It’s hard to separate the impact of injury from the actual performance in the Ravens’ awful loss to the Chiefs in Week 4. There was a snowball effect. Something went wrong (Lamar Jackson threw a dreadful interception) and then … in a blink … everything went off the rails.
We’ve seen Ravens teams choke away big second-half leads and lose in crushing fashion. But we hadn’t seen this. The 37-20 loss was their most lopsided since 2021. There was some window dressing late to make the score closer than the game actually was.
The Lions loss was eye-opening. This was something else. This was gutless.
It’s hard to have a tangible conversation about where to go from here. The list of injuries is overwhelming. They were already decimated by losing Nnamdi Madubuike, Broderick Washington and Kyle Van Noy from their defense. Adding Marlon Humphrey, Roquan Smith and Nate Wiggins to that list would be impossible to overcome.
And then there are the two most important players on the entire team (Lamar Jackson and Ronnie Stanley).
And yet, it’s hard to figure what the line is between overwhelming injuries and … just plain disastrous performance. The injuries are real. At least we think they are. John Harbaugh’s lack of interest in discussing whether Jackson could have returned to the game will feed into conspiracy theory. But I cannot make heads or tails of “the chicken and the egg” of this. Did the Ravens get destroyed in Kansas City BECAUSE of their many injuries? Or did they get destroyed in Kansas City AND they have many injuries?
I’ve got a take that will really rock your socks. It’s probably a little bit of both!
That’s sort of the issue when it comes to trying to figure out what happens next. No, the Ravens aren’t firing Harbaugh. They’re the betting favorites to win the AFC North … still. Things are bad. They’re very bad. And if they stay this bad, the Harbaugh conversation will be had. If 1-3 becomes 1-8, the conversation absolutely will be had. But you don’t throw in the towel because of a 1-3 start, no matter how badly or how many fans would like to see the manager.
But should there be changes? That’s … much more complicated. Firing a coordinator after just four games feels a bit panicky, particularly given the injuries. But wretched starts both this and last season complicate the credit that defensive coordinator Zach Orr may or may not deserve for a second-half turnaround last year. There’s no way to measure what the Dean Pees effect may have been on the unit’s ultimate success.
So we’re back to the chicken and the egg. Is the Ravens’ defense struggling BECAUSE of Zach Orr? Or is the Ravens’ defense struggling AND Zach Orr is the coordinator? No matter where it falls on the sliding scale, is it possible that the Ravens just have to make a major change anyway?
I appreciated Kyle Hamilton’s thorough and thoughtful retraction and apology for his comments about Ravens fans being “spoiled” earlier in the week. My gut tells me that Hamilton simply got carried away in what he thought was a defense of Orr and just hadn’t thought about how it might come off. Hamilton is the one defensive player who deserves to be cut at least a little bit of slack. I’m glad he recognized that his comments were in error.
Still, it’s hard to ignore the possibility that Hamilton’s initial comments reflected an amount of denial from the team that things really were as bad as they appeared. Hamilton’s “spoiled” suggestion felt a little like Aaron Rodgers’ famous “R-E-L-A-X” statement when the Packers got off to a 1-2 start in 2014 before reaching the NFC championship game. The difference, of course, is that Rodgers and the Packers put up 38 points in a blowout win against the Bears after Rodgers’ comments while Hamilton’s unit surrendered 37 in its next game.
Did Hamilton’s comments reflect an amount of hubris the Ravens had internally that things really weren’t as bad as the numbers appeared? The concern would be that perhaps they weren’t as focused or didn’t take things as seriously as necessary and that cost them in an embarrassing performance. I’d like to hope that’s not the case and that, again, Hamilton really just misspoke.
No matter what, it doesn’t change the reality facing the defense.
I don’t think Orr gets fired or has play-calling responsibilities taken away this week. As bad as things are, I think the bye week is the more legitimate time period for any such consideration.
But these two weeks are critical. The Ravens are still in decent shape for the playoffs, but a path toward competing for a championship looks more perilous by the game. No matter what this week’s injury report looks like, if the defense continues to be this wholly inept, the Ravens will have no choice to make a major change soon.
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