–The Ravens have an opportunity to help their playoff chances with four of their next five games at home.
Baltimore is coming off one of the most dominant performances in franchise history, a 21-0 victory over the Tennessee Titans in Week 6. Ravens head coach John Harbaugh knows a successful stretch will go a long way for his team’s postseason hopes.
“Winning a game like that on the road doesn’t mean nearly as much if you can’t follow it up,” Harbaugh said. “You have to back it up with another win, and what you need to do in the NFL is stack wins. You need to find a way to get on a roll, and you do that by getting better every single day, all the things we always talk about, and going out there and playing good, winning football on Sunday. That’s all our focus needs to be, because if we can stack a win on top of that win, then it really starts to mean something.”
Baltimore finished with 11 sacks against the Titans — one shy of tying the NFL record.
“You just want to play productive defense, and we had the opportunity to do that,” linebacker Terrell Suggs said. “Our offense did a good job of controlling the time of possession, so we pretty much had a fresh defense. It was a team win, offense, defense, and special teams alike. So, it was a good win. It was a good road win, too.”
–Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco had 11 passes batted down at the line of scrimmage over the first six games, tied with Minnesota quarterback Kirk Cousins for most in the NFL, according to ESPN Stats & Information.
“I know we lead the league in batted balls,” Ravens head coach John Harbaugh said. “I think we have 11 now, and that’s something that’s a problem, because those are opportunities. A lot of times, those guys are open, and those are chances to complete passes. That’s something that we’ve been working on the last couple of weeks. We still haven’t it cleaned up the way we want to, and we’re not happy about it. We need to clean that up.”
As a result, quarterbacks coach James Urban implemented a drill to help Flacco overcome the challenge. The veteran quarterback was not overly enthused about the process.
“He’s standing there with a bag in his hand that goes up to 12-feet high, unrealistically high for anybody’s hands,” Flacco said. “I just threw the ball and hit the bag on purpose. It’s just like, ‘I get your point. We got it.'”
Harbaugh thinks it is more of a technical issue than a physical one for the 6-foot-6 Flacco. Saints quarterback Drew Brees, who is just 6-feet, has not dealt with the same issue.
“Those guys that are in front of him are pretty tall, too, but Drew Brees, I don’t think, has a batted pass yet this year, to make that contrast,” Harbaugh said. “So it’s probably not as much about that as it is about other issues. It’s always a team effort. Anything like that is always a team effort, and we have to get better at it.”
BY THE NUMBERS: 1 – Number of NFL teams, the Ravens, to boast a top-five passing and rushing defense. Baltimore ranks second and third, respectively, in each: passing – 188.0 yards per game and rushing – 82.8 average. Overall, The Ravens rank No. 1 in the league, allowing 270.8 yards per game
