AFC Analysis: Ravens' Strategy Fails to Overcome Chiefs
Transcript
00:00 [MUSIC]
00:03 All right, so let's start off with the AFC Championship.
00:06 The most ridiculous narrative, I gotta be honest, is people who last night and
00:12 this morning are saying, I'm never fading my homes again.
00:16 Like, okay, that's fair.
00:18 [LAUGH] Come on, I mean, did anybody watch that game?
00:21 Thought that that was the reason why the Chiefs won the game and
00:25 the Ravens lost the game?
00:26 Like, I mean, my takeaway was they had a great first half, and
00:30 then the Ravens just imploded on themselves in the second half with play calling and
00:34 drop passes and fumbles and everything else.
00:36 That's not to say that the Ravens would have won, but Lauren, I mean, come on.
00:40 If the score was 20-20 and they go to overtime and
00:44 Mahomes throws some bomb for a touchdown, okay, then let's do that here on this day
00:48 on Monday, but I did not feel this to be the case.
00:50 Takes nothing away from Mahomes, by the way, or Kelsey, or anyone else.
00:54 But the game absolutely should have been much closer, and
00:58 the Ravens should have given themselves a better opportunity to win, I thought.
01:02 >> Well, I agree with that sentiment, especially at the end there.
01:07 Look, the Chiefs came out and they were doing whatever they wanted to do.
01:10 Mahomes was what, like 11 of 11 on his first 11 passes, moved up and
01:14 down the field on this great vaunted Ravens defense.
01:17 Don't forget this game was being played in the rain.
01:20 And the key for me defensively for the Ravens is, you're Mike McDonald,
01:23 you're going up against Patrick Mahomes.
01:25 You need to give your own team a chance here to keep this game tight.
01:29 And it's not as if Patrick Mahomes is beating you with Marquez Valdez-Scantling,
01:33 or they're beating you with Clyde Edwards-Zuller.
01:36 They're beating you with Travis Kelsey, and they're beating you with Rasheed Rice.
01:40 I mean, every single thing that they're throwing to Kelsey and
01:42 Rice is working.
01:43 If these are the two top weapons, you can't take either of them away,
01:47 that's gonna be a big time problem.
01:48 And so the Ravens defense made some adjustments at halftime,
01:51 looked a lot better in the second half, gave their offense a little bit more of
01:55 a chance to get back in the game by slowing down that Kansas City offense.
01:58 But there was also a point where it's like, hey, if I'm Andy Reid,
02:02 the Ravens are beating themselves.
02:03 So I don't even need to really go and expose myself too much here offensively.
02:07 Let's just make sure we don't turn the ball over,
02:09 let's play the field position game and allow them to throw up on themselves.
02:13 So I think at some point the Chiefs did take their foot off the gas,
02:15 the Ravens made some great adjustments there in the second half, but
02:19 did not understand the defense in the first half.
02:21 The biggest issue though to me of this entire game is,
02:25 the game is being played in the rain, the Ravens are one of the most run heavy teams.
02:29 The Ravens are going up against the 28th ranked run defense in the NFL and
02:32 the Kansas City Chiefs, who by the way,
02:34 ranked number four on offense defensively defending the pass.
02:39 They ran the ball with a running back on first down,
02:41 the very first play of the game with Justice Hill.
02:44 And from that moment onward, the entire game, Craig,
02:48 two running back runs on first or second down, two running back runs on early downs.
02:53 All they were doing was dropping Lamar Jackson back to pass the football in
02:58 the rain in a close game.
03:00 I mean, there was no point in time in the entire first half that the Baltimore Ravens
03:04 were down by more than a score.
03:06 And the Chiefs the entire game only scored 17 points.
03:09 We just saw the San Francisco 49ers come back from 17 points down at halftime.
03:14 So this is not something impossible that could not possibly be done here.
03:18 For whatever reason, Todd Monken thought that they should come up with a game plan
03:23 that would be pass first with Lamar in the rain against a Steve Spagnuolo coach
03:27 defense, which is elite against the pass, made absolutely no sense to me.
03:32 And this is where we talk about coaching winning games.
03:37 Andy Reid can win games by his coaching.
03:39 And I thought that the Baltimore Ravens lost this game with their coaching and
03:44 their game planning and
03:45 their lack of adjustments on offense throughout the course of the game.
03:49 That falls on the OC, that falls on the head coach.
03:51 Now, let's not say that Lamar Jackson was great.
03:55 He obviously did not play great in this game and he contributed to it as well.
03:59 But when it comes down to it, coaching matters a ton in the NFL.
04:03 It matters a lot more than people give credit for it,
04:05 both positive coaching and negative coaching, both good game planning and
04:09 bad game planning.
04:10 The thing is the average fan watching on the couch doesn't necessarily know what
04:13 the game plan is here.
04:15 The average person is just seeing the athletes out there either execute or
04:18 not execute.
04:19 But they're being put in these positions by their coaches.
04:22 And I thought this was one of the worst game plans and
04:24 most unthinkable game plans that I could ever remember in a key moment.
04:28 Just coming out using your weakness against the strength of an opponent's
04:32 defense when that defense has a clear weakness which aligns with your offensive
04:35 strength, zero sense to me.
04:37 [MUSIC]