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Why Diontae Johnson is a Raven

Wednesday, October 30, 2024 6:46
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Diontae Johnson to the Ravens makes sense

The Rationale Supporting the Diontae Johnson Trade

For most Ravens fans, the news of the Diontae Johnson trade amounted to a big nothingburger. And from a trade perspective that’s exactly what it was. The Ravens exchanged a 2025 5th-round pick for a Carolina Panthers 6th-round pick (essentially 19 picks apart for the moment), agreed to absorb just $625K in salary plus they get a wide receiver, and a pretty good one at that.

The pushback from the Ravens faithful has less to do with the Diontae Johnson acquisition and more to do with the fact that fans want to see defensive reinforcements to stop the hemorrhaging, to keep the team’s Super Bowl aspirations from bleeding out.

There are 6 days before the trading deadline passes. Let Eric DeCosta work. With the acquisition of Johnson, it’s obvious that EDC has an open line of communication with Panthers GM Dan Morgan. Could a trade that brings Jadeveon Clowney back to Baltimore be in the works? Perhaps EDC is knocking on some other doors. But you can rest assured knowing that DeCosta and his staff are leaving no stone unturned. If a deal or deals are made to improve the defense, DeCosta will make it happen. And if he doesn’t, it’s because the price and the long-term impact upon the team wasn’t worth the price. Always remember, right player, right price.

But back to Diontae.

We’ve established that the cost to get him was next to nothing. But what does he bring to the field? Matt Harmon, a respected football writer and analyst for Yahoo who focuses in large part upon the wide receiver position, points out that the Ravens have faced Cover-1 at the 8th-highest rate in the league. Essentially, the corners use inside leverage to force perimeter receivers to the boundaries. Meanwhile, there’s a single high safety who is asked to patrol the back end of the defense. He needs to be rangy. Ultimately the Cover-1 defense leans those three DBs so that the other 8 defenders can help stymie the opponent’s rushing offense. This is a strategy that the Chiefs used against the Ravens in the AFC Championship Game last season. It also was employed by the Browns this past weekend.

One way to thwart the effectiveness of the Cover-1 defense is to run 11 personnel at it. In other words, a single back, a single tight end and 3 receivers. That will help spread the defense and give a tailback a less congested space within which to operate.

But the Ravens like to use 22 personnel – 2 RBs and 2 TEs, and in order to beat Cover-1 when using such personnel groupings, it’s important to have receivers along the boundaries who can create separation. Suddenness and high-end change of direction skills are a prerequisite. According to Harmon, the Ravens “just got another one who has done it better than almost any non-elite WR over the last five years.”

No, the Ravens have not yet improved a defense that has seemingly lost its identity and is falling rapidly from its No. 1 perch in 2023. But on Tuesday, they did get better overall and the price wasn’t far removed from a freebie.

Tuesday was a win for DeCosta!

[Diontae Johnson to Baltimore: The Film Says “Yes”]

Conquering The Yinzers

Even the staunchest adversary of the Pittsburgh Steelers must give the team credit for at least one thing – under Mike Tomlin they know who they are. They embrace the identity of a tough, physical football team that plays all four quarters. It might not look pretty at times, but at the end of the day, the only stat they care about is the W/L column. And so far through Week 8, no one can deny their success and position atop the AFC North. Nor can they deny that at the very least the 2024 season thus far, is a mild surprise.

During the Monday Night Football broadcast, ESPN’s Joe Buck and Troy Aikman shared a conversation that they had with Tomlin as they prepared to work the game. Among the things mentioned that really stuck out, is that the Steelers’ skipper believes that his team is not “quarterback centric”.

Now if you’ve ever listened to a Tomlin presser, you know that his choice of words at times is unique yet almost always on point. That said, in today’s NFL, it’s unusual for a team to admit they are not focused upon quarterback centricity. But when Buck and Aikman shared that nugget of wisdom, it made sense. It fits the Steelers post-Roethlisberger identity. After all, the combined cap space of quarterbacks Russell Wilson and Justin Fields is $4.443M, or 1.79% of the team’s current 2024 cap obligations of 248.296M.

The Ravens on the other hand are QB centric. Lamar Jackson’s cap number in 2024 is $32.4M, which is 13% of the teams current $248.634M in cap obligations. And really, where would the Ravens be without No. 8?

The two teams are set to square off in Pittsburgh on November 17 and then at The Bank on December 21. Now as things stand today, you might say that the Ravens running game is a bit much for the Steelers run defense. And with the rebound season that we appear to be witnessing from Russell Wilson, you could say that the Steelers will chuck it all over the cow pasture known as Acrisure Stadium. But then again, the Little Sisters of the Poor might net 300 yards by air against Zach Orr’s regularly confused, porous defense.

So, if you’re an optimist and think that the Ravens run game v. Pitt and the Pitt passing offense v. Ravens is a push, it could boil down to special teams. And if it does, the Ravens could be in trouble.

Aren’t special teams supposed to be a Ravens hallmark?

Any Dogs in the House?

It’s anyone’s guess what is going on with Marcus Williams. He played infinitely better while injured in 2022-23 than he has as a fully healthy safety in 2024. And no one outside of The Castle has a clue WTF is going on. All we know is that he’s been one of the league’s worst performing safeties yet he’s among the highest paid. Watching the All-22, it’s akin to the Waldo game.

“Where’s Marcus?”

Well last week he was on the sidelines, active, dressed and waiting to take the field if needed. We don’t know if there’s a nagging injury. We don’t know if Zach Orr isn’t using him properly. We don’t know if he has off-the-field distractions that are disrupting his focus. We don’t know if he said “everybody” after Harbaugh asked, “Who’s got it better than us?” We don’t know if he’s made a career business decision and opted to never get his uniform dirty again. We don’t know if Eric DeCosta has asked him to take a pay cut and he’s refused. We don’t know if the Ravens have simply parked him in the proverbial garage because he’s being traded.

Marcus Williams in the John Harbaugh doghouse

We do know how John Harbaugh feels about Williams:

“Marcus [Williams] is a heck of a player. I have the utmost confidence in him as a player, as a person, as a pro. He’s a great person; he’s a hard worker. [He] plays hard, practices hard, does everything at the highest level, and I anticipate him playing great football for us all season and very soon.”

DeCosta Harbaugh

More Orr Less

Per Wikipedia, Kurt Benkert is a 29-year-old former quarterback who played collegiate ball at East Carolina and Virginia. He signed with the Atlanta Falcons as a UDFA in 2018 followed by short stints with the Packers and 49ers. Today he is an NFL analyst for Sleeper HQ. Benkert is a Baltimore native and judging from his frustration level with Zach Orr, he’s a fan of the Ravens – but not Orr.

Let’s be honest, the Ravens placed Orr in position to fail. Not on purpose of course, but the signs were all there. Three excellent defensive coaches left the team and the Ravens lost defensive starters on each level of the defense. Jadeveon Clowney, Patrick Queen and Geno Stone all left Baltimore for greener pastures. A more experienced coach may have been the safer bet. And that coach was already on Harbaugh’s staff last season.

Dennard Wilson.

The chart below compares the current defensive rankings through 8 weeks for both Orr and Wilson, the Titans defensive coordinator.

Zach Orr as defensive coordinator v. Dennard Wilson

• Number in parentheses represents league ranking

This really isn’t meant to be an indictment of Zach Orr. Instead, it has been presented to illustrate a major blunder on the part of John Harbaugh who has complete autonomy by contract, of all coaching assistants hired. He chose a great man in Orr; a former All-Pro player yet a relatively inexperienced coach, to handle play calling responsibilities for the first time in his coaching career. Making the decision worse, the Ravens are a team that is Super Bowl ready and just one season removed from the league’s best defense. The hire represents naivety, arrogance, coaching malpractice or all the above. And the results through 8 weeks suggest the same.

When all is said and done, the defensive tanking of the Ravens could cost players money and force some not to see their current contracts through to the end. It could cause others to lose their jobs and tenure in the league, which affects pensions. It doesn’t sit well when any player’s earning power is compromised. Maybe they’ll blame Orr at first. But the players I’m told, see Orr as Harbaugh’s guy. If this potentially ground swelling issue metastasizes, it could morph into some form of mutiny.

Unless of course Lamar Jackson bails Harbaugh out again.

Stand up to Cancer

As I write this piece, the World Series is on in the background and during the middle of the 6th inning stretch the FOX broadcast featured Stand Up to Cancer. It’s not new but touching Every. Single. Time. To watch 50,000+, fans, players and media alike, send their best to those suffering, those who won their battles or those who didn’t, puts sports in perspective. It reminded me that the athletes and coaches who we cheer for, those we place on a pedestal and those we criticize, even here in this article, have friends and family just like all of us. At the end of the day, this, right here, is all entertainment and/or a welcome distraction.

Life is far more important for each of us.

To all suffering from cancer, may God’s mercy and healing hand be beside you every single step of the way.

The post Why Diontae Johnson is a Raven appeared first on Russell Street Report.


Source: https://russellstreetreport.com/2024/10/30/tltakes/diontae-johnson-traded-to-ravens/


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