I feel like the problem with this team right now is that we’re just not good in the right areas. I’m beginning to wonder if our struggles are partially a talent problem. We went 8-9 last season and we’re 4-3 this season with a pretty easy schedule up to this point. We haven’t played good football in a season and a half. Thats a 12-12 record.
The Ravens have some stars like Lamar Jackson, Derrick Henry, Zay Flowers, Roquan Smith and Kyle Hamilton so our team looks like a Super Bowl contender when you look at it from a Madden perspective. However our offensive line is not very good, we see this with the sheer amount of holding penalties and false starts they get. Part of this is due to the injuries we’ve suffered on the OL but it wasn’t very good last season either. Drafting Ioane was a great pick and Rosengarten is a good OL but outside of those two who else do we really have? Ronnie Stanley is getting up there in age and he’s hurt half the time. We also see it with how often this team gets stuffed on short yardage situations.
This team had a rough offseason losing Isaiah Likely and Tyler Linderbaum, losing 2 young high quality offensive players in the same winter is a tough break which certainly didn’t help.
Then you have the defensive line, it is much improved but still not that great. We’re middle of the pack in sacks in 17th. We’re also middle of the pack in pressure %. So essentially we have an average defensive line. It’s not awful like it was last season but still average sort of lines up with how we’ve been the last season and a half.
Having elite skill players is great but it’s really icing on the cake. Being great at the line of scrimmage is what matters more. Our offensive line is below average and our defensive line is average. We have some great players but we’re not great at the right things.