getting ham and cookies and eggnog and all sorts of good goods and bonbons over wise markets got a great show there. You’re gonna be hearing some best stuff this week from our crabcake tour in recent times have had so many great conversations 2023 It’s been such a great year around here. Certainly good year for the baseball team. Good year for the football team. Good year for Luke to cover sports good year for me to be locked out and cover sports from here and not be flying back from Santa Clara the day after Christmas and instead eating quote MBAs and eating some chocolate chip cookies around here. Merry Christmas to everybody. The ravens are still the ones see the Miami Dolphins are coming to town. We’ll be talking all about that. He’s Luke, I’m Nestor we are wn st am 1570, Towson Baltimore and we never stop talking Baltimore positive