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Baltimore Ravens Thread
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Ed Reed thank you note in the Baltimore Sun:
http://www.sbnation.com/nfl/2013/3/24/4141394/ed-reed-texans-ravensRavens Nation, My eleven seasons in Baltimore were more than I would have ever imagined, which is why I have such deep love for you all. I will forever cherish my time with the Ravens and the chills that ran down my spine when I finally kissed the Lombardi Trophy.
Special thanks to the City, Team, Organization and all the Fans! I'm going to miss being a part of this tremendous team and organization, but I'll always be Baltimore and my Foundation will remain in this community, this is not a goodbye, but a See You Soon.
Thank you for everything Baltimore, God Bless you.
ED REED #20
Sad to see such an iconic Raven go, but being honest it was the right time to move on. His shoulder is goosed and he can't tackle, and there must have been three or four times this season when he got jumped over like a horse going over a fence :pac: which was painful viewing.
Anyway I'm just glad his last game with us was a Super Bowl win, a perfect way for him to go out!
Does anyone else think Harbs is happy to let all the experienced leaders go so he can now say ''this is now my team'' and ''we're doing things my way now''? For example the likes of Lewis, Reed, Pollard etc were all very loud voices in the dressing room. I'm not saying it wasn't his team before but now he'll take more of a leadership role himself IMO.
Interesting times ahead, we're certainly going to get faster and younger on defense.0 -
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Elam our pick in the 1st round last night. I'd probably have gone for Cyprien if given the choice myself but obviously our front office know better than me thankfully!
Ozzie said that he was the best player on their draft board at the time and that all the main four guys (him, Harbaugh, Biscotti and De Costa) were in consensus on the pick.
A very speedy, versatile safety who doesn't miss tackles and plays with passion. If he gets a hand on you you're going to the ground. I'm sure he'll fit in just fine:
Those hits at 25 seconds and 50 seconds
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There a few videos around about Brandon Williams.
A very humble and hard working guy
And here is a college player getting crushed :eek:
Welcome, welcome.
Looks to be a beast!0 -
John Simon seems to be very good value in round 4:
http://www.baltimoreravens.com/news/article-1/Round-4-Ravens-Select-LB-John-Simon/a68349e2-4113-49e8-a003-3b56f4efa4c9The Ravens have continued their efforts to upgrade their front seven.
They added Ohio State linebacker John Simon in the fourth round Saturday with pick No. 129.
Simon, 6-foot-1 and 257 pounds, is a hybrid defensive end/outside linebacker who can help bolster the pass rush as part of a defensive rotation. He was the Big 10 Defensive Player of the Year after finishing last season with 44 tackles, nine sacks and 14.5 tackles for loss.
“They’re just a tough, hard-nosed team and I feel that’s how I play the game,” Simon said after getting picked. “I’m just excited to be part of the organization and look forward to getting to practice.”
As has been the trend for the Ravens this draft, they picked up another defensive leader.
Simon was a two-time captain for the Buckeyes and Head Coach Urban Meyer routinely referred to him as the “heart and soul” of the team. Meyer credited Simon for his toughness and even said that he would consider naming a son after Simon.
“If we have another child, I want to name him Urban John Simon Meyer or something,” Meyer said last season. “That’s how much I love that guy.”
Head coach John Harbaugh referenced Meyer's press conference (video below) where he talked about naming a son after Simon, and said it gives a good indication of the kind of person the Ravens are getting.
"It probably says it all," Harbaugh said.
Simon was a three-year starter at Ohio State and first two-time captain since Rams linebacker James Laurinaitis played for the Buckeyes.
He was a versatile defender who worked at both outside linebacker and defensive end, and he’s known for his relentless motor. He most likely projects as an outside linebacker in the Ravens’ scheme, but said he’ll go “wherever they want me to play.”
“I’m going to do whatever it takes to be the best I can to help the team out any way possible, whatever that role is,” he said. “I’m going to do everything I can to be the best possible player for the Baltimore Ravens I can be.”
Simon has drawn comparisons to former Ravens outside linebacker Jarret Johnson, who was a hard-nosed player that started a franchise-record 129 straight games for Baltimore.
“He is our kind of guy,” Harbaugh said. “Jarret Johnson was a Raven, and he always will be. So, it’s probably a good comparison.”
Simon will join a crowded group of linebackers, which includes Terrell Suggs, Elvis Dumervil, Courtney Upshaw, Albert McClellan and Pernell McPhee, who is planning to play rush end this year. Suggs and Dumervil are the most likely candidates to start, but Upshaw, McClellan and McPhee all have starting experience.
While it’s a packed competition, General Manager Ozzie Newsome has said on a number of occasions that he’s always looking to add more pass rushers.
“That’s what you go into the National Football League for, is to compete against the best, and I’m looking forward to the challenge and I’m looking forward to start practicing,” Simon said.
Simon dealt with some injuries in college, battling shoulder and knee injuries his senior season. Those injuries don’t appear to be a concern now, and Simon said he’ll be ready for rookie minicamp next week.
“My health is 100 percent,” he said. “I’m good to go.”
Another leadership guy that we seem to have targeted, as most of our picks have been team captains in college.
Some analysis from CBS Sports:
http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/draft/players/1664625/john-simonStrengths: Simon has a motor that never quits, playing extremely relentless as one of the best attacking defenders in college football the past few years. He has a strong upper body to swat and use his limbs to beat blocks with the natural power and forceful playing style to keep blockers off balance and shed.
Simon does a nice job setting the edge against the run and takes on blocks destructively, staying disciplined with excellent recognition skills. He takes aggressive angles in the run game and doesn't play hesitant, trusting his eyes and reacting in a flash. Simon tackles through the ballcarrier and has strong wrists and hands to secure stops, rarely missing tackles. He has good short-area quickness with good snap anticipation and dip off the edge to bend around the tackle and gain a step on blockers.
Simon plays every snap as if it's his last and doesn't know how to go half speed, playing motivated and focused. He is a smart, heady player to make impact plays against the run and pass, getting his hands up at the line of scrimmage. Simon is a two-year captain and there isn't a lot he hasn't seen, leading Ohio State as the heart of the team. He closes quickly and plays with excellent pursuit on defense and special teams coverage. Simon has versatile experience at both LE and RE, standing up and with his hand in the dirt, also moving inside to DT at times.
WEAKNESSES: Simon is almost too bulked up, which limits his fluidity, and he lacks ideal arm length, making it tough for him to disengage at times. He is more of a one-speed rusher and doesn't flash consistent explosion, lacking creativity as an edge rusher. Struggled to cover running backs or tight ends in one-on-one coverage at the Senior Bowl, lacking the natural hip movement or footwork to quickly adjust and blanket his man.
Simon plays too energetic at times and will wear himself out due to his relentless attitude. He takes overaggressive angles at times and needs to control his intensity (roughing the passer penalty vs. California, 2012).
Simon suffered a minor right knee injury (bursa sac) against Wisconsin in 2012, missing the Michigan game (his final collegiate game).
COMPARES TO: Allen Bailey, DE, Kansas City Chiefs - It's tough to find an exact comparison for Simon, but Bailey comes close with their muscular frames, quick feet and relentless attitude. Simon isn't as big as Bailey (285 pounds), but he's just as strong.
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One of our better acquisitions this offseason might just be one of the least noticed, AQ Shipley. Being honest, I can't say I really know him, but those that know more than me seem to like him.
https://www.profootballfocus.com/blog/2013/05/10/neils-nfl-daily-may-10-2013/Oh come on Ozzie, you’re just showing off now. Not content with as good an offseason as anyone, the Ravens are just icing the cake with their recent trade for A.Q. Shipley. Who? Well, Ozzie Newsome and Eric DeCosta know about him even if 95% of the rest of the football world doesn’t. I’ll get into detail about Shipley and why this is such a clever move below, but for the time being it’s worth reiterating why Baltimore is so good.
Just when you thought they were losing touch by letting Anquan Boldin go because they couldn’t find $5.5m in cap room (although that could still come back to haunt them), they deliver hit after free-agency hit and replace departed players with potentially better options. Two-time Super Bowl winners, I don’t think a third is in the cards next year, but the moves will get them close in 2013 and keep them in the running for another few seasons.
With the retirement of Matt Birk the Ravens were left with a choice of replacing him with 2012 fourth-rounder Gino Gradkowski, or rookie sixth-rounder Ryan Jensen. Gradkowski played 89 uneventful snaps last year but the majority of those (73) came in a meaningless Week 17 meeting with the Bengals. That’s not enough action to be confident of him making the promotion seamless, and as for Jensen? Who knows?
A.Q. Shipley was originally drafted by the Steelers, didn’t play for them and after floating through Philadelphia without seeing the field was signed by the Colts the day after Bruce Arians arrived. In March the Colts then signed Samson Satele as their center and gave him a contract that would effectively keep him in Indianapolis for two years. Satele is not a terrible player but has been very inconsistent throughout his career and generally poor in pass protection — indeed, he was the lowest ranked players at his position in Pass Blocking Efficiency in 2012.
However, he was also injured on occasions last year which gave Shipley a chance to step in, which he did very well indeed. In his first game he played all 100 snaps against the Packers in the one of the surprise wins of the year — in fact, he gave up only a single hurry in 67 pass drops and run blocked effectively.
He had a few issues in his next opportunity (Week 9) when he faced Paul Soliai of the Dolphins in the running game, but beyond that stood up well when given playing time, which he was to the tune of 476 snaps. In the end we graded him at +6.9 and positive in every facet of play.
Now maybe the Colts figure Satele was affected by injury and will be OK, but there’s no doubt last year Shipley was a more effective player. This makes the trade of, at very worst, an excellent backup who was due to count less than $0.5m against the cap for a conditional pick, a strange choice if not one that will have fans screaming for Bill Polian’s return anytime soon.
Also a nice piece on Bernard Pierce:
https://www.profootballfocus.com/blog/2013/05/15/secret-superstar-bernard-pierce/As our Secret Superstar series rolls on, we come to the defending Super Bowl champion Baltimore Ravens who, with general manager Ozzie Newsome, have made a name for themselves by finding diamonds in the rough with late-round steals and undrafted gems like Adalius Thomas and Bart Scott.
Previous years have seen Josh Wilson and Pernell McPhee named as Secret Superstars for the team, with Wilson having moved on to have two up-and-down seasons for the Washington Redskins, never reaching the level of his 2010 season in Baltimore.
McPhee, on the other hand, saw his second season hindered by injury, especially early in the year, but recovered to finish the season well with 17 total pressures from Week 13 through the playoffs, and figures to continue to be an important role player for the Ravens going forward.
So who gets the honor this year? Well, despite having a few players step up down the stretch, there was one player who stood out among them all, starring in a backup role. That was rookie running back Bernard Pierce.
Starting Out Slow, Finishing Strong
Drafted in the third round of the 2012 NFL Draft out of Temple, Pierce entered the season as the primary backup behind starter Ray Rice, replacing the retired Ricky Williams. Despite this, he saw only 30 carries in the seven games he played during the first half of the season. That’s not to say he didn’t impress though, averaging 4.03 yards after contact of those 30 carries.
The signs that he was worthy of a bigger role were evident even during a four-carry performance against the Dallas Cowboys, with Pierce forcing three missed tackles and averaging 5.5 yards after contact.
His strong performance in the first half of the season was obviously noticed by the men who matter in Baltimore, as his role began to grow the later in the season we went. This lead to him racking up 586 of the 734 rushing yards he produced all year, including the playoffs, from Week 10 onward.
With 33 missed tackles forced as a runner, and a further four as a receiver, he finished the year with an Elusive Rating of 75.7. That number put him third among all running backs that saw at least 25% of their team’s carries, bettering even Adrian Peterson, albeit on a much smaller sample size.
Room to Grow
While his rookie season was pretty impressive, there’s still plenty of improvement required from Pierce if he wants to develop into a three-down running back. We didn’t get to see much of him as a receiver, which is to be expected when you’ve got a player like Ray Rice atop the depth chart. Despite forcing four missed tackles from eight receptions, we really need to see more of him in that role to find out if he can truly be a threat as a receiver out of the backfield.
The biggest area of concern from his rookie year was in pass protection, as it was the only area of his game where he finished with a negative grade. Allowing a sack, a hit and three hurries might not seem like much, but coming on just 38 pass blocking attempts it was simply too much pressure to permit.
That’s likely part of the reason he saw such little action as a receiver, with his pass blocking enough of a liability to limit him on obvious passing downs. Here’s hoping he can improve on that in his second season in the league and give the Ravens even more reason to keep him on the field going forward.
Stealing Carries From Rice?
There’s no doubting that Ray Rice is a bigger threat than Pierce as a receiver out of the backfield, with Rice reeling in over 60 receptions in each of the past four seasons. However, when you look at the pair purely as runners, it might surprise you to learn that Pierce is the more productive.
We’ve already highlighted how impressive he was at forcing missed tackles but, putting it in context, he finished the regular season with 21 missed tackles forced as a runner compared to Rice’s 20. This was despite Rice seeing 149 more carries than his rookie counterpart.
On top of that, Pierce averaged 1.12 more yards after contact per carry than Rice. Simply put, he did more than Rice beyond the help of their offensive line and, all in all, was a better pure runner. The problem for Pierce is that he needs to work on the other aspects of his game and improve enough that the Ravens can trust him on the field regardless of the situation. That would allow him to see even more touches offensively and grow into a much bigger part of the Ravens’ offense.
Despite those concerns, there are plenty of reasons to expect Pierce to improve on what was still an impressive rookie season. It may have been on a limited sample size, but Pierce produced and gained yards beyond the work of his offensive line all throughout the season as opposed to just one game skewing the numbers.
He may be unlikely to unseat Rice as the man atop the running back depth chart in Baltimore, but a bigger role than he had at the start of 2012, and even late in the year, seems inevitable as we head toward the 2013 season. It’ll be up to Pierce to continue to produce as he did and, if he does, he won’t be considered a secret for much longer.
And a paragraph on what McKinnie signing means for the rest of the O-line. Just look at the difference between Oher's statistics at RT and LT!
https://www.profootballfocus.com/blog/2013/05/03/neils-nfl-daily-may-3-2013/It’s not that Bryant McKinnie is performing brilliantly at this stage of his career which makes this a good move for Baltimore — he’s not — it’s more the positive ripple effect across the rest of the line. He didn’t start a single game until the playoffs in 2012, and other than the wild card game against the Colts was broadly average in every regard from then on in. However, starting him at left tackle allowed Michel Oher to go back to right tackle which, in turn, gave them the facility to move Kelechi Osemele to left guard. Now, moving Oher didn’t immediately make him a better player but I’m convinced all the changing positions is having a detrimental effect. To get better at any task requires constant repetition — the facility to ingrain the physical into the subconscious and the two positions require different somatic responses. How can a player who is being asked to play two different positions be as good as if he was asked to concentrate on just one? If it was down to me (Ravens fans send a silent blessing to whichever god they worship that I’m not) I’d put him at RT and leave him there — here’s why.
Over the course of his career, starting in 2009, here is our grading for Oher broken down by position:
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The Shipley trade is a strange one! I thought the Colts would cut Satele but maybe they wanted that bit of experience with all the O-Line changes!
Hard to judge Shipley as he was surrounded by mediocrity (that's being generous) last year when he played, so how much help he'll give ye this year is hard to judge!
One word of caution is that the Colts chose Satele over Shipley even though Satele is injury prone, not very good and costing about 3 times as much this year! This either means that the Colts coaching staff don't rate Shipley (I personally hope it's this!) or that they are sticking with Satele because cutting him would show they were wrong to sign him in the first place!
Anyway as its a conditional pick I hope he starts every game
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