One Month Out
What a difference a year makes. Especially if it’s a year where a band of supposed Super Bowl contenders went 5-11, fell into disarray, and ultimately drove their coach out of town.
Such is the lot of the Ravens this year, who enter the season in something of a rebuilding mode. New coach, new QB, new routine, new (non-Hall of Fame) left tackle. The Brian Billick era is but a memory.
Thus far, the Harbaugh era is off to a fairly ordinary start. Early-camp chatter about the practices being “too tough” has given way (as such things usually do) to the mundane reality of preparation. There have been injuries, yes, but nothing catastrophic.
Much remains to be decided during the next four weeks, including Big Issues such as “Who starts the season at QB?” and “Will the O-line hold up?” Less easily defined issues (What will become of Ray Lewis? Will the team take to Harbaugh?) will take longer to resolve, but are arguably more interesting.
Either way it all begins in earnest tonight as the blackbirds head north to take on Bill Belichick and the Patriots. The start tonight goes to Kyle Boller, out of seniority as much as anything else.
I’m interested in hearing everyone’s predictions for the year. Wins and losses, of course, but also on how you think the season will go in general. And if you’re insane planning on watching the game tonight, that’s fair game too.
Football season’s here…time absolutely flies.
Also, a programming note: I’ll be on the Fighting Ungers show tonight from 6-8 pm (1570 AM, listen live at wnst.net) to make up for missing last Tuesday. Next week we’re back on the regular Tuesday schedule.
I hate preseason football. It’s more useless than Spring Training, which is mostly useless, too. Everyone watches just hoping nobody gets hurt.
That said, I’m ready for some football, so I’ll watch the first quarter or however long there’s at least 1 guy I can recognize playing. My girlfriend went to high school with Ray Rice, so I kinda want to see how he does if he gets in there, just as a conversation piece.
This year? Well, it’s sort of a Baltimore thing I guess to be rebuilding in ‘08. But I think the coaching (playcalling) is upgraded, so we’ll be under .500 but not by much. The pieces are definitely getting in place – except the O-line looks bad, to my green eyes at least – so it’ll be a year about getting ready for next year. But hey – this is the NFL, anything can happen, really.
Predicting the NFL is a form of madness, but I don’t think that should stop anyone. I look at this team and I see 8-8, maybe 7-9. It’s probably not a playoff year but I don’t think they’ll embarrass themselves again.
The biggest issue is the one everyone says it is: O-line. They still don’t have much at receiver, either, which could make life difficult for Smollacco. That all said, the defense should be nasty as always and that’s good for some wins by itself.
So, yeah…7-9, 8-8 (ish).
the ravens schedule is RIDONCULOUS
they’ll be very lucky to go 8-8.
that said, 8-8 could win the afc north this year.
i’m as excited about ray rice as any player the ravens have drafted since jamal lewis.
also for the record i think the favre trade was a good move by the jets.
honestly i would have liked for the ravens to be a little more active in those dealings. somehow the idea of kyle boller and troy smith mentoring flacco is a bit, well, RIDONCULOUS.
and did i read that all the jets gave up was a fourth round pick?
You did read that. The better the jets & farve do, the better the packers compensation will be.
So yeah, it will be just a 4th round pick.
Record: 5-11
9 years to go to catch the O’s consecutive losing-season streak…
haha drew farted in the loss column again
I don’t know, man, that comment wasn’t so bad. I was looking for predictions after all.
And the line about the Orioles is just…wait for it…Drew being Drew!
Really, though, that comment wasn’t bad.
Drew isn’t that critical of the Orioles. He always is careful to say that when they do something good he talks about it….what’s that? Uh-huh….uh-huh….I see…
Well, Drew may never talk about the Orioles except when there’s something bad going on, but he has the point: the Ravens have been far nicer to us over the years, even if football is an uncouth sport compared to the simple brilliance that is baseball.
Also, @Ben: Marc Unger and I talked a lot about Favre tonight and both agreed that it’s very strange that the Ravens weren’t even involved in the discussions. They’re a team tailor-made for bringing in a one or two-year veteran QB rental. I get the hesitation with how the McNair experiment went south in year two, but the situation is totally different now that you have a “quarterback of the future” to whom you’ve committed long-term.
I think the Jets were smart to get him, though. I know a certain occasional Loss Column contributor who might disagree, but it seems to me that if you have Favre for a year or two and either (a) keep grooming Clemens or (b) draft someone next year, you’re in good shape.
Meanwhile, Boller started out great tonight and then…he got his Boller on. I haven’t been watching so I have no idea how Smith did — any thoughts?
Also Also, @Andrew: Drew does talk about the positives with the Orioles. Gotta be fair about that. The thing that mystifies me is that such discussions are always — always — couched in terms of the positives being some kind of surprise, then immediately followed by a litany of complaints.
I heard a funny thing on WNST the other morning. Nestor was in-studio for his weekly appearance, and he said “I hate Radio Drew. I like you 23 hours out of the day, but why am I here?”
I’m paraphrasing, but that was the gist.
It’s all schtick of course, but schtick only goes so far. You gotta have something solid behind it.
To the Jets situation:
It’s rent-a-Qube action. While hardly a long term solution, you gotta’ look at the politics behind the move by Green Bay. They absolutely didn’t want him in Minnesota, and I doubt they really wanted him in TB either.
In NY, they know that reasonably Favre’s essentially at BEST looking at a wild card berth considering the Pats’ unconscionably “light” schedule. Sure, he could turn NY into an AFC E. contender but that still ultimately doesn’t mean a whole lot. He’s not much of a threat to the organization he came from outside of a Superbowl appearance, and I think that’s all GB was concerned with in getting rid of him.
Given, he will almost assuredly destroy the Broncos when they meet him in NY come Nov, just like he did last year at Mile High on Monday night, deep to a relative unknown receiver first play of OT.
To the Ravens: It’s game 1. At this late hour, I’m half amazed that Ball-lick-chick hasn’t sprung his ego and just thrown the hardest team he could at the hatchling Ravens. But… he is supposedly a genius, and thus it makes sense that he’d act like one and show some restraint. Still, everyone has some bugs to work out, but Bmore doesn’t actually look that bad considering the complete lack of QB obviousness.
But what do I know, I’m half in the bag and 3/4 gut-full of crabs? I imagine that’s pretty common this time of year amongst B-moreans when it comes to football. Just happy to see a ball snapped, after 8 months.
It was the preseason, who cares? I totally agree with ryan, just seeing the ball snapped was enough for me. Go Ravens!
I actually can’t complain about Drew, because I stopped listening to his show. I like the guy actually, but it’s easy to criticize someone like him in regards to baseball…but I love his football coverage, so I might be tuning in more often with the transition into the fall.
No question that there’s something great about seeing the ball snapped for the first time in a game that semi-matters. It’s hard to believe football is back…should be a fun season.
As far as Drew goes, I think it’s obvious that I basically like the guy as well. He referred to me (and, by extension, all of us here at the site) in a recent blog entry as a “hater.” I had to laugh. If my work constitutes “hating” then he’s doing pretty damn well for himself.
i think if drew and i hung out and had a few glasses of wine and listened to like, jackson brown or some shit we’d get along really well.
but drew’s in radio after all. gotta be a blowhard sometimes.
I’m gonna say 6-10. And Neal, you know how passionate I am about my beloved Ravens. Just going down the schedule, I think we go 2-4 in the division, and beat the Dolphins, Raiders, Skins, and Eagles. Lose to HOU, IND, JAX, DAL, NYG, TEN. So I dont think we will have the long losing streak in the middle of the season. It’ll be 10 scattered losses. Most i think will be close games but DAL, and INDY will probably kill us (40 something – less than 14 something).
I’m going with 6-10 based on last year, since I dont think we have improved in the areas we needing improving in. Flacco wont pay off til next year probably. We have no new threats at receiver. Mason is sure handed, but not a deep threat, and when Clayton, and Williams, or Figures goes deep, no one can hit em with it (i.e.Boller). I give Heap til week 4 to be out indefinantly again, and the O-line went from bad to worse with the absence of JO.
The X-Factors which will give us the 2 extra wins will be the new coach, (cause anyone can manage a game better than Billick could), Troy Smith who I think will ultimatly start adds the mobile element, and he’s smarter with the football. And Ray Rice. If Willis stays healthy and the Ravens go with this tandem backfield thing, then who knows how well they can do. Jacksonville uses it well, and they compare simalarly to the ravens. Not a great QB, not great recievers, stout hard hitting defense, and great coaching. Jax made the playoffs, so who knows.
I say 2 extra wins because that win against PIT in week 17 doesnt count. It was handed to us. we shoulda been 4-12.
so 6-10, but I hope the Ravens can prove me wrong. a lot.
p.s. Antwan Barnes is going to be the next big star on the D. Dont ask me why, but from what I saw in his little playing time last year, and with him getting to play 1st string with Suggs holding out, he’s gonna rise to the occasion, and be a household name by next year.
whew…long post, havent talked football in a while. my bad.
totally agreed about antwan barnes.
i don’t know which nickname of his blows my mind more:
“el monstruo”
or…
“the bucket”
fabian washington looks like the real deal…
kyle boller fucking sucks. and that’s the first time i’ve thought/said that with absolute certainty.
Well that totally unexciting. I hate preseason football so much. It’s more boring than Arena Football highlights on Sportscenter.
its suppossed to be unexciting though. thank god no one got hurt. yet. i cant belive if you go on craigslist people are selling tickets for the next game against the vikings for 80 bucks a piece. Why? who wants to pay 80 bucks to watch 2 quarters of rookie tryouts, or adrian peterson carry the ball one time.
Just put up Justin’s “day after” post on the main page…