Predictable Offense

[italianjoker]

years upon years of the same old thing have killed our offense. i will listen to the "give McNair time to learn the offense" for a little while, but this offense is to closed for us to succeed.

yeah, yeah, we are 3 and 0 right now and i am happy and appreciate that. i give them their props for what they have accomplished. my main problem is the fact that we do not open the field up at all. teams do not respect us. sure, they give us a step more than they used to with Kyle in there, but not much.

watch SD this week. watch how close they stay to our line of scrimmage. teams are putting their entire team within 10 yrds of the LOS. our wrs only run 10 yrd routes at best. many of them running next to each other so that 1 guy can cover 2. when we run the ball, we have that stupid "bunch" package keeping the entire team between the hash marks and then run right up the middle.

if we do not take some shots downfield and open up this offense some, we are going to lose a lot of games to come. i just hope that McNair can actually get the ball there when we take those shots. so far, he has underthrown the wrs, allowing them to be tackled.

[Mista T]

:iagree:

I was hoping to see the offense open up with a new QB that the coaches have greater confidence in. And I'm tired of the excuses being made. An offense that produces just one TD per game is not likely to cut it against the better teams that the Ravens will be facing this month. Moreover, for the first time since 1997, the Ravens WRs appear to be awesome, but inhibited by some combination of playcalling and/or McNair's disappointing arm strength.

Hopefully, what we have seen in the first three games has been Billick's crew not wanting to show their cards against the weaker opponents, and we will be in a pleasant surprise this Sunday!

http://media.scout.com/media/image/26/263359.gif

[UKRavenStockers]

The most encouraging adjustment I've seen in our passing game is that we're covering for the weakness/fade on McNair's deep passes by running our deep routes in from the sideline a bit so that the passes fade to the sideline, not beyond as they have done in years past.

I've got no problems with a methodical approach to offense but our passing game just seems far too simplistic, I don't see many double moves as an alternative to deep routes as a way to attempt to push back press coverage, we are just very simplistic, in's, out's and deep routes, if we think McNair is still the capable and warrior like QB he's been (even if we think he's perhaps 80% of what he used to be) then we've gotta fully open up the routes to exploit the reliability of Mason, the mismatches Heap brings and the run after the catch ability of Clayton.

[italianjoker]

Hopefully, what we have seen in the first three games has been Billick's crew not wanting to show their cards against the weaker opponents, and we will be in a pleasant surprise this Sunday!


this is one thing i forgot to touch on, but agree with totally.


as for UK, have you ever noticed how our DBs give a huge cushion off the line, where the opposition dbs blanket our guys week in and week out? it is crazy. i know each defense runs different schemes, but we rarely if ever see that one guy running free that you see from other teams at least once a game. and i think we have the wrs that can do that. just odd they do not.

[UKRavenStockers]

Notice that a lot IJ, I think with us not playing press is because in the last couple of years we've taken a lot of penalties from our corners playing too physical, ti strikes me as a complete cop out way of avoiding some of those penalties, but if our illegal contact and PI penalties are coming when we're pressing then I guess it makes sense to not press and take those penalties out.

Even so, CMac is a physical corner so seeing him not press is odd because that simply doesn't help his game as he doesn't have the elite top end speed to just run with guys (hence Chad Johnson beating him a lot the last two years), he needs to bump them and knock them off their routes.

I'm also with you on noticing other teams pressing us a lot and them doing it to Clayton I can understand because the main doubt of him coming out of his draft was that he wouldn't be able to get off the jam in the pros, I think at times he's getting off the jam well but I think defensive coordinators and DB coaches around the league are waiting for him to do it more regularly and really hurt teams before they take the jam off him, even so that's Fassel's, Billick's, Clayton's (and whoever our WRs coach is) to scheme to get Clayton off the jam, Clayton to get more physical and develop more moves or god forbid move him in motion so that the DB has to try and hit a moving target, not a stationary one.

Just the entire lack of inventiveness in our passing game in spite of the injection of talent of the last few years is infuriating.

[braven98]

Its still very vanilla

[camdenyard]

Repeat after me, and follow the bouncing ball:

It's the offensve line, people.

[highwater]

my main problem is the fact that we do not open the field up at all. teams do not respect us. sure, they give us a step more than they used to with Kyle in there, but not much.

I agree, except from what I've seen so far, the opposing defenses are not giving us a different look at all -- I've seen eight in the box a lot so far. They are still waiting for us to prove we can hurt them passing.

What I'm hoping is that we open it up this weekend because (1) we are finally playing a quality team, and (2) historically, Billick has played very conservative on offense on the road. Well, this is not a road game, so hopefully that "let's play it safe" attitude will not creep into the game plan so much.

[UKRavenStockers]

Repeat after me, and follow the bouncing ball:

It's the offensve line, people.

That stops us from including double moves, I'll agree with you there, but it doesn't stop our offensive coaches from experimenting with how to back DBs off, at some point you have to be able to back people off by scheme, in spite of having a horrendous OL.

[camdenyard]

In order to throw the deep pass, the one that will back the DBs off, you need protection. McNair hasn't gotten it. He's getting clobbered on 3-step drops, for crying out loud.

The offensive line is your limiting factor.

[BTP Raven]

You're absolutely right IJ. Run, Run, Throw has got to go. If we open up with 2 long strikes downfield from Air McNair, SD won't know what hit them. It was nice to see McNair use the throw to open up the run last week - hopefully, they'll use it again to keep SD off balance. Of course, as others have pointed out, this too requires an O-line. I can't wait to see how Marcus McNeil does for SD because I really wanted him in the 2nd this year.

[Mista T]

Repeat after me, and follow the bouncing ball:

It's the offensve line, people.

Overused and exaggerated excuse.:bag:

Anyway: good coaching can help offset. e.g. how often, when faced with porous pass protection, do we run draws?:229031_confused2:

:mrt:

[ExiledRaven]

How about using the short passing game to screw with people?

Pats used to do that all the time, throw lots of slants, almost impossible to stop...but of course bigger WRs are better...still, you've got heap split out, etc.

We'll see, I think we'll see a new wrinkle this week since I'm playing the optimist.

[PurpleRulz]

Can we wait until McNair has learned the offense? Geez, guys we are 3-0. Face reality that we are not going to be a Bengals or Colts high powered offense. That's NOT GOING TO HAPPEN! McNair is not a QB that throws for 300 passing yards and never has been.

Our M..O. will always be ball control. We will run and play smashmouth football with a passing game that balances our attack. (See the Cleveland game, 4th quarter). McNair also has to get on the same page with Clayton, Williams, and Moore. He seems to have found a comfort with Mason, Heap and Wilcox.

I would give this offense until the game after the bye week, but everyone just Chillax and enjoy being 3-0 and possibly even 4-0.

[Kaven]

Watch for changes this week. The Ravens had no intention of showing anything they didn't have to in the past two games. Things open up this week.

[highwater]

Watch for changes this week. The Ravens had no intention of showing anything they didn't have to in the past two games. Things open up this week.

I'm not positive this will happen, but this is what I am hoping will happen. I think the offense will look a little different this week.

[Ravens0587]

Even so, CMac is a physical corner so seeing him not press is odd because that simply doesn't help his game as he doesn't have the elite top end speed to just run with guys

Are yu kidding me? That's what makes himi so great is that he is a big physical corner but he does have the top end speed to cover

[UKRavenStockers]

Are yu kidding me? That's what makes himi so great is that he is a big physical corner but he does have the top end speed to cover

No he's not an elite speed corner, he's a big phyiscal corner with good cover speed, but you just need to see him up against Chad Johnson to know he doesn't have elite speed. He's stays with quick guys by playing physical and knocking them off their routes, not by running step for step with them.

[Ravens0587]

so then who in your opinion has elite speed?

[UKRavenStockers]

DeAngelo Hall has elite speed, Terrance McGee has elite speed (though not the rest of the game to go with it) other pure speed guys along those lines. Fact is there aren't that many CBs with elite speed much like there aren't many really tall CBs, both for the same reason so far as I can see it, they get put at WR where you can score points from those attributes.

Elite speed is elite speed for a reason because few have it, CMac has very good straight line speed but it's not elite speed, absolutely running with guys isn't his strong point, as guys spend longer and longer in the league it becomes less a part of their game because of wear and tear, the younger guys are the guys who can just turn and run with guys for the most part in my opinion.

[Ravens0587]

I disagree. I think he has great straight line speed.

and btw chad johnson is one of those players that isn't that fast, but when he gets on the field he plays faster then his 40 time.

[Merlin]

How much does the o-line prevent us from opening up the playbook?

Unless we take steps to address that -- saw that TL expounded on the Ogden at RT idea :thumbup: plus Brown plus Terry -- don't think we're going to get any new flavors besides vanilla.

[italianjoker]

i will agree about the oline to an extent, but i think he has gotten some time this year. more than we have seen in previous years. there are plenty of times when McNair has just stood around back there and taken a sack.

aside from that, if our oline has sucked that bad, why has McNair not run the ball at all? do our qbs go out with directions to hold the ball until you are sacked? seriously. he has not scrambled at all compared to the McNair of the past. sure, he is older now. still, he has had a few times where he could have run and hurt the blitzing team to keep them honest. instead, just stood there or shuffled around a little bit to delay the sack.

also, to help with the blocking, ever heard of keeping in the rb and te to block? i know these are novel ideas, but our offense has never learned them. the RB and TE in this offense just chip their defender and go. someone brought up the Pats. they max protect all the time and their passing game was fine. i know Mason and Clayton are just as good as any of their previous wr tandems.

lastly, purplerulz, read what is written and respond please. no one on here has tried to compare this offense to the colts or the bungles. we are looking for a competent offense. and that is something we do not have right now. everyone is giving them props and high-fives for barely getting into 52 yrd fieldgoal range last week. 1) why did we need the FG? because our inept offense could not do a thing to gain a yard the entire game. 2) what would a good offense had done at the end of that game? they would have eaten the clock in order to leave no time and they would have gotten closer. without the miracle catches of Clayton and Mason last week would have been a loss. and against a real football team, last week would have been a loss.

with the talent on this team (top TE, one of the top wrs, 3 good rbs) there is no reason why this team can not have an offense that moves the ball at will. instead, the defense gives them the ball on the opposition's 40 or closer multiple times against oakland and we just kick FGs.