Ravens Roost 4

Ravens:
Shall we queue the music? Ice Rice Baby. Rice has been banned from North American Football. That’s right, the CFL won’t even touch him now either, but expect it to be only a temporary knee jerk reaction. His suspension will be reevaluated after all the hype has died down, and analyst only need to look to the handling of the Vick chronicles. I still assert that there is more to this than just the video. Don’t get me wrong, I do not support his actions, but keep in mind that the court system, having fully viewed these videos, only gave him one diversionary course. The League, who denies seeing the tapes, gave him a 2 game suspension originally (hoping the tapes never got leaked?) after meeting with both Rice and his wife. My theory is that Ray is afraid to admit he is the victim of an abusive relationship.

That said, we are missing the real point. Football has started, except for the Ravens who appeared to be taking an extra bye week in week 1. It better be worth it because we now get the, er, “High Flying” steelers who nearly lost a 24 point lead to the Browns. Two losses to division rivals to start the season will dig the Ravens in a terrible hole, and need to find a way to right the ship. It starts with CATCHING the FLIPPIN FOOTBALL.
An estimated 8 dropped passes can not be hung on Flacco, who was mercilessly booed on Sunday. Well, he kind of deserved it a few times, but the overall offensive play was sloppy, and ill-deserving of a win, which they nearly pulled out anyway. The defense kept them in the game by allowing only 5 field goals before finally having their secondary exposed when insufficient quarterback pressure gave Dalton time. Long story short, We have a lot of work to do, or this will become a very long season.

Ravens:
A perfect preseason, which translates into… nothing really. Now the Ravens have their team set for the Week 1, we’ll see how much changes. There are still depth issues, and a few starting positions which the \Ravens say they may address with trades, as they evaluate the options. I don’t expect much to move for now. Our lineup is our lineup, and now we need to live with it.

Ravens:
Another Preseason win, but what is becoming more and more clear is our lack of pass rush and our lack of depth at CB. Ravens need to consider converting a WR that is likely to get cut into a CB, or sign someone else out there, because this can be painful. Ravens also had a tendency to not tackle. I’m not an expert, but this could be bad as well. It’s still early, and I expect these cob webs to clear up before the first game. ’cause if they don’t… well, let’s just hope that they do!

Ravens:
First preseason is out of the way, and no key injuries… Running game looks to be by committee, so don’t be banking on a Ravens RB in your fantasy league… Questionable Offensive Line off to a decent start, but only time will tell… NFL is working up a plan for a mandatory suspension of 4 to 6 games for domestic violence cases, after taking significant heat for the perceived light sentence on Ray Rice…

Ravens:
Well, the Ray Rice penalty saga has finally come to a close, or has it. There has been severe backlash from many non-Baltimore outlets claiming that the penalty was too light. Many fans have said that it would have been better to hit him with 4 games, and then cut it back to 2 after an appeal. Personally, this is about what I expected, but I think the Ravens should have preemptively suspended Rice 2 games, and challenge the league to pile on. The nfl would look more favorably upon the situation if it thought the team was on top of the discipline, but the team is also dealing with 4 other incidences as well, which are all drawing attention away from the real topic: Training Camp, which is now in the thick of it with the first preseason game next Thursday at home against the San Francisco 49ers.

Ravens:
Oh well, our streak of consecutive days without an arrest is over, with Jimmy Smith being picked up on disorderly conduct, or more commonly known as operating without a brain. In summary, he was helping a female friend who obviously had too much to drink, and was unconscious. When emergency personnel arrived on the scene, he revised to give way to medical personnel… Ravens to hold auditions for singing the national anthem on Tuesday… Training camp starts on Thursday, with Quarterbacks, rookies and injured veterans reporting to training camp.