BALTIMORE — Ravens coach Jesse Minter doesn’t think it’s “productive” to spend his Monday morning definitively saying they should have called something different. But that’s the question Ravens fans stirred over when their heads hit the pillow Sunday night.
Should Baltimore have tried for a kill shot deep ball to veteran receiver Chris Moore on third-and-1 in the fourth quarter from its own 37-yard line?
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“Just a little bit about that,” Minter started to say, launching into football’s weekly pastime of a head coach explaining his thought process the morning after a loss — this one following a 24-17 unraveling vs. the New Orleans Saints.
Minter said the third-and-1 looked more like 1 1/2 or 2 yards away from the first-down line, rather than a short third-and-1. That may have changed the calculus. Minter and offensive coordinator Declan Doyle deliberated over making it a “two-down situation,” potentially running the ball on both third- and fourth-down to move the sticks.
Instead, Doyle called for a long pass play, chasing an explosive that he presumably thought could catch New Orleans on their heels. Moore, who started the year on the practice squad and has two catches across two games, couldn’t wrestle the ball from sticky coverage by Saints cornerback Kool-Aid McKinstry.
“Defensively, we had just really come off of one bad drive,” Minter said. “I thought we had played OK for the game. I didn’t feel like we were scrambling or reeling on defense. To even risk giving them the ball at the plus-36 in a tie game didn’t feel like that was the right move. But again, you look back at it, and you say, ‘Maybe we should have done this and done that.'”
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The Ravens punted the ball away in a tie game with about eight minutes left. New Orleans then chewed nearly seven minutes on a 16-play, 68-yard drive that ended with a controversial Tyler Shough tush push decided upon official review, which proved to be the deciding score.
Health surely played a role in the decision-making process of that critical third down.
The Ravens were without their top wide receiver, Zay Flowers, who’s nursing a hamstring injury suffered in Week 1, as well as wideout No. 3 Ja’Kobi Lane because of a fractured wrist. And by the fourth quarter, All-Pro left tackle Ronnie Stanley checked out for a toe injury that bothered him throughout the week.
“We just weren’t good enough in the second half to win this game,” running back Derrick Henry said. “We were put in a position to win this game. We just have to be better. We just weren’t good enough — at all.”
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Minter took onus but said his team is “not in the blaming business” and wouldn’t pin the 15-point comeback loss on one call or player.
Still, Ravens fans felt déjà vu from the last home game, a 28-24 loss to the Patriots in December in which former play caller Todd Monken didn’t give Henry the ball more to close out what could have been a win. A vocal portion of the fanbase wondered why Henry, a surefire Hall of Famer, again wasn’t given the ball like a closer jogging out from the bullpen in the ninth inning.
Henry finished with 16 carries for 68 yards but only touched the ball five times after halftime.
Asked whether Henry may have been dealing with an injury, Minter said, “I think throughout the course of a game, there are plays where maybe something small or whatever, but for the most part, Derrick was definitely himself.”
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He took nearly twice as many carries against the Colts a week before. Thirteen of his 24 touches came in the second half in Indianapolis. On Sunday, Henry spent most of the final quarter on the sideline. He took one carry for two yards.
Minter said he didn’t spend much time harping on what they could have done differently in the loss. Rather, he waxed about how the talent in Baltimore implies they’ll be in this situation again with leads that will need protecting.
“This team is going to have a lead [again],” Minter said. “We are going to continue to chase and learn from what happened in those situations. We will get better and put our guys in the best position to be successful given the circumstances.”
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Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: Sports.yahoo.com
