BALTIMORE — Baltimore MVP quarterback Lamar Jackson and Washington rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels put on the show that most had expected, but the Ravens’ ability to unleash Derrick Henry proved to be a big difference as the Ravens held off Washington, 30-23, at M&T Bank Stadium on Oct. 13.
Jackson completed 20 of 26 passes for 323 yards and a touchdown, and Henry ran for 132 yards and two scores as the Ravens (4-2) won their fourth in a row after an 0-2 start.
The Ravens took the lead for good at 17-10 in the final minute of the first half when Jackson threw a 13-yard touchdown pass to Mark Andrews. Then in the second half, the Ravens had an answer for every threat by Daniels and the Commanders (4-2).
Daniels, the rookie No. 2 overall pick who had taken the league by storm in leading the Commanders to four straight wins, finished 24-for-35 for 269 yards and two touchdowns. That included a fourth-down, tight-window 7-yard touchdown pass to Terry McLaurin along the left sideline that cut the Ravens’ lead to 27-20 with 12:12 left.
But the Ravens, who have had more than their share of issues holding late leads in the past few years, didn’t wilt time this, in large part because of Henry. On the ensuing drive, he ran four times for 22 yards, and Jackson connected with Rashod Bateman (4 catches, 71 yards) twice to get the Ravens into field goal range in a drive that chewed up nearly six minutes of the fourth quarter.
Justin Tucker’s 39-goal boosted the lead to 30-20. The Commanders weren’t done, though. Austin Seibert’s third field goal of the game trimmed the Ravens lead to 30-23 with 2:48 left, but Henry essentially ended the game when he broke free on a 27-yard run just before two-minute warning.
The Ravens still needed one more first down to secure the win, and they got it when Jackson kept around left end for two yards on third-and-1.
The Ravens overcame a ragged start that included an interception and a fumble on their first two possessions. On their opening drive, Jackson’s pass glanced off Andrews’ hands and was intercepted. Their second drive ended in a field goal after Jackson had to fall on a botched third-down snap from Tyler Linderbaum.
Wide receiver Zay Flowers shouldered the Ravens’ offensive load in the first half with nine catches for 132 yards, both career highs.
Here are five quick impressions of the win, which improves Jackson’s record against the NFC to 22-1 as a starter:
1. The Ravens’ “pick your poison offense” is humming.
Lamar Jackson just shook his head at the idea of defending what he called the Ravens’ “pick your poison offense” right now. Stack the box to try to stop the league’s No. 1-rushing offense? Jackson can find an open receiver, which he did with Zay Flowers early and Rashod Bateman late.
Worry about the receivers, and he might focus on the tight ends. They had a quieter day than normal, but Andrews (3-66) and Isaiah Likely (2-27) had a combined total of five catches for 93 yards and a score. And as they showed last week, worry too much about Likely or Andrews, and No. 3 tight end Charlie Kolar might sneak off the line of scrimmage and get loose for a big gain.
Stretch the defense to defend all those targets, and the Ravens can unleash Henry or have Jackson keep on a designed run. Both continue to climb all-time lists; with 40 rushing yards against Washington, Jackson passed Cam Newton and moved into No. 2 in NFL history in rushing yardage by a quarterback with 5,661. He needs 449 to pass Michael Vick for the record.
The Ravens have the No. 1 rushing offense in the league and piled up 176 rushing yards against the Commanders.
The Ravens put together two scoring drives of 90-plus yards. They had a nine-play, 93-yard touchdown drive in the second quarter and an eight-play, 94-yard scoring drive in the third. The Ravens finished with 484 yards of offense.
“We are extremely versatile in what we are doing,” Andrews said. “We are going to take this game and get better from it and keep it going week-by-week to become the machine that we know we can be.”
With an offensive line that was always expected to get better as the season progressed, this is an offense that looks increasingly confident and increasingly difficult to defend.
2. Derrick Henry and Patrick Ricard will close the deal.
In baseball, the closer is called upon in a high-leverage spot to protect the lead. There might not be anything more equivalent in the NFL than Derrick Henry running behind Patrick Ricard late in a game against a tired defense.
Henry ran 24 times for 132 yards, his third 100-yard game in the past four weeks. Henry is a fitness freak who historically has gotten stronger as games go on, and in each of the past two weeks, his longest run of the game came in the waning minutes.
In this game, the Ravens leaned heavily on him, often running behind All-Pro fullback Patrick Ricard, on two fourth-quarter drives when they were holding the lead.
Henry ran 15 times for 94 yards after halftime, picking up key yardage late in the fourth quarter when every Commanders player, every coach, and every vendor at M&T Bank Stadium knew he was getting the ball.
Once Washington cut the Ravens lead to 27-20 early in the fourth quarter, Henry ran for 8 and for 5 yards on the first two plays to move the chains. With Washington stacking the box to stop Henry, Lamar Jackson and offensive coordinator Todd Monken mixed it up just enough, and executed when they did so. Jackson found Rashod Bateman for gains of 17 and 18 on that drive, which ended with a field goal by Justin Tucker for a 30-20 lead.
Then when the Ravens got the ball back with a seven-point lead, Henry ran for two yards, and then he burst open down the left sideline for 27. Game over.
When the Ravens signed Henry this offseason, he was viewed as the perfect addition given how the Ravens want to play. Concerns about his wear and his age (30) just haven’t surfaced. He has been everything the Ravens had hoped, and with him on the field late in a game with the lead, the Ravens are a force.
“I definitely just want to be able to close the game so we can win and everybody is happy,” Henry said. “You have to take pride in that, to be able to finish games and have the ball last.”
3. Travis Jones and the Ravens’ run defense deserve their due.
The Ravens came into this game allowing 60.4 rushing yards and 3.05 yards a carry, both the lowest totals in the league. Both those numbers will be going down after Washington ran 18 times for 52 yards (2.9 avg.).
Travis Jones is at the heart of that. The third-year defensive lineman from Connecticut is having a breakout year in a way that bruising run-stuffers can. He won’t put up big sack numbers, but when the Ravens blow up a running play, Jones is usually in the middle of the pile after fighting off a block. When he wraps up a ball-carrier, that player practically disappears. And Jones did record a sack in this game.
“The guy is an animal, as we all know,” linebacker Roquan Smith said, adding that Jones’ “presence throughout the game and just the impact that he had throughout the game is not taken for granted. So, I definitely appreciate him a lot.”
Washington was playing without leading running back Brian Robinson Jr. (knee), but the Commanders came in averaging 178.2 rushing yards a game, second only to the Ravens (211.2). They never got on track.
The Commanders ran on first down 10 times. Four of them went for no gain, and the longest gain, 9 yards came on a scramble by Daniels. The other nine first-down carries netted 23 yards.
That kept the Commanders in longer third-down situations and put more pressure on rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels. The Commanders came into the game converting a league-best 51.7 percent of their third downs and they went 4-for-12.
Jones, who finished with four tackles, isn’t alone up front. Justin Maduibuike, Michael Pierce and Brent Urban are also winning in the trenches.
“We go against them all the time [in practice] and it’s a tough, gritty group,” center Tyler Linderbaum said. “… They play the game the right way.”
Plenty has been written this year about the struggles of the Ravens’ secondary and a learning curve for new coordinator Zach Orr. But give the Ravens’ defense its credit for the way it negates the running game and forces teams to be one-dimensional.
4. Mark Andrews has been located.
Mark Andrews slammed the ball down and gave out a yell, unleashing a lot of pent-up emotion after his first touchdown of the season gave the Ravens a 17-10 lead. Earlier in the game, on the Ravens’ opening drive, a pass from Jackson had glanced off Andrews’ outstretched hands and was intercepted, adding to what had been a strange, frustrating season to date for the All-Pro tight end.
Andrews’ training camp was disrupted by a scary car accident on the way to the team facility, and while he and team officials said he escaped without any injuries, he was shockingly quiet during the first five weeks of the season. In Weeks 3 and 4, he was held without a catch in back-to-back games for the first time in his career. In one of those games, against Buffalo, he dropped a pass while wide-open.
The whispers began: What’s wrong with Andrews? Nothing, head coach John Harbaugh said. Nothing, quarterback Lamar Jackson said. Nothing, Andrews said. They noted that Andrews was often being double-teamed and that opened up the field for others, including Zay Flowers and tight end Isaiah Likely, the Ravens’ leading receiver among tight ends this year.
They noted that he’s blocking better than ever, and that he has been a key blocker on some of their biggest runs of the season.
But at some point, the Ravens expect and need Andrews to make big plays, and Andrews, as ferociously competitive as anyone in that locker room, expects it as well. So as he came down with a 13-yard pass for a touchdown and a 17-10 lead, the relief was apparent as he spiked the ball into the turf and gave out a scream.
“It felt great to get in the end zone,” Andrews said. “It was a great feeling. It usually doesn’t take me six games to get in there. Yes, that was a fun one. [Jackson] threw a great ball.”
The touchdown was the 41st of Andrews’ career, tying Todd Heap for the Ravens’ all-time record among tight ends.
Andrews finished with three catches for a season-high 66 yards.
The Ravens have to be encouraged that others such as Flowers, Likely and even No. 3 tight end Charlie Kolar have picked up the slack. But this team is better with Andrews showing his old form, and if they’ve relocated that, this offense got even better.
5. That 0-2 start seems a long time ago.
The uncertainty and concern after an 0-2 start that included a home loss to Gardner Minshew and the Las Vegas Raiders has subsided, as the Ravens have reeled off four straight wins to rise to the top of the AFC North.
Other than frustrating gaffes in the secondary, this team has looked more like the team many pegged in July as an AFC Super Bowl favorite. Lamar Jackson is playing at an MVP level again, Derrick Henry is exactly who he has been, and Zay Flowers is emerging as a slippery, shifty No. 1 receiver on pace for 1,136 yards.
The offensive line, maligned after two weeks, has steadily improved and appears to have found a winning formula with Patrick Mekari at left guard and rookie Roger Rosengarten at right tackle.
It’s still a long season that is less than half over, and nothing will be given, all will be earned. But like a boxer that took an early shot, the Ravens staggered but have recovered and gotten their legs back. Six weeks in, they and the Pittsburgh Steelers appear to be the class of the AFC North.
The Ravens go on the road for two straight games, first to Tampa Bay on “Monday Night Football” Oct. 21 and then to AFC North rival Cleveland on Oct. 27. Baker Mayfield and the Buccaneers (4-2) hung 51 points on the New Orleans Saints this week, but the Ravens team that will go to Tampa is a better, more confident team than it was a month ago.
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