colin

the honest answer is no. the flip side to that is if you don't protect the ball, you will lose to lesser teams. the ravens are the 6th best nfl team of all time based on DVOA. they are also huge fast and physical, which is an advantage vs everyone and in any scheme, so they aren't as game script dependent as other all time nfl teams by DVOA. they lost because of turnovers way way more than we won based on anything we did. if we came out and scored 10 points on our two first 3rd quarter drives instead of a 3 and out and a 4 and out, then i'd argue we clearly played better and took advantage of mistakes and hammered the nails in when we needed to, but that didn't happen. we really just made fewer mistakes and held on to win.

some good points about the culture war issues w lamar in this thread. the thing for me (the football thing, there are culture war/race/whatever issues in sports media, but sports media is oddly politically charged and shockingly shockingly dumb so I'll ignore it here) is that the big rub for those of us who think josh was mvp over lamar, and that lamar was sort of gifted his prior MVPs is that lamar plays qb on easy mode, and josh plays qb on hard mode on the ice level of the game (those are always frustrating). lamar (for most of his career, but let's just focus on this season) has a silly level of talent around him on his team. their d fell off early but ended on a strong note. their secondary has a soft spot in it, but the rest of it is crazy (top guys in humphries, and a legit positional mutant in hamilton). their LBs are really really good, and smith in the middle is around the best in the nfl (they traded high value picks for him considering he's an off ball lb, and aj klien, LOL). their DL are a deep squad of monsters, and they got KVN to be an edge monster late in his career, oweh has not produced sacks like they wanted, but he's a size weight speed freak (i know those guys are "lbs", but they really are DL in my opinion) and really the mix of talent they have up front is a crazy match up for everyone. On O they get solid play from their OL (big strong and dirty but the refs barely ever seem to call them, how did they not get holding flags in that barn burner of a game?), have very solid TE talent, hall of fame RB with a back up RB who is a dangerous guy, and their mix of WRs (flowers being out hurt them this season) who have enough speed and shiftiness to scare you. Their kicker is literally the best of all time for his career, and they always seem to return and cover well. Their coach is a champion and while their DC is a rookie, they never seem to have too many unproven coordinators or position coaches. the ravens really are the monster team who are built to win tough physical games, the less stuff get called the better it should be for them. when you hear ex nfl players talk about who they played with, the crazy men who scared people with their strength of speed, the guys who were grown man size at 16 and always dominated, and the nasty rough confident guys are always the ones they talk about most. fan favorite plucky freddie jackson guys who went no where for school and just somehow got it done besides being maybe undertalented never get the good stories. that's not who always win championships, but that's who you'd instinctively see as the biggest threats. that's the ravens top to bottom, they draft based on size speed and temperament, their "process" is about getting as many scary monsters on the field as they can. Lamar is like that a little bit at QB. he's small and not a fast processer, and doesn't have the tightest fundamentals, but he's super confident, the fastest and most athletic guy to play qb since vick, and a heisman winner to boot. the ravens coaches have engineered a system where they have their team playing advantage football. the vicious hard hitting way they play (reminds me of the 2012 era seattle team, they foul on like every play but only get called sometimes), the speed and size they have all over the field (300 pound mutant fullback, fast guys outside and at qb, and rb, 6'4" and fast safety, no team looks like them!) is hard to deal with at all times. when you see the ravens line up, and you see the bills line up, you really think the ravens should beat the bills to a pulp and in every way except turnovers and the score just like they did last night. qb's get credit for the whole team, so it's natural the sports media lauds qbs based on great coaching and well built teams. lamar has what is almost certainly 3 mvps while only having 3 playoff wins and not one solid playoff campaign to hang his hat on (this one was his best ever, and his mistakes cost his much more talented team the win today). he's obviously much better than most nfl qb's, but if playoffs and championships is what matters, he's simply not had success in the post season and he doesn't have the allen narrative (itself being something that many in the media hate about allen, because their preferred narrative is that he's a disaster in waiting who will play basically how lamar played today) of balling out and being the best player in the playoffs despite his team losing. im pretty confident to say that if allen were on the ravens, and lamar was a bill, they'd both have success and playoff appearances and division wins, but allen would have some chips w baltimore and this board would talk about how we need a player more like josh allen who play better when the stakes are higher. that's why so many of us discount the lamar mvps and think josh should have some. in the end it's hard to really establish who the best or better or more clutch player is in a team sport, but narratives capture interest more than complex analysis, and the narratives on both lamar and josh are so overdone and charged up and interesting that mud is gonna get thrown no matter what happens.

I think we were good and also lucky to get trucked statistically like we did and still win. Our d is simply not staffed or coached to stop the ravens, few teams are. There was a bit of room to be better there (blitz edge guys not up the gut, we suck so bad at inside blitzes) but frankly not much. On O Brady lost his flipping mind in the second half. The ravens knew what we were going to do based on our personnel and formation nearly every time. We did almost nothing to stress the defense, we just let them bully us near the Los and played weak small ball. Brady simply does not have is do anything to outside wrs. What bothers me is if he's gonna not do that, then passes to RBs (we did like 4 and they were very effective) and play action or roll outs or something but not an obvious cool hand off on 1st was needed. Ty was covered and accounted for approximately zero times all game, Baltimore sucks covering backs, how Brady can't figure that vs his trash screens is baffling to me. A single TD on either of the first two 3rd quarter drives ice's the game for us, he has Allen but runs plays like he has Chicago's QB and ol Nearly the worst half of football I've seen from Brady, he better flip that script hard

When we blitz from the outside we get huge results. Milano forced the pick, Hamlin forced the fumble, and we messed up Detroit with some too. When we blitz inside we run into blocks, lose contain, and just kinda suck most of the time. It's crazy that we don't stunt more and use outside rushers more. Like, am I crazy? Does anyone else notice this?

Henry is so obviously that teams MVP. We held him in check enough and they couldn't do it, vs an undersized d that honestly lacks talent all over. Josh avoided a lot of negative plays, but he didn't really have a heater, nor did we run that well. If Allen didn't get the MVP last year because of turnovers, then it's pretty clear by that criteria Lamar is a playoff pumpkin

Ty Johnson is our least covered player by far, so we keep him off the field vs the best running d in the NFL by a country mile. The ol was solid, so the quick small ball stuff laterally was dumb. Some roll outs with a pass option for Josh woulda killed them. They worked every time. If Brady gets a HC gig he will be lucky to look as good as Dabol has, and that's not great

Brady won't run outside passes, maybe the odd quick out or a couple 50/50 balls to 0. His scheme has shown zero ability to get the ball to wrs, and increasingly TEs down the field. The biggest weakness to me was the lack of wheel routes and RB passes. Ty was impactful every time he was south there, so instead he goes extra ol and runs cook into a pile. He better figure it out with a quickness now, but he leans on the same stuff too much

Incredible win, such a puckered butthole game. The teamed played their hearts out, d got steam rolled particularly in the second half but pulled out enough turnovers to win. The offensive play calling was pretty awful all second half. Nothing outside, nothing to wrs, too predictable. We can beat KC, and anyone else left, this was by a mile the worst match up, but Brady had better stop interviewing and start game planning.

That was nearly the worst possible win. Love it!!!!

This d is awful

Awful d on that play, but hard to stop a scrambling Lamar. If they get 8 here and win this game it's gonna be Lamar is better than Josh all day everyday for a long time

7 being out is bad

Small Ball to small guys isn't working

Mana from all the gods

Another really poorly called drive. 3 possessions in the 2nd half, 3 points and minus 6 for scoring. No down field passes at all This is coaching scared and weak

Bad toss

We don't have our best weapons doing weapon things, and zero passes to RBS outside of a couple cheap screens. Just a lack of scheme here

I love the PMA, I'm so shell shocked!!

We are lucky to not be tied. These wasted drives and defensive lay downs to start this quarter is wearing my patience with MCD thin. It's time to decide if we are a championship team or a squad of soft clowns

Ok, this team looks like they can't hang. Gotta make some plays

What 3rd quarter so far

Hollins is the only outside guy there and the right ends aren't getting open deep, makes the o easy mode to stop. We need some actual plays. We are one bad play on d from a tie game.

Good play at the end there, but they got points. Here is another chance to seal this more tightly

Another bad 3rd

If we end up losing, that sequence will be big. Bad return, horrible drive, bad punt and coverage