Is Yanda just too much to over come?

[757RavensFan]

Losing Yanda directly impacted the effectiveness of Jensen and Howard. Having Yanda next to them allowed them to play better. So losing Yanda basically weakened the entire right side of the line.

[srobert96]

It sucks, and there's no way the team is as good without him, but every team has significant injuries.

- the Dolphins lost Ryan Tannehill
- the Chiefs lost Eric Berry and Tamba Hali
- the Chargers lost Jason Verrett
- the Bears lost Cam Meredith
- the Jags lost Allen Robinson
- the Panthers lost Greg Olsen
- the Patriots lost Julian Edelmen
- the Cardinals lost David Johnson and Mike Iupati
- the Vikings just lost Dalvin Cook

Each one of these guys was going to be a key component to the team. And the list will be at least twice as long by the end of the season. Coaches have to be able to adapt over the course of a season.

More significant to me is the number of injuries, especially to young players.

The difference is that the Ravens have lost:
Yanda, Lewis, Nico, Urschel, Dixon, Pitta, Gilmore, Urban, Young, Hill, Canady, Woodhead, McClellan, Williams

A lot of the teams you mention are struggling. Cardinals are last in the league in rushing. Dolphins look awful with Cutler. Patriots have the same record as the Ravens but it is probably their losses on defense and not Edelman causing the issues. Vikings offense has been really bad due to injury at QB and without Cook will probably be even worse.

Ravens have lost 7 starters. 8 if you include Woodhead. Followed by 3 of the replacement starters: Gilmore, Hill, Nico/Urschel. I do not believe Webb would be playing if Young, Canady or Hill were healthy. Webb has been a liability.

Not making excuses for Pees because I think he could have adjusted and the defense would perform better. His 3rd down play selection is awful. On offense I have to give Roman and MM a bit of a break because when you lose 4 OGs before week three I am not sure how you can prepare and adapt. There is nothing worse than having two guards that have no business playing in the NFL. Eleumanor was supposed to be a developmental prospect and is now forced into playing. Skura was a developmental C. Hurst was a traffic cone as a back up tackle last year and now is the starting LG. I just don't know what you do with that as an OC. I do like the run game design under Roman. The running game has been much better this year even with the injury riddled line.

[Jsmoove]

Losing Yanda directly impacted the effectiveness of Jensen and Howard. Having Yanda next to them allowed them to play better. So losing Yanda basically weakened the entire right side of the line.

shit try the entire line even Stanley been sucking lately he probably has to help out hurts because that fool is on sleds.

[JAB1985]

shit try the entire line even Stanley been sucking lately he probably has to help out hurts because that fool is on sleds.

He seems to be battling through some injuries himself from what I can tell. maybe nothing more or less than any other football player, but worthy of note.

[Jsmoove]

He seems to be battling through some injuries himself from what I can tell. maybe nothing more or less than any other football player, but worthy of note.

he was basically playing with one leg on Sunday you could tell he was gimpy when he came back. Injuries are killing this team man.

[JAB1985]

The difference is that the Ravens have lost:
Yanda, Lewis, Nico, Urschel, Dixon, Pitta, Gilmore, Urban, Young, Hill, Canady, Woodhead, McClellan, Williams

A lot of the teams you mention are struggling. Cardinals are last in the league in rushing. Dolphins look awful with Cutler. Patriots have the same record as the Ravens but it is probably their losses on defense and not Edelman causing the issues. Vikings offense has been really bad due to injury at QB and without Cook will probably be even worse.

Ravens have lost 7 starters. 8 if you include Woodhead. Followed by 3 of the replacement starters: Gilmore, Hill, Nico/Urschel. I do not believe Webb would be playing if Young, Canady or Hill were healthy. Webb has been a liability.

Not making excuses for Pees because I think he could have adjusted and the defense would perform better. His 3rd down play selection is awful. On offense I have to give Roman and MM a bit of a break because when you lose 4 OGs before week three I am not sure how you can prepare and adapt. There is nothing worse than having two guards that have no business playing in the NFL. Eleumanor was supposed to be a developmental prospect and is now forced into playing. Skura was a developmental C. Hurst was a traffic cone as a back up tackle last year and now is the starting LG. I just don't know what you do with that as an OC. I do like the run game design under Roman. The running game has been much better this year even with the injury riddled line.

The difference with our injuries and most others is losing one player vs multiple at the same position. even a great player sucks but is possible to cover up. when you have multiple injuries at the same position(s), youre no longer going to a 2nd or even 3rd option in some cases, but a 4th or 5th. Were starting our top reserve T at G right now, a position hes never played, because hes the best option. the other side is a PS player, a green prospect lacking physical tools. theres going to be growing pains with both, and on top of that we have a C with little experience. That makes our entire interior line inexperienced, out of position, and over matched. You add Yanda, you now have somebody that helps with all 3 of those issues, simply by his own greatness. it was a brutal blow that reminds me very much of past years when the one player we were relying on went down (Suggs, Jimmy, Flacco, etc).

[bravens23]

The difference with our injuries and most others is losing one player vs multiple at the same position. even a great player sucks but is possible to cover up. when you have multiple injuries at the same position(s), youre no longer going to a 2nd or even 3rd option in some cases, but a 4th or 5th. Were starting our top reserve T at G right now, a position hes never played, because hes the best option. the other side is a PS player, a green prospect lacking physical tools. theres going to be growing pains with both, and on top of that we have a C with little experience. That makes our entire interior line inexperienced, out of position, and over matched. You add Yanda, you now have somebody that helps with all 3 of those issues, simply by his own greatness. it was a brutal blow that reminds me very much of past years when the one player we were relying on went down (Suggs, Jimmy, Flacco, etc).

Realistically, all it exposes is your lack of depth in certain spots.

Frankly, I think people barely notice the fact that we lost Young and Canady. Why? Because we have tremendous depth at Corner. We've got three good boundary corners, and Webb can move down into the slot. That's called having depth.

What's clear is we never had offensive line depth. We lost Yanda and Lewis, which certainly sucked. But I have zero idea whether Nico or Urschel were even any good. For all we know, they're comparable to Hurst at Guard. AND... we have zero depth at the Tackle spots. If you want to see what a worse offensive line looks like, give me Lewis and Yanda back, and send Stanley and Howard to IR. That would be the worst Oline in Ravens history and it wouldn't be close. You're probably talking Lewis and Hurst as your tackles, and still have somebody who sucks at LG.

I think we're partially get exposed by the fact that we THOUGHT we had great depth at DLine, because a lot of these guys played great in the preseason or whatever. Come to find out... when they have to start for a month, they're below average NFL talent, and there's a reason why they're not starting. If you insert one of them and they get to play beside Williams and Pierce, they'd probably do OK. When 2-3 of them have to start together, its not pretty.

Injuries expose your depth. Some years you get lucky enough to suffer injuries at spots your deep at. Other years, you get hit with injuries in positions you didn't invest enough in, and it crushes you.

[JAB1985]

Injuries expose your depth. Some years you get lucky enough to suffer injuries at spots your deep at. Other years, you get hit with injuries in positions you didn't invest enough in, and it crushes you.

Id agree it exposing a lack of depth, but its not like we didnt plan to have better options. Nico may be an unknown, but his size and strength was something we targeted in the draft for our interior. He fit what they wanted to do, a mauler. Lewis is similar in that mold.

adequate depth and ideal depth is a concept we fought for years here with our secondary. when wed lose our 1st, 3rd, 4th, 5th CB... no amount of depth is going to overcome that. you cant have starting caliber players on your bench at every position, the cap doesnt allow that. we spent heavy after years of injuries in our secondary depleting what depth we thought we had, so wed have more NFL caliber players at that position, but in doing so that weakens other areas. this was probaby our deepest team across the board in many years. I was happy with the depth we had, even on OL, but when you only carry 3 typically and you lose 4... well you can see how that math doesnt add up in your favor.

[bravens23]

Id agree it exposing a lack of depth, but its not like we didnt plan to have better options. Nico may be an unknown, but his size and strength was something we targeted in the draft for our interior. He fit what they wanted to do, a mauler. Lewis is similar in that mold.

adequate depth and ideal depth is a concept we fought for years here with our secondary. when wed lose our 1st, 3rd, 4th, 5th CB... no amount of depth is going to overcome that. you cant have starting caliber players on your bench at every position, the cap doesnt allow that. we spent heavy after years of injuries in our secondary depleting what depth we thought we had, so wed have more NFL caliber players at that position, but in doing so that weakens other areas. this was probaby our deepest team across the board in many years. I was happy with the depth we had, even on OL, but when you only carry 3 typically and you lose 4... well you can see how that math doesnt add up in your favor.

On the OLine, I completely disagree.

For starters, we literally never had depth at Tackle. We spent most of the offseason expecting our tackles to be Stanley (certainly fine) and Hurst (ouch). Like I won't knock the FO for having Hurst as your swing tackle... if that's your actual plan. Practically no team has a quality backup LT, and you just hope you get a decent swing Tackle and can move things around. This "worked out" because Howard became available in late July. If that didn't happen, or if he signs elsewhere, any Stanley injury cripples this team, even with Yanda and Lewis and anybody else healthy.

We also basically went all in on Jensen. I liked him as a player, and I don't think its a bad move, but if he struggled, there's literally nothing. We don't even really have a backup Center right now. So we spent most of the offseason with literally nobody who can play reserve Center, and basically no 3rd Tackle.

That, to me, is an utter failure in roster construction. Basically, we were built to absorb losing Lewis and we were built to absorb losing Yanda (as long as we don't lose both). We had literally no replacement for Stanley or Jensen.

Sure, losing your interior depth is unexpected and tough to deal with, just like losing your two starting Guards is. I won't knock them for failing to try to hedge against Yanda or Lewis. I knock them for not hedging Stanley or Jensen, and for still thinking that Hurst is a starting caliber player in this league.

And the sad thing is... we could be just fine with Hurst as a starter at LG. If the rest of the line is Stanley, Jensen, Yanda and Howard, and Hurst simply is the backup for Lewis, I think I'd be OK with that. It's not Dallas or Tennessee or Oakland, but I wouldn't be complaining about our QB getting killed with that line.

[Goode05]

1st udfa 6th udfa udfa

And people wonder why the offense is trash. That's what's on the field last Sunday and this Sunday let that just sink in


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[esmd]

I think it is a combination of losing Yanda, his three backups, our starting rb, three of our TE and the other thing that I have discussed in depth. It all adds up.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

This.

[esmd]

yanda 1
lewis 2
urschel 3
siragusa 4
hurst 5
bergstrom 6
eluemunor 7
skura 8

AND WE'VE ONLY GOTTEN TO WEEK 4.

And this.