In clutch defense can't get off field

[Haloti92]

I'm so fucking tired of hearing excuses for the defense. First it was that the Ravens couldn't sustain drives. Then the Ravens started sustaining drives and it was that they weren't scoring points in the first half. Then, they score ten points in the first half and it's more bullshit excuses.

When I see significantly more money and absurdly more effort put into the defensive side of the ball, I expect better results than the offense that was pretty much left for dead this off-season. So save me the crap about the offense not pulling weight, because you know what, with the way the front office and coaching staff maneuvered this off-season, that's what they wanted, and they fucked up.

I am tired of hearing excuses for Flacco and the offense. It is embarrassing the level to which people contort reality and delude themselves to try to argue he or it is infallible.

The defense lost 6 starters. Read that as many times as needed to understand what it means. The defense was not that great last year even with those 6 starters. The FO knew that turning 6 guys who were backups in 2012, on a defense that wasn't good to begin with, into starters in 2013 might lead to a catastrophic result. So to some degree they HAD to address the defense. Whether they needed to use the first 3 draft picks on the defense, and jettison Boldin to sign a collection of middle-priced, older, journeyman can be debated. But they had to do something.

The offense lost Birk, but the team had drafted his replacement and gave him a year to be an understudy. The offense lost Boldin by choice, which as anyone knows, I viewed as a risk, but they felt confident the young guys could pick up the slack as long as we had an elite QB. Then Pitta goes down making the loss of Boldin more pronounced. The offense also just made a nearly-unprecedented trade for Monroe to upgrade the LT spot.

And the end result is an offense that sucks so bad that only those with transparent agendas attempt to defend it with a straight face.

"First it was that the offense couldn't sustain drives....Then it was they weren't scoring points in the first half...now it's more bullshit excuses." This is knee-slapping comedy. No, it has always been: the offense sucks shit. It can't sustain drives, or score in the first half, or score enough points in a game to win without a top-5 defense (which we don't have and shouldn't expect to have).

If you adjust for meaningless yardage and points scored against soft, ahead-by-two-scores-late defenses, the offense is even worse than shit.

Here is your 1st half scoring data......it is so sad it borders on comedy:

http://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/stat...oints-per-game

31st at 7.9 points. Ahead of the 0-8 Jags, behind every other sorry ass team in the league, including winless teams, teams with 4th string QBs, and a couple dozen teams with QBs getting less than $20M per year and RBs getting less than $7M.

Oh and our defense's stats in points allowed in 2nd halves of games? Right here:

http://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/stat...oints-per-game

Yep, ranked 8th at 10 points. But who cares how many times they hold or how little they allow when the offense sucks so bad it is never enough. They always need to hold one more time. And after that? Like yesterday, one more time again. And after...hold them again, please.


What this really comes down to is that the FO saw the fact our defense was average (though showed spurts) last year. And saw the unit lost 6 starters which, even if you replace the individual talent, you still lose something due to loss of continuity (time to 'gel'). And figured they had to make an effort on defense just to tread water and stay the same. They took that a smidgen further by trading Boldin and probably hoped for a defense that improved a bit. And it has, as long as everyone remembers Kirk Cousins driving down the field and Romo scoring at will at M&T.

The FO also, unfortunately, bought into the belief that many around here (including myself) bought into that our baseline on offense going into this season was the playoff performances (or close to them) and not the regular season performances. But it is becoming all too clear the playoff run was anomalous, lucky, divine inspiration, or a combination of all. Unfortunately this belief/assumption led to less offseason moves on offense (though we already desperately grabbed a good LT) and a monumentally horrific offense. It also led to us overpaying our QB (off the playoff run anomaly), and we'll see how much that costs us over the next several years.

The offense isn't pulling its weight. That cannot be denied by anyone with eyes. It is close to league-worst (especially when adjusted for game situation).

[wickedsolo]

The offense is definitely not pulling their weight.

However, the defense can't get off the field when the game is on the line and they need to get off the field. I don't care how great they are for 57 minutes and 59 seconds of the game. If the game is within a score of being able to be won, then the defense needs to get off the field and let the offense - as bad and inconsistent as it has been - try to score.

[pslholder96]

I am tired of hearing excuses for Flacco and the offense. It is embarrassing the level to which people contort reality and delude themselves to try to argue he or it is infallible.

The defense lost 6 starters. Read that as many times as needed to understand what it means. The defense was not that great last year even with those 6 starters. The FO knew that turning 6 guys who were backups in 2012, on a defense that wasn't good to begin with, into starters in 2013 might lead to a catastrophic result. So to some degree they HAD to address the defense. Whether they needed to use the first 3 draft picks on the defense, and jettison Boldin to sign a collection of middle-priced, older, journeyman can be debated. But they had to do something.

The offense lost Birk, but the team had drafted his replacement and gave him a year to be an understudy. The offense lost Boldin by choice, which as anyone knows, I viewed as a risk, but they felt confident the young guys could pick up the slack as long as we had an elite QB. Then Pitta goes down making the loss of Boldin more pronounced. The offense also just made a nearly-unprecedented trade for Monroe to upgrade the LT spot.

And the end result is an offense that sucks so bad that only those with transparent agendas attempt to defend it with a straight face.

"First it was that the offense couldn't sustain drives....Then it was they weren't scoring points in the first half...now it's more bullshit excuses." This is knee-slapping comedy. No, it has always been: the offense sucks shit. It can't sustain drives, or score in the first half, or score enough points in a game to win without a top-5 defense (which we don't have and shouldn't expect to have).

If you adjust for meaningless yardage and points scored against soft, ahead-by-two-scores-late defenses, the offense is even worse than shit.

Here is your 1st half scoring data......it is so sad it borders on comedy:

http://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/stat...oints-per-game

31st at 7.9 points. Ahead of the 0-8 Jags, behind every other sorry ass team in the league, including winless teams, teams with 4th string QBs, and a couple dozen teams with QBs getting less than $20M per year and RBs getting less than $7M.

Oh and our defense's stats in points allowed in 2nd halves of games? Right here:

http://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/stat...oints-per-game

Yep, ranked 8th at 10 points. But who cares how many times they hold or how little they allow when the offense sucks so bad it is never enough. They always need to hold one more time. And after that? Like yesterday, one more time again. And after...hold them again, please.


What this really comes down to is that the FO saw the fact our defense was average (though showed spurts) last year. And saw the unit lost 6 starters which, even if you replace the individual talent, you still lose something due to loss of continuity (time to 'gel'). And figured they had to make an effort on defense just to tread water and stay the same. They took that a smidgen further by trading Boldin and probably hoped for a defense that improved a bit. And it has, as long as everyone remembers Kirk Cousins driving down the field and Romo scoring at will at M&T.

The FO also, unfortunately, bought into the belief that many around here (including myself) bought into that our baseline on offense going into this season was the playoff performances (or close to them) and not the regular season performances. But it is becoming all too clear the playoff run was anomalous, lucky, divine inspiration, or a combination of all. Unfortunately this belief/assumption led to less offseason moves on offense (though we already desperately grabbed a good LT) and a monumentally horrific offense. It also led to us overpaying our QB (off the playoff run anomaly), and we'll see how much that costs us over the next several years.

The offense isn't pulling its weight. That cannot be denied by anyone with eyes. It is close to league-worst (especially when adjusted for game situation).

Stop being logical. It's not allowed here:)
Spot on with the outlook on the offense. The thread was mostly on the defense not being clutched when it had to be so there's some validity to the griping. I would place more of the blame on the offense though no doubt for the very reasons you've already mentioned.
Losing Pitta has definitely magnified our problems on offense among other things. It doesn't make sense why we come out so slow and sluggish game after game.

[pslholder96]

The offense is definitely not pulling their weight.

However, the defense can't get off the field when the game is on the line and they need to get off the field. I don't care how great they are for 57 minutes and 59 seconds of the game. If the game is within a score of being able to be won, then the defense needs to get off the field and let the offense - as bad and inconsistent as it has been - try to score.

Yes the defense needs to be more clutch but the offense needs to be more consistent. It's not possible for our offense to stink it up for 57 minutes and 59 seconds then come alive in the last 2 minutes and still pull out the win. Can't sustain a winning strategy that way.

[BSHU]

The offense is definitely not pulling their weight.

However, the defense can't get off the field when the game is on the line and they need to get off the field. I don't care how great they are for 57 minutes and 59 seconds of the game. If the game is within a score of being able to be won, then the defense needs to get off the field and let the offense - as bad and inconsistent as it has been - try to score.

Or in this last game, how average they were against a sub-par offense for 54 minutes of the game.

FTR, for me, this isn't an either/or thing. Both deserve a colossal amount of blame.

[Haloti92]

The offense is definitely not pulling their weight.

However, the defense can't get off the field when the game is on the line and they need to get off the field. I don't care how great they are for 57 minutes and 59 seconds of the game. If the game is within a score of being able to be won, then the defense needs to get off the field and let the offense - as bad and inconsistent as it has been - try to score.

The game is on the line from the opening whistle. The defense has surrendered exactly one 2nd half lead this year and that was the 17-14 lead we hilariously had against Denver due to Welker handing our offense a TD to end the 1st half with his muffed punt on the 2 yard line. That's it.

The defense "got off the field" with the game "on the line" twice against Miami after Joe threw a game-tying pick-6 (thereby matching the defense's total number of 'leads surrendered' for the year). The defense "got off the field" with the game "on the line" against Buffalo, giving the ball to the offense down by 3. Result? Flacco's 5th pick of the game, Buffalo knees it out. The defense "got off the field" yesterday with 10 minutes left in the game with us down by 3. Result? Offense goes 26 yards and takes 4 minutes to do it, then Koch punts it 25 yards.

What you really mean is that the defense can't get off the field enough times for an offense as pathetic as ours to win the game. On that I agree. Of course it doesn't tell us much about the quality of our defense. All it really does is rule out the possibility it is a dominant top-5 defense. But no one should consider this defense a top-5 defense anyway. Not now or before the season started. It is an inconsistent, average to slightly above-average defense. The offense is consistently shit (every game) and massively below average.

[Dirt1]

I am tired of hearing excuses for Flacco and the offense. It is embarrassing the level to which people contort reality and delude themselves to try to argue he or it is infallible.

The defense lost 6 starters. Read that as many times as needed to understand what it means. The defense was not that great last year even with those 6 starters. The FO knew that turning 6 guys who were backups in 2012, on a defense that wasn't good to begin with, into starters in 2013 might lead to a catastrophic result. So to some degree they HAD to address the defense. Whether they needed to use the first 3 draft picks on the defense, and jettison Boldin to sign a collection of middle-priced, older, journeyman can be debated. But they had to do something.

The offense lost Birk, but the team had drafted his replacement and gave him a year to be an understudy. The offense lost Boldin by choice, which as anyone knows, I viewed as a risk, but they felt confident the young guys could pick up the slack as long as we had an elite QB. Then Pitta goes down making the loss of Boldin more pronounced. The offense also just made a nearly-unprecedented trade for Monroe to upgrade the LT spot.

And the end result is an offense that sucks so bad that only those with transparent agendas attempt to defend it with a straight face.

"First it was that the offense couldn't sustain drives....Then it was they weren't scoring points in the first half...now it's more bullshit excuses." This is knee-slapping comedy. No, it has always been: the offense sucks shit. It can't sustain drives, or score in the first half, or score enough points in a game to win without a top-5 defense (which we don't have and shouldn't expect to have).

If you adjust for meaningless yardage and points scored against soft, ahead-by-two-scores-late defenses, the offense is even worse than shit.

Here is your 1st half scoring data......it is so sad it borders on comedy:

http://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/stat...oints-per-game

31st at 7.9 points. Ahead of the 0-8 Jags, behind every other sorry ass team in the league, including winless teams, teams with 4th string QBs, and a couple dozen teams with QBs getting less than $20M per year and RBs getting less than $7M.

Oh and our defense's stats in points allowed in 2nd halves of games? Right here:

http://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/stat...oints-per-game

Yep, ranked 8th at 10 points. But who cares how many times they hold or how little they allow when the offense sucks so bad it is never enough. They always need to hold one more time. And after that? Like yesterday, one more time again. And after...hold them again, please.


What this really comes down to is that the FO saw the fact our defense was average (though showed spurts) last year. And saw the unit lost 6 starters which, even if you replace the individual talent, you still lose something due to loss of continuity (time to 'gel'). And figured they had to make an effort on defense just to tread water and stay the same. They took that a smidgen further by trading Boldin and probably hoped for a defense that improved a bit. And it has, as long as everyone remembers Kirk Cousins driving down the field and Romo scoring at will at M&T.

The FO also, unfortunately, bought into the belief that many around here (including myself) bought into that our baseline on offense going into this season was the playoff performances (or close to them) and not the regular season performances. But it is becoming all too clear the playoff run was anomalous, lucky, divine inspiration, or a combination of all. Unfortunately this belief/assumption led to less offseason moves on offense (though we already desperately grabbed a good LT) and a monumentally horrific offense. It also led to us overpaying our QB (off the playoff run anomaly), and we'll see how much that costs us over the next several years.

The offense isn't pulling its weight. That cannot be denied by anyone with eyes. It is close to league-worst (especially when adjusted for game situation).

:word Totally agree. Well said.

[wickedsolo]

Yes the defense needs to be more clutch but the offense needs to be more consistent. It's not possible for our offense to stink it up for 57 minutes and 59 seconds then come alive in the last 2 minutes and still pull out the win. Can't sustain a winning strategy that way.

No doubt.

In 5 games this season, the Ravens have failed to score more than 6 points in the first half. In two games, they didn't score at all in the first half.

That puts HUGE pressure on the defense.

Or in this last game, how average they were against a sub-par offense for 54 minutes of the game.

FTR, for me, this isn't an either/or thing. Both deserve a colossal amount of blame.

They definitely do.

[wickedsolo]

The game is on the line from the opening whistle. The defense has surrendered exactly one 2nd half lead this year and that was the 17-14 lead we hilariously had against Denver due to Welker handing our offense a TD to end the 1st half with his muffed punt on the 2 yard line. That's it.

The defense "got off the field" with the game "on the line" twice against Miami after Joe threw a game-tying pick-6 (thereby matching the defense's total number of 'leads surrendered' for the year). The defense "got off the field" with the game "on the line" against Buffalo, giving the ball to the offense down by 3. Result? Flacco's 5th pick of the game, Buffalo knees it out. The defense "got off the field" yesterday with 10 minutes left in the game with us down by 3. Result? Offense goes 26 yards and takes 4 minutes to do it, then Koch punts it 25 yards.

What you really mean is that the defense can't get off the field enough times for an offense as pathetic as ours to win the game. On that I agree. Of course it doesn't tell us much about the quality of our defense. All it really does is rule out the possibility it is a dominant top-5 defense. But no one should consider this defense a top-5 defense anyway. Not now or before the season started. It is an inconsistent, average to slightly above-average defense. The offense is consistently shit (every game) and massively below average.

With the way the coaching staff has been using the defense and the offense, you'd think they were under the assumption that they were a top-5 defense.

[Haloti92]

With the way the coaching staff has been using the defense and the offense, you'd think they were under the assumption that they were a top-5 defense.

Maybe so. But if they are, they are fools. I certainly am not defending the play calling.

I actually would defend Harbaugh's gametime decisions (and have) in terms of going for 4th downs and onsides kicking, etc., because he understands and assumes our defense cannot hold the opposition every time from there until the final whistle, and that the offense needs as many 'possessions' as it can get , in order to cobble together a respectable point total (and each time we convert a 4th down or recover an onsides kick it is effectively an 'extra' possession).

[wickedsolo]

Maybe so. But if they are, they are fools. I certainly am not defending the play calling.

I actually would defend Harbaugh's gametime decisions (and have) in terms of going for 4th downs and onsides kicking, etc., because he understands and assumes our defense cannot hold the opposition every time from there until the final whistle, and that the offense needs as many 'possessions' as it can get , in order to cobble together a respectable point total (and each time we convert a 4th down or recover an onsides kick it is effectively an 'extra' possession).

I like that he goes for it as well because they need the offense to sustain drives.

It is the constant pounding of the rock for gainst of 1 yard or less for much of the season that I'm referring to.

You can't win the TOP game, which is somethign we all feel that Harbs cares about, if you're not consistently converting first downs and the Ravens get into an incredible amount of 3rd and long situations.

From my perspective, it seems like Harbaugh & Co have a delusional outlook on this defense and what they're capable of.

[mmi16]

When the game is on the line - needing a stop - the D doesn't.