Thought the Skins played well or am I missing something?

[Peregrine]

You always judge a teams potential on how the first stringers perform. The colts often get beaten in a preseason game, sometimes by 14 or so, but if you check the box score you see the starters played great. Outside of a fake punt(which does not count if you are determining pre-season performance) it was 6-3 Ravens at the half. Not exactly a big concern.

The jets game will be the big one. The skins need to hang with the jets through three quarters to be legit.

[Going Commando]

Sounds like you've put far too much stock in the outcome of the game and not the evaluation of talent.

Perhaps, but an awful outcome like that one usually means most of your talent fared very poorly. This was true Saturday.

The offensive line struggled to protect our QBs and the starters didn't look very good. They got almost no push in the running game and we had no running game to speak of until Keiland Williams started pounding second and third stringers. This is particularly troubling since our offensive success will be predicated on how well we run the ball and it's supposed to be our coach's specialty. The receivers, except for Moss and Armstrong, struggled to get open against a soft secondary. McNabb made some nice plays in the passing game, but even some of his completions were poor throws. And even then he still made some dreadful throws which suggest he's not as far along in his transition to our offense as one could hope. Let's pray he doesn't get hurt and miss time (like he has in 5 of the past 6 seasons and in all but 4 years of his 11 year career) because Rex Grossman looked awful. Ditto for any of our starting offensive linemen since, as ineffectual as they were, the backups looked as awful as last year's. The defense didn't look all that great and had some trouble stopping the run. Dennis Pitta (a rookie) killed our safeties. The defensive line also looked bad and got pushed around most of the night. The only defenders who stood out were Fletcher, Landry, and Tryon. In general, the team looked unprepared and unfocused and made a lot of stupid errors and sloppy plays.

McNabb is definitely better than Campbell but he didn't look that great. He's not good enough to carry us to the playoffs if the rest of the team plays the way it did last night.

The only consolation I found in that game is the hope that our team will learn more from playing like **** and getting it's ass whipped than they would from beating the crap out of the Bills.

[Rdskn4Lyf21]

Stevemcqueen1, please step away from the ledge.

[MattFancy]

Or in fewer words: the Ravens are better, have better players, and beat us soundly.

Since when does the final score of a preseason game matter? Remember, the Lions went 4-0 the year they went 0-16. So who cares if you win or lose in a preseason game? The Ravens are going into their 3rd year under Harbaugh/Flacco. They should be clicking on all cylinders at this point. They're basically the same team as least year that beat down the Patriots on the road in the playoffs.

We however have a brand new coach, brand new QB, brand new offense, and a brand new defense. So for our first team offense and defense to hang with the Ravens is a great accomplishment. Yeah we didn't look great, but neither did the Ravens. We had less than 200yds of offense for the whole game when we played the Ravens last year. We had that in the first half this year.

I'm not worried about anything. You know Shanahan and Co. are here to win and are proven guys. Week 1 is the first time final scores start to matter.

[KingGibbs]

So you (and everyone else who keeps bringing up the excuse that the Ravens gameplanned and played unseemly hard) are essentially saying that the Ravens were better because they were better prepared and played with a much higher level of intensity.

How exactly is that reassuring?

You obviously don't get it. In spite of the Ravens effort we still put up 219 yds passing on them with our starters. That's running basic packages and a vanilla offense. While Larry Johnson looked like ****, Portis showed some explosiveness and gained the yards that Johnson coudln't. How could you not be impressed with those 3rd and long conversions?

Our starting defense was just as stout and intense as the Ravens and again that's running basic packages. They couldn't do jack **** outside a fake punt that padded there offensive stats. Got it? I doubt it.

We can continue to play this game, but it's as if I'm putting you over my knee and spanking you.

[Skinz4Life12]

Stevemcqueen1, please step away from the ledge.

I agree with this.

Even if our entire starting unit looked immaculate last night i wouldn't take too much comfort in that because the NFL season is a marathon, not a sprint.

Too much can happen to change the fortune of a team throughout an NFL season.

We should know that better than any NFL team's fans by now..

Remember 6-2 in 2008?

[Chachie]

Since when does the final score of a preseason game matter? Remember, the Lions went 4-0 the year they went 0-16. So who cares if you win or lose in a preseason game? The Ravens are going into their 3rd year under Harbaugh/Flacco. They should be clicking on all cylinders at this point. They're basically the same team as least year that beat down the Patriots on the road in the playoffs.

We however have a brand new coach, brand new QB, brand new offense, and a brand new defense. So for our first team offense and defense to hang with the Ravens is a great accomplishment. Yeah we didn't look great, but neither did the Ravens. We had less than 200yds of offense for the whole game when we played the Ravens last year. We had that in the first half this year.

I'm not worried about anything. You know Shanahan and Co. are here to win and are proven guys. Week 1 is the first time final scores start to matter.

I can't say I'm not worried about anything but beyond that I "fancy" Matt's approach.

[Going Commando]

Since when does the final score of a preseason game matter? Remember, the Lions went 4-0 the year they went 0-16. So who cares if you win or lose in a preseason game? The Ravens are going into their 3rd year under Harbaugh/Flacco. They should be clicking on all cylinders at this point. They're basically the same team as least year that beat down the Patriots on the road in the playoffs.

We however have a brand new coach, brand new QB, brand new offense, and a brand new defense. So for our first team offense and defense to hang with the Ravens is a great accomplishment. Yeah we didn't look great, but neither did the Ravens. We had less than 200yds of offense for the whole game when we played the Ravens last year. We had that in the first half this year.

I'm not worried about anything. You know Shanahan and Co. are here to win and are proven guys. Week 1 is the first time final scores start to matter.

Once again, when you talk about the Ravens, you're basically saying that they are a good team and that we aren't. It's true, they are well along with their coaches, have lots of talent on both offense and defense, are tough and play with a lot of intensity, and are clicking on all cylinders like you say... because they are a good team. That's what a good team does. That's not what we did because we aren't a good team right now. It's as simple as that.

What's our goal for the season? To improve from last year? That won't be hard in and of itself because we were awful before. So how much improvement would be acceptable? FWIW, the way we played last night looked about the same as the way we played last season. I think too many people around here have forgotten we are rebuilding (supposed to be anyway) and are already talking playoffs.

ALSO, I don't think it's granted that Shanahan & Co are competent enough team builders to build a championship caliber roster like everyone around here seems to. Shanahan's best years as a coach were over a decade ago, and his most recent body of work was a spectacular collapse down the stretch in 2008 that got him fired by one of the most conservative and loyal owners in the NFL. Allen's best year's as an executive were almost a decade ago. He was a pretty terrible GM in Tampa Bay. One of our only prominent new coaches or executives that isn't here because he got fired at his last job is Kyle Shanahan. And our new "franchise QB" was traded to us by a division rival who thought they'd be better off going with a former second round pick with about four starts under his belt.

[The Tris]

I think too many people around here have forgotten we are rebuilding (supposed to be anyway) and are already talking playoffs.

Thankfully, you have picked up that slack, and while I know you aren't meaning to, you give off the impression of impatience to our transitional team.

Considering who we are, and who we played, I agree with the OP that I thought the team played well, relatively speaking. Playing well =/= no room for improvement. In some areas, great improvement is needed. In others, we have already seen great strides from last season.

And then we get the edit, where you move past impatience to resignation about our future, over competency of our leaders.

[MattFancy]

So what did you want to see from the team stevemcqueen1? Did you want them to win 42-0? Its a PRESEASON game! Until the start giving out awards for it, I don't care. We didn't play as bad as everyone thought. Was it as good as the Bills game? No. But the Bills are bad, we play decently against a Super Bowl contender. I'll take it as progress.

[wbar3383]

The ravens were playing like it was a superbowl.

They gameplanned, dialed up all their blitzes, ran a fake punt,and even gave a coach a gatorade bath.

Someone forgot to tell them it was preseason.

Well congrats ravens, you win the preseason. Your trophy is in the mail

[War Paint]

Sounds like you've put far too much stock in the outcome of the game and not the evaluation of talent.

Yeah, it seems that people aren't analyzing preseason games the way they are supposed to. They only seem to see the score. Look at Dallas. They won their game. They beat the Chargers, but their first string looked like crap. Not only did the Cowboys offense look bad again, their first team D looked very soft in that game.

When it comes to preseason, you want to see how the key components of your first team O and D are doing. Is the QB developing chemistry with WRs? Did the QB make good passing plays? Is the oline providing good protection? Is the secondary getting toasted? Is our front seven getting steamrolled? For the second string, you want to see if a player stands out. You are looking for gems. You are looking for good special team players and solid back ups.

I would only be concerned with a 23-3 loss in preseason if our first team O and D looked horrible. They didn't. First team O marched right down the field on the the first series and should have had a TD. Our D shut down the Ravens for most of the first half. The score only looked lopsided at half time because of a fake punt.

For the most part, the only concern I had with the first team is that we seemed to have very bad field position for most of the half. I think that is why we had so many yards and few points. It's just too hard to march from your own end zone to theirs against a team like the Ravens.

If our O and D looked like trash, like not being able to move the ball, or getting toasted by their O, being completely dominated in the trenches by the other team, etc....I could see the concern. We weren't dominated.

[blue collar]

I admit, I'm a little concerned. I've seen this movie way too often with this team. Play like crap in the preseason and it carries over to the regular season. And too the people saying that this beatdown means nothing, that's not what was being said last week when we were on the good side of a beatdown. No one was saying the Bills were using a vanilla anything.

[MattFancy]

I admit, I'm a little concerned. I've seen this movie way too often with this team. Play like crap in the preseason and it carries over to the regular season. And too the people saying that this beatdown means nothing, that's not what was being said last week when we were on the good side of a beatdown. No one was saying the Bills were using a vanilla anything.

What beat down? The 13-3 score with starters in the game, that should've been 6-3 if the Ravens don't do a fake punt? So yeah, they're backups beat our backups 10-0. So what?

[PCS]

ALSO, I don't think it's granted that Shanahan & Co are competent enough team builders to build a championship caliber roster like everyone around here seems to. Shanahan's best years as a coach were over a decade ago, and his most recent body of work was a spectacular collapse down the stretch in 2008 that got him fired by one of the most conservative and loyal owners in the NFL. Allen's best year's as an executive were almost a decade ago. He was a pretty terrible GM in Tampa Bay. One of our only prominent new coaches or executives that isn't here because he got fired at his last job is Kyle Shanahan. And our new "franchise QB" was traded to us by a division rival who thought they'd be better off going with a former second round pick with about four starts under his belt.

Going out on a limb here and speculate that maybe you haven't been and aren't all that enthralled with a few of these "hires."

[Going Commando]

You obviously don't get it. In spite of the Ravens effort we still put up 219 yds passing on them with our starters. That's running basic packages and a vanilla offense. While Larry Johnson looked like ****, Portis showed some explosiveness and gained the yards that Johnson coudln't. How could you not be impressed with those 3rd and long conversions?

Our starting defense was just as stout and intense as the Ravens and again that's running basic packages. They couldn't do jack **** outside a fake punt that padded there offensive stats. Got it? I doubt it.

We can continue to play this game, but it's as if I'm putting you over my knee and spanking you.

Alright, if you'd stop patting yourself on the back and pretending like you know more about football than everyone long enough to actually read my argument, you'd see that the whole "vanilla" scheme excuse is pathetic. It's basically you saying, "We didn't play well because we weren't trying." It'd be completely lame if it were true, but from what I saw, I don't think it is.

First off, do you think the Ravens were running their entire playbook? Significantly more so than we were? I saw us running all kinds of spread formations, trips, bunches, 2x2, in the shotgun, 2 back, single back, empty, etc. Hell I'm even fairly sure I saw us run some pistol. We put a ton of personnel groups and packages out there for just running the "vanilla" scheme. If the Ravens opened up their playbook some, so did we.

And BTW, it was the same story on defense. Just like the week before, we ran 2 gap 3 man line looks, 1 gap looks, 5-2 fronts, 4 man lines, and zone blitzes. Don't act like we weren't trying. And if we weren't trying, then that's even worse IMO.

For the few nice 3rd down conversions we had, we still couldn't score and still had to punt quite a bit. Yes Larry Johnson looked awful, Clinton Portis looked alright on his two carries, and we put up a lot of passing yards on a handful of big plays against a soft secondary. That's not even very much of a moral victory.

[War Paint]

I admit, I'm a little concerned. I've seen this movie way too often with this team. Play like crap in the preseason and it carries over to the regular season. And too the people saying that this beatdown means nothing, that's not what was being said last week when we were on the good side of a beatdown. No one was saying the Bills were using a vanilla anything.

This was nothing like other preseason losses. In the past, our first team would get dominated and look clueless in a preseason loss. A lot of us would then make excuses like "it was vanilla" and such. Our first team did okay in the Ravens game. First team D looked better than they did against the Bills. This was nothing like the Patriot game in preseason, where our entire team was completely dominated.

My feeling is that if this was a regular season game against the Ravens, it would be one of those low scoring 16-13 type of games.

[blue collar]

This was nothing like other preseason losses. In the past, our first team would get dominated and look clueless in a preseason loss. A lot of us would then make excuses like "it was vanilla" and such. Our first team did okay in the Ravens game. First team D looked better than they did against the Bills. This was nothing like the Patriot game in preseason, where our entire team was completely dominated.

My feeling is that if this was a regular season game against the Ravens, it would be one of those low scoring 16-13 type of games.

All I can say is, I hope you're right.

[Skinz4Life12]

What beat down? The 13-3 score with starters in the game, that should've been 6-3 if the Ravens don't do a fake punt? So yeah, they're backups beat our backups 10-0. So what?

Exactly, people really need to put this game in perspective

[scruffylookin]

The first team defense was fine against Baltimore.

With the offense it was good news and bad news.

The good news was that McNabb appeared to be a playmaker. He did a good job avoiding the rush and made plays while doing so. That is encouraging and certainly not the sign of a fading QB.

The bad news was the oline did struggle in pass protection causing McNabb to make those plays and of course the running game was lacking.

So overall while I'm not happy with how things went down on Saturday, the starters looked okay.

[Going Commando]

So what did you want to see from the team stevemcqueen1? Did you want them to win 42-0? Its a PRESEASON game! Until the start giving out awards for it, I don't care. We didn't play as bad as everyone thought. Was it as good as the Bills game? No. But the Bills are bad, we play decently against a Super Bowl contender. I'll take it as progress.

What I mainly wanted to see was our offensive line play well against a good front seven. After that, I wanted to see our running game get untracked. I wanted to see McNabb reign it in and play consistently making the easy throws when he had them. On defense I wanted to see us shut down the run and limit big passing plays. I wanted to see our kicking and return games perform well and look like dependable unit.

That's all the basic stuff that's essential to becoming a good football team and winning tough games. Most of that didn't happen although I was fairly pleased with our return game and definitely with our kickoffs. I had hoped our offensive line would be significantly better this season compared to last season but they still look like they've a long way to go. The defense looked too soft against the pass and the Ravens definitely started to push them around once they got warmed up.

There was a lot to build on.

[blue collar]

he starters looked okay.

I want us to be better than just OK for a change. I'm tired of accepting "well enough."

[Going Commando]

Thankfully, you have picked up that slack, and while I know you aren't meaning to, you give off the impression of impatience to our transitional team.

Considering who we are, and who we played, I agree with the OP that I thought the team played well, relatively speaking. Playing well =/= no room for improvement. In some areas, great improvement is needed. In others, we have already seen great strides from last season.

And then we get the edit, where you move past impatience to resignation about our future, over competency of our leaders.

I don't know, I'm not even sure we looked good relatively speaking. We were awful against them last year in the preseason, this year's beating was only slightly less. That seems a poor standard to set your goals upon.

I do have less patience with this regime than I would with an inexperienced and unproven one (like say the Lions have). Obviously, they need less time to learn the ropes. And our FO members have track records of recent failure. For better or worse, that's how I think of them because that's what I have to go on until they do something here.

Second, I'm impatient with this regime because the moves they themselves have made give the impression that they have foregone a traditional rebuild and are trying to win immediately. If they mortgage off our future by trading picks for old players, they absolutely deserve to get slammed if they don't win right away. I'll wait and see what happens this year and next offseason and then form my expectations for the 2011 season if we have one.

[TSO]

This thread is awesome. You could totally filter the glass half full thinkers from the glass half empty ones.

By the way, I liked the way we played against them. They desperately wanted this game it seems, and that's fine, but we got some work throwing deep in and looked damn good doing it. Our 1st team Defense absolutely shut Flacco down, and held the Ravens O for the most part even while being held pass rushing every other play. I'm pleased.

And that one guy who complained about our Special Teams... man, really? You even complained about Bidwell, who had an awesome game punting? Are you out of your mind?

[ouvan59]

I wonder if we were more predicable when LJ was back there (i.e. they knew we were going to run, because when portis is back there he could possibly be blocking as well)

It looked like Johnson was running too tentatively. Portis hit the hole hard both carries while Johnson seemed to be looking for a hole to develop. Too early to bury him but he needs to be much more aggressive.