Marlon Humphrey has seen players come and go in eight years with the Ravens. He’s also seen chances come and go. Now the second-longest tenured Raven after the departure of kicker Justin Tucker, Humphrey, who turns 29 on July 8, speaks with both perspective and a touch of urgency knowing his window to reach that elusive Super Bowl won’t be open forever.
Led by two-time Most Valuable Player Lamar Jackson, the Ravens return nearly every starter from a team that finished 12-5 and won the AFC North for the second straight season in 2024. By every measure, the team should be positioned to make a Super Bowl run.
But that’s been the case several times in Humphrey’s career, and the Ravens have always come up short. That has left Humphrey both frustrated and motivated.
“I feel that we’ve prepared like a championship team, and there’s just been something we have to do,” an introspective Humphrey said in a lengthy media session as minicamp ended last month. “But I don’t feel that we’re far off.”
Yet he knows as well as anyone in that locker room the sting of playoff shortcomings.
After the top-seeded Ravens were upset at home by the Tennessee Titans in the 2019 playoffs — which came a year after a first-round playoff loss at home to the Los Angeles Chargers — Humphrey had said, “I think you have to look at yourself in the mirror, and I think this team’s identity right now is to get in the playoffs and choke. It is what it is. This is just the hard truth.”
Humphrey finally earned his first playoff win in 2020 at Tennessee, but the Ravens were eliminated the next week at Buffalo. Other playoff heartbreak followed. The Ravens playing without Lamar Jackson lost at Cincinnati in the opening round of the 2022 playoffs when Bengals defensive lineman Sam Hubbard returned a fumble 98 yards for a touchdown for the game-winning score.
Then in 2023, the Ravens earned the AFC’s No. 1 seed only to lose at home to the Kansas City Chiefs in the AFC championship game.
This past season, the Bills again ended the Ravens’ season, this time in the divisional round.
Like Jackson, Humphrey has walked off the field as a winner way more often than as a loser. In regular-season games in which Humphrey has played, the Ravens are 71-28. But Humphrey is 2-6 in eight playoff games. (He did not play in the 2023 divisional round win against Houston.)
Asked about postseason struggles, Humphrey said, “I’m not gonna say that we have underperformed, but we have underperformed. I feel that we’ve had championship-caliber rosters. I feel that we’ve prepared like a championship team. It’s just something we gotta do.”
Humphrey said in the days after this past season ended, most players scattered as is typical, but Humphrey and a few others stuck around to try to do a post-mortem and find some answers about the latest postseason disappointment.
“We never really came to anything,” he said. “It just felt like we were preparing the way we should. It really seemed like everything was kind of where you wanted it, and the answer never truly came.”
The obvious answer, he noted, was turnovers. The Ravens committed three, and the Bills committed none. Jackson threw an interception and lost a fumble in the first half, and tight end Mark Andrews lost a fumble in the second half. Andrews also dropped a would-be, game-tying two-point conversion pass with 1:33 left in the Ravens’ 27-25 loss.
Humphrey, though, wasn’t pointing figures at Jackson or Andrews. Just as he did earlier in the season when criticism swirled around first-year defensive coordinator Zach Orr, Humphrey put the onus on himself and the defense.
“Three [forced] turnovers are more than likely going to win the game. Two [forced] turnovers, you’re more than likely going to win the game. … That’s pretty evident,” he said. “It doesn’t really matter how good you play defensively, if you can’t get the football, you’re not playing good enough.”
Humphrey said in watching videos of the 2000 Super Bowl Ravens, he was struck by the dominance of the defense, especially its ability to create game-changing turnovers.
Overall last season, the Ravens finished with a plus-6 turnover differential, which ranked tied for 10th. The defense struggled mightily early in the season before a second-half resurgence, finishing 10th overall and 31st in pass defense.
“When I first came to the Ravens, it was all about the Ravens defense. It was all about the Ravens defense. It was all about the Ravens defense,” Humphrey said. He suggested other teams’ players at times caught the “Raven flu” and sat out rather than face the ferocious, thunderous physicality of the Ravens.
“There was a fear of when you stepped on the field,” Humphrey said. “We’re chasing to get it back. It’s an urgency to get it back.”
Noting that he is the longest-tenured defensive player — only tackle Ronnie Stanley has been with the team longer — Humphrey said, “I feel like I’ve let that standard kind of slip, and that’s something that I want to get back. Obviously, we love Lamar Jackson. He’s a great player, but I want the Ravens’ identity to be defense like it was when I first got here, so that’s something that we’re chirping in our room.”
The Ravens are well positioned for that after this offseason. They drafted safety Malaki Starks in the first round, and just as minicamp ended, they signed former Packers Pro Bowl cornerback Jaire Alexander.
If everyone is healthy, the Ravens can trot out a nickel defense featuring five first-round draft picks in the secondary with Humphrey in the slot, Alexander and Nate Wiggins at outside cornerback and Starks and Kyle Hamilton at safety.
The Ravens have Pro Bowl talent throughout the defense with Nnamdi Madubuike up front, Kyle Van Noy on the edge and linebacker Roquan Smith in the middle. They also have Orr back for his second season, and veteran NFL coach Chuck Pagano back in the fold as the secondary coach.
Humphrey said that he is driven to help build “the defense that I feel like Baltimore deserves. … I think that’s crucial to get that standard back, and that’s all I’m thinking about as I go on this break.”
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