Ravens head coach John Harbaugh mentioned after two recent games that his team could’ve gone a little different direction offensively in those contests, which begged the question: Why didn’t Harbaugh take matters into his own hands?
It’s not that simple, according to fellow Super Bowl champion Brian Billick, who said big-picture strategies can be lost in the flow of the game and that a head coach cannot “shackle” a coordinator by vetoing a play as it is being called.
The first situation in question came against the Browns on Dec. 17. The Ravens ran the ball once across three fourth-quarter drives despite running for nearly 200 yards throughout the first three quarters of the game behind J.K. Dobbins and Gus Edwards. The Ravens had fallen behind 13-3 when they turned to a passing game that didn’t feature starting quarterback Lamar Jackson.
Two days later, Harbaugh mentioned that the clock became a factor in deciding to abandon the run but that the Ravens could’ve stuck with the run longer.
“We didn’t run the ball in the fourth quarter once we got after 11 minutes, so you look back at that real hard, and you say, ‘Yeah, we could’ve run it,'” Harbaugh said. “We were hitting them with some good runs, and maybe would’ve popped a few runs because we were doing well.”
The second situation came against the Steelers on Jan. 1, when Edwards got just three carries in a 16-13 loss. The Ravens opted to lean on Dobbins, who posted 93 yards on 17 carries, but didn’t complement him with Edwards’ bulldozing style. A day later, Harbaugh was upset that Edwards didn’t get more chances.
“Gus should have played more. There’s no doubt about it,” Harbaugh said. “There’s really no excuse for that.”
Offensive coordinator Greg Roman calls plays, and position coaches likely have significant input into how many snaps each of their players sees in various personnel groupings. Harbaugh oversees the entire operation. In addressing Edwards’ lack of carries, Billick said the criticism of Harbaugh is misplaced.
“I don’t know that it’s a fair criticism to say, ‘Well, shouldn’t John Harbaugh know?’ Yeah, he does know,” Billick said on Glenn Clark Radio Jan. 5. “And in the postmortem you look at it and say, ‘Yeah, Gus probably should’ve played more, but here’s why [he] didn’t and let’s see what we can do moving forward so we don’t get into that loop.’
“But during the course of the game, I don’t think that’s a fair assessment to say, ‘Well, gee, aren’t you aware of that and shouldn’t you be doing something about it?’ I’m sure you are during the course of the game as best you can, but the flow of the game is going to dictate that more than anything.”
Billick mentioned that the Steelers held the ball for 34:14 during the Jan. 1 game and the Ravens went three-and-out in the two drives before the ill-fated final possession, meaning there weren’t a lot of opportunities to spread the ball around late in the game. Dobbins was also running well, so the Ravens might have simply opted to ride the hot hand.
“Trust me, Greg Roman did not go into the game going, ‘Ah, I don’t think we’re going to play Gus Edwards a lot today.’ That wasn’t the plan,” Billick said. “Sometimes it unfolds that way. You look at the same thing [another way]. I love seeing that they got Mark Andrews involved. … But then you look at the outside receivers and go, ‘Well, how come they’re not getting more balls?’ Well, that’s because that’s the way it falls sometimes.”
Billick then talked about the Browns game, during which the Ravens abandoned the run late. He said a head coach should not overrule his offensive coordinator during the course of a play call, but that the head coach can ask his coordinator to take him through his thought process between series.
“Now, in between series there can be, ‘Hey, tell me what you’re seeing here. Tell me what’s going on. Why aren’t we running the ball?’ And take them through that process,” Billick said. ” … Or same on the defensive side — ‘Boy, we’re playing a lot of zone. I thought we were going to pressure more.’ And prompting the coordinator as best you can in a short period of time, ‘OK, we were going to do this, why are we not doing that?'”
If head coaches do not call plays, they cannot “shackle” a coordinator by butting in during the middle of a play call, according to Billick. Teams have either 25 or 40 seconds to get a play off (usually 40). A coach’s communication with the quarterback is cut off at the 15-second mark.
“There’s no way a head coach — not a good head coach, and John Harbaugh is as good as there is — during the course of the play call given the time [is] going, ‘No, don’t run that play,'” Billick said. “There are some that do, but most of them aren’t employed right now because that’s just not the way to operate.”
For more from Billick, listen to the full interview here,
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