Ravens Once Again Get the Best of Sean Payton

Ravens Pass-Catchers Through 9 Games

In October of 2018, Sean Payton brought his New Orleans Saints into Baltimore for a game against the Ravens.

Payton was extremely intense about that game. NFL coaches as a class don’t tend to be “chill dudes” about football games; but even by that standard Payton seemed to take the game extremely seriously. He had some quotes in the media about how tough it was to win in Baltimore.  It flies below the radar, but the Ravens have long held one of the best home field advantages in the NFL. (Denver is one of the more well-known ones due to the altitude.)  Saints beat reporters said that Payton had been planning for that game as far back as training camp.

Payton had previously brought a Saints team into Baltimore.  They came into town as defending Super Bowl champs in 2010.  In that game, they scored first, but then fell behind 21-7 in the 2nd quarter.  They came back to tie it at 24 early in the 4th, but the Ravens iced it with a pair of field goals.

Payton’s history with the Ravens goes back farther.  In 2000 he became an Offensive Coordinator for the first time.  His team had a great season; they won their division and were their conference’s #1 seed for the playoffs.  They did well in the playoffs, beating Andy Reid’s Eagles team 20-10 and then pasting their opponent in the Conference Championship game 41-0, to advance all the way to the Super Bowl.  And there in the Super Bowl, they got absolutely curb-stomped by the 2000 Baltimore Ravens.  Yup, he was the OC of those New York Giants. The final was 34-7; the game was not even as close as that lopsided score implies.

Payton goes back even further with John Harbaugh.  He told a Broncos beat reporter this week:

Actually we were on the same staff back in 1998. We were both with the Eagles together, Ray Rhodes was the head coach. John was our special teams coordinator, I was coaching quarterbacks. It’s funny as you do this longer and longer, you don’t know as many of the new head coaches but John is someone I have a tremendous amount of respect for, he’s a fantastic person.  He’s someone that I would call a good friend. And the consistent success he’s had there speaks for itself. It was easier in the NFC [when Payton coached the Saints] when you only had to see him every four years. But even like Mike Tomlin, who’s a good friend, it was once every four years. Now in the AFC it’s different. But [Harbaugh]’s done a great job. And he’s done it consistently for a long period of time.

So in 2018, Harbaugh’s Ravens were very much on Payton’s radar, even more so than you might expect with a Super Bowl -winning coach from the other conference.  In the game, the Saints tried to get off to a hot start, with 4th-down tries and no-huddle tactics.  It didn’t work; the first quarter was scoreless, and the Ravens took a 10-7 lead into the half.  The Ravens tacked on a TD to take a 17-7 lead into the 4th quarter.  But the Saints stormed back, scoring 17 unanswered in the 4th to take a seven-point lead.  They held on to win, as Joe Flacco threw a touchdown pass in the final minute that would’ve tied the game, but Justin Tucker missed the first extra-point of his (then-seven year) career.  (The look on Tucker’s face was terrible: shock + dismay.)

This walk down Memory Lane is to give background on how tough a matchup Denver planned to present to the Ravens.  It’s a bit of a rivalry game for the head coach.  The Broncos came into the game with the #5 defense by DVOA; #1 by Expected Points Added, #1 in Yards-per-play.

And it did not matter one damn bit. The Ravens absolutely destroyed them.  The Ravens scored on seven straight drives from late in the first quarter thru early in the 4th, including four straight touchdown drives from midway through the second through the end of the third.  They just got whatever the hell they wanted.  Yes, there were some stops.  Denver sacked Lamar Jackson once for a loss of eleven.  They dropped Derrick Henry for a loss one time, and held him to just a single yard on seven other carries.  Those play were merely the equivalent of holding off an avalanche with an umbrella.

The Broncos’ defense led the NFL in success rate entering Week 9 (61.8%).

When Lamar Jackson was on the field today, Denver had a 41.7% success rate. That would’ve been one of the 10 worst performances for any defense this season, per TruMedia.

— Jonas Shaffer (@jonas_shaffer) November 3, 2024

One of the most impressive performances by an offense that you will ever see.

A Divisive Choice for the Country

These last several weeks have brought a stark choice into focus.  There are two main candidates.  Observers look at the two candidates and feel that it’s just OBVIOUS who the choice should be; then they’re shocked to discover that people who they thought were reasonable have the exact opposite idea.  It’s a contentious choice that divides fanbases who should be rooting together.  I’m no different: my feelings on this choice run high, and I can’t help but have opinions about people who see it differently.

I’m talking of course about the MVP race between Lamar and Derrick.  To me it’s dead obvious that Lamar is the MVP. Henry is having a very damn fine season, of course. But there’s a reason he’s having the best Yards-Before-Contact of his career, and it ain’t the Ravens O-line.  And the things Lamar is doing better this year over what he’s done previous seasons are mostly in the pre-snap phase: identifying coverages, changing protections or the play, etc. Henry doesn’t help with that.  After the snap, Lamar is doing mostly the same things he did last year when he won MVP; except a little more in the quick-release game, which again traces back to the pre-snap phase.

Henry is reducing the load on Lamar.  That’s a huge contribution; I don’t mean to make light of that at all.  I expect it to pay gigantic dividends for the Ravens as the season wears on.  But Lamar is still the straw that stirs the drink.

I got Lamar as MVP and Henry as Offensive Player of the Year.  That seems “fair” to me.  But we should be aware that it’s quite possible no Raven wins it.  The two Ravens could split the vote, opening the way for someone like Josh Allen or Jared Goff to get the award.

If that happens, and Lamar has to console himself with the Lombardi trophy this year, then I’d be alright with it.

The Other Major National Event on Tuesday

Oh yeah, there’s something else going on this week. Events on Tuesday will create national headlines and influence the course of the future.  People also have strong opinions on this: stay the course or make a disruptive change?   It’s a choice where responsible people can have differing opinions in good faith.

I’m referring to – you guessed it – the NFL trade deadline.  Ravens fans are expecting the team to make a major addition on defense.  They need help on the front, and probably in the secondary too unless Marcus Williams has made a big return to form.  But the Ravens also have to be smart about spending resources, with the team perpetually near the cap ceiling.  The Lamar contract makes things tight for the foreseeable future.

My own sense is that this is a strike-while-the-iron is hot season.  The Ravens front-office has not been an “all-in” kind of shop over the years.  But Ravens teams have not declared this kind of championship ceiling this early before.  In 2019 they had a first-year starter at QB and a new offensive system.  Things only really started to click with the win over the Patriots in Week 10, after the bye.  Last year was the Ravens’ first in a new system, and they were uneven in the early going.  The first indication that they could be really special was when they stomped the life out of the Lions and then the Seahawks in Weeks 7 and 9.

This year presents much differently.  The Ravens were already established as “contenders” at the beginning of the season, coming off an appearance in the AFC Championship Game.  They already had an expectation that this offense would be better, since they were in Year 2 of the system and had made a major acquisition (Henry).  And they posted “statement” performances on offense in five consecutive weeks, games 3-4-5-6-7.  It’s the clearest “all-in” scenario that this organization has ever had in its entire history.  (Or maybe a tie with 2006.)

I think they’ll do something.  We’ll see how exciting a splash they can make.

Where No Raven Offense has Gone Before Redux

Here’s the team’s current active streak of FIVE games with a hundred-yard receiver:

Before this year the longest streak the team had ever had was three just games, which they’d done six times before.  (1996, ’99, 2005, ’06, 2012, 2021.)

Stats

Here are your stats for the game:

(Data from NFL)

Three explosive receptions for Zay Flowers, coming off a game with four.  He’s making a big statement these last several games.

Justice Hill finally gets an “official” explosive play!  Rather than the on-the-cusp 19-yarder he had before. Henry also breaks the seal.  And Patrick Ricard finally gets a reception!  His first of the year: he was 0-for-2 before Sunday.

Light days from Rashod Bateman and Isaiah Likely; from Mark Andrews too, if we’re talking volume.  Be honest: if I had told you ahead of time that Andrews & Likely & Bateman would combine for just 51 yards, and Lamar would be held to just four yards rushing, you would have assumed a Ravens loss, right?  Yeah, not so much.

Lamar’s stat line: 16 of 19 (84%) for 280 yards (14.7 yards-per) with 3 TDs and no INTs  Those numbers add up to a perfect Passer Rating, the fourth of Lamar’s career.

Data from Stathead

Lamar’s just 27 years old!  And already tied for the most career games with a perfect passer rating.  Crazy.

I don’t know if there’s any stat for “most career games where he racked up such a commanding lead that he sat for much of the 4th quarter joking with his teammates while the backup handled mop-up duties,” but Lamar’s gotta be near the top of that list too.

Season Stats & Leaderboard

Here are your full-season stats to date:

(Data from PFR)

Flowers’ performance over the last five weeks has vaulted him up to fourth in the NFL in receiving yards.  (Before Monday Night Football.)  Yes, that’s right: YOUR RAVENS have a top-5 Wide Receiver.  Feels weird, doesn’t it?

Andrews has quietly moved up this table over the past five games.  Here is his season broken out:

He hasn’t had a “big” day in any of those games, maxing out at 66 yards (though he has had a 2-TD game).  If you weren’t watching the efficiency stats you might not’ve noticed how productive he’s been. But Andrews’ performance has been night & day better than over the first month of the season.

One thing the team stats table doesn’t make clear, is how good ALL of those numbers are.  Last year the league average YTS for all pass-catchers was 3.7: a 50% Success Rate times 7.35 Yards Per Target.  Here are the 2023 league stats broken out by position group:

Every Raven but Ricard is over last year’s league average (and Ricard only has three targets). Every Raven but Ricard and Henry is over last year’s league average for Wide Receivers; and Henry is over the average for his position.  That’s incredible.  If every receiver is having a good season, that must mean the Quarterback is having a great season.

Lamar was already leading the league in passer rating; has been since Week 7.  And we know that no one went by him this week to sneak into the top spot, since he went perfect this week.  So what else can we say about passer rating?  Well, you may wonder how Lamar’s number ranks among the all-time leaders in that stat.  I gotcha covered:

Data from PFR

Top five in NFL history!

Now, as a fan I love this.  LOVE. IT.  But as an analyst I have to add, this means a lot less than it looks like on first glance. Notice that all of the first 15 rows on the table date from this century.  NFL rule changes and points of emphasis, as well as play-style, have steadily inflated Passer Ratings over the last 45+ years.  Here’s a graph of the league average Passer Rating year-by-year from its post-merger low in 1977 to today:

Data from PFR

(Shout out and apology to my stepdaughter, for not having this graph’s Y-axis start at zero. Hey, it’s for emphasis! Yes, that’s the type of conversation we have at the ZipCode house.)

The rising tide has lifted all Passer Rating boats, over decades.  Honestly, Steve Young’s rating of 112.8 in a year when the NFL average was 78.4, is more impressive than Aaron Rodgers‘ 121.5 in a year when the average was 93.6.  Hell: the season that Bert Jones of the Baltimore Colts had in 1976, a rating of 102.5 in a year when the average was 67.0, might be more impressive than either one.

A more nuanced way to use efficiency stats across history is to “normalize” them to the era.  DVOA does that.  They base each year so that “average” is zero, which lets them compare between seasons fairly.  We could try to do the same thing.  I don’t have the statistical sophistication that Aaron Schatz has; but an easy thing we could do is just divide each Quarterback’s rating by that year’s league average rating.  That would give us a measure of how much the player was blowing away the rest of the league that year.  Here the top 25 seasons by “passer rating over average”:

If you’re wondering if I chose the random-seeming “1957” as a start year just to get Johnny Unitas on the list: I’m not saying.

That table seems a little better, from a historical perspective.  The name at the top might seem strange if you haven’t spent any time with league stats from the 1960s. Milt Plum had a three-year run where he led the league in completion percentage each season.  He may have been helped a wee bit by having a young Jim Brown at Running Back.  But the rest of these guys are Hall Of Famers and NFL legends.  They’re names you would expect to find on any list of the greatest passing seasons.  Um, and Nick Foles; but whatever.

Lamar falls way out of the top 5 when you look at it this way.  His rating-over-average this year clocks in at #42.  Still fantastic: the same rating-over-average as Steve Young 1993, Drew Brees 2009 (the year he won the Super Bowl) and Tom Brady 2010 (one of his three All-Pro seasons).  Fantastic; not top-5 in NFL history, but fantastic.

Passer Rating has some serious flaws.  In the modern days of “advanced analytics,” serious people tend not to use it, and for very good reason.  Sacks aren’t accounted for.  An 8-yard gain on 3rd-&-10 boosts the passer rating but doesn’t help the team win.  I still like the stat, though.  We’re all used to seeing it, it incorporates TDs & INTs, and it aligns nicely on a “100 = very good” scale.  There are contexts where it, or at least the idea of it, is useful.  I might noodle around during the mini-bye with ways to “rescue” Passer Rating by adjusting for Sacks and maybe using Success Rate. A fun little project.

Next Up:

Election Day!  Make sure you vote.

Then: an interminable amount of TV coverage and news items.  The counting is going to drag on for a while.

But finally: Joe Burrow brings his Bengals into Charm City for Thursday Night Football, a rematch of one of the best games of the season.  Being at home on Thursday night is an advantage.  The Ravens need to capitalize.

On deck: *IF* the Ravens are able to hold serve in that home game, then the mini-bye positions them well for the trip to Pittsburgh for the next game.  An important two-game stretch.

Best wishes to all for a safe and civic-minded week.

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