Baltimore Ravens still addressing their defensive issues
John Harbaugh’s defensive unit was exposed in the 2019 playoffs. What are the Baltimore Ravens doing to bolster this side of the football?
They were the highest-scoring team in the league in 2019 and featured the NFL’s MVP in quarterback Lamar Jackson. The Baltimore Ravens split their first four games and then closed out the regular season with a dozen consecutive victories.
They boasted an NFL-best 14-2 record as they took on the Tennessee Titans in the AFC Divisional Playoffs. And of course, John Harbaugh’s club was the No. 1 seed in the conference. Then came the end result: Titans 28, Ravens 12.
Flashback to earlier in the 2019 season. After knocking off the Dolphins and Cardinals to start the year, the club dropped consecutive games to the Kansas City and Cleveland. Harbaugh’s squad gave up a combined 73 points and surrendered 503 and 530 total yards, respectively, in those setbacks.
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Yes, Harbaugh’s club rolled up 530 total yards in the Divisional Round vs. Tennessee but Jackson was not only sacked four times and committed three turnovers. But coordinator Don Martindale’s unit also watched Tennessee running back Derrick Henry run for 195 yards on 30 carries.
It was reminiscent of the team’s last loss of the regular season (Week 4) when Browns’ running back Nick Chubb rolled up 165 yards and three scores on the ground on only 20 attempts in Cleveland’s 40-25 victory.
So Baltimore general manager Eric DeCosta went out to beef up his front seven. There was a flirtation with Rams’ defensive tackle Michael Brockers but he failed a team physical (via Kevin Patra of NFL.com). So the club went out and added veteran Derek Wolfe from the Denver Broncos.
He would join talented Calais Campbell, obtained in a trade with the Jaguars for a fifth-round pick. And the Ravens also added inside linebacker Jake Ryan, who has barely seen the field the past two seasons after missing all of 2018 with the Packers and playing in only two games for Jacksonville this past year.
The latter shows how needy the club is at the position. A year ago, C.J. Mosley signed with the Jets. This offseason, both Josh Bynes (Bengals) and Patrick Onwuasor (Jets) left via free agency.
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The Baltimore Ravens come off a tremendous season that ended on a very sour note. DeCosta does have nine draft picks at his disposal this year. If the team is to make a serious Super Bowl run, there have to be some upgrades to this once-formidable defense that despite its final rankings may have been too dependent on takeaways this past year.