The Los Angeles Rams’ season hasn’t gone exactly as planned, with two ugly losses and an underwhelming record of 6-4. The Ravens, on the other hand, are 8-2 and have absolutely rolled over their last four opponents.
Monday night’s matchup is huge for both teams, but the Rams desperately need a win to keep pace with their foes in the NFC playoff picture. Ahead of this Week 12 showdown, we talked to managing editor Matthew Stevens of Ravens Wire about the state of Baltimore’s team.
We discussed Marcus Peters, whom the Rams traded to the Ravens at midseason, as well as Lamar Jackson and the improved Baltimore defense, among other topics.
How has Marcus Peters played since arriving?
Peters has been stellar for Baltimore. It’s not a coincidence the Ravens’ defense has jumped up the rankings after trading for him, holding the No. 1 DVOA since Week 7, when they traded for Peters. He’s been physical and aggressive without being too much of either thing to draw penalties or get burned deep. In return, that aggressiveness has netted him two interceptions, returning both for touchdowns. He’s the perfect complement to Marlon Humphrey, who has arguably been the best cornerback in the league this season, albeit not putting up a ton of interceptions of his own.
Perhaps the best thing about having Peters is that he allows defensive coordinator Don Martindale to be a little more inventive with how he manufacturers pressure. By knowing the cornerbacks have things locked down fully now, he can send blitzes from different spots and at different times to throw off offensive lines and quarterbacks.
What has changed about the Ravens defense the last few weeks?
The biggest change has obviously been Peters, but quite a lot has changed outside of that, actually. The Ravens have added six players since Week 5 that have turned into impact players playing a high percentage of snaps.
Outside of Peters, I contend the biggest and most important defensive change has come at linebacker, seeing Baltimore switch out Kenny Young and Patrick Onwuasor for Josh Bynes and L.J. Fort. That change immediately saw improvements, most importantly in coverage, with Bynes grabbing an interception just a few days after being signed. Much like with Peters, the improved play at linebacker has allowed the rest of the defense to take added responsibilities off their shoulders and just do their individual jobs better. The secondary hasn’t had as many lapses, the run defense is in much better shape and the Ravens have generated more consistent pressure.
Another big reason the defense has improved has simply been because everyone’s getting more comfortable with the playbook and each other. A large portion of the starting defense is made up of newcomers that weren’t with the team just last year — some being signed as recently as last week. As guys like safety Earl Thomas have jelled with the coaching staff and their teammates, the play has steadily improved with it. It both helps and hurts that the Ravens run a more complicated scheme that includes a bigger playbook than most others.
That takes time to digest and turn into muscle memory, but once they get there, there’s a lot to dig your teeth into and play with on the fly. We’re seeing the defense come out on the other side now and putting in performances similar to what we saw last year with their No. 1 ranking.
What is Lamar Jackson’s biggest weakness right now?
I still wonder if Jackson would revert back to some of his bad habits and mechanics if a defense could find a way to throw him off his rhythm or dictate to the Ravens’ offense what they’ll do instead of the other way around. He’s had some of that happen earlier in the season but has generally been improving from Week 4 on, coinciding with his MVP argument strengthening. However, we saw a little dip in the first quarter of Week 11 against the Houston Texans before regaining his mojo and going 13-of-13 the rest of the way.
The problem with trying to replicate that success against Jackson is that it almost seems to be self-created rather than what a defense has done to him thus far. Even last week against the Texans, it was Baltimore’s miscues that threw everything off in the first quarter. Once they settled down as a team, they got right back to form and never flinched again. Part of the reason for that rhythm is that the Ravens’ offense is a pick-your-poison style that creates mismatches in a few spots and then picks apart wherever a defense is pulling from to cover elsewhere.
If you use a safety to spy Jackson, it’s going to leave passing lanes open to Marquise Brown and Mark Andrews. If you have a stout defensive line and you commit to shutting down the power rushing attack, you probably don’t have the outside speed to keep Jackson from running around you or the speed on the field to protect against the intermediate passing attack inside. If you throw more defenders into the secondary to cover everyone and keep Jackson contained, they’ll bludgeon you with running backs Mark Ingram and Gus Edwards)
What happened in the Ravens’ two losses? How did the Chiefs and Browns win?
Both of those games were before Baltimore’s defense underwent a dramatic change in personnel. In fact, those two games were the reason the Ravens made such drastic changes, starting in Week 5. In both games, the secondary had major lapses that left guys completely uncovered for touchdowns, something you can’t have against talented offenses. Combine that with little in the way of a pass rush, and it allowed two really good quarterbacks to just sit back and pick apart an already battered secondary.
On both sides of the ball, Baltimore had penalties at the worst possible times. It killed their drives while sustaining drives for their opponents, and further wore out a defense that was dealing with injuries that kept out quite a few starters. Against the Chiefs, a close loss very well could have been a win if they get a few calls their way or some questionable penalties aren’t called at all. Against the Browns, it allowed what was already set to be a close division matchup to turn into a blowout in favor of Cleveland. Losing the turnover battle that week didn’t help them either.
What’s your prediction for Monday night?
As has been the case for the last few weeks, I’m not sure if the Rams have the defensive talent to take away everything the Ravens can do. They have one of the best defensive lines in the league, which should do wonders against Baltimore’s physical power-rushing attack. But they’re going to either have to sell out to contain Jackson, which will open up the pass or they’re going to have to let Jackson run all over them and hope they can limit the damage. We’ve seen defenses try to do both and ultimately no one has been able to really shut them down yet.
So it’s going to come down to whether Los Angeles’ offense can beat the Ravens’ defense, which has been arguably their best unit over the last three weeks in spite of Jackson and the offense getting all the praise. Considering Jared Goff has more turnovers than touchdowns through 10 games this season and Todd Gurley’s usage continues to draw questions and criticism, I’m not sure the Rams have what it takes to win a shootout. And when Baltimore gets out to a two-score lead in a game, opponents have gotten desperate and only dug themselves further into the hole like quicksand.
I think that’s exactly what happens here as well. It’ll be a close one for the first half, but the Ravens take a big enough lead in the third quarter to force the Rams into abandoning the run and leaning on Goff, which only causes more problems as Baltimore’s opportunistic defense makes them pay. Which then, in turn, gives the offense a short field, and they pile on the points quickly.
Ravens 38, Rams 17