The first big move of the Ravens’ offseason came out of nowhere Friday night: Defensive coordinator Don “Wink” Martindale is out after four years in Baltimore.
His departure adds yet another wrinkle to an offseason that could dramatically reshape the Ravens’ roster and set a new course for their future. After an injury-marred season ended short of the playoffs, the team faces questions about went wrong over its six-game losing streak, the defense’s disappointing year, quarterback Lamar Jackson’s future in Baltimore, the offense’s direction under coordinator Greg Roman and more.
As the wait for coach John Harbaugh’s season-ending news conference drags on, here’s what Baltimore Sun reporters Childs Walker and Jonas Shaffer and editor C.J. Doon make of the Ravens’ wild 2021 season and 2022 offseason.
The Ravens need a new defensive coordinator. Where should John Harbaugh look for Don “Wink” Martindale’s replacement?
Walker: The Ravens have almost always looked within when choosing their defense’s next designer, and it’s difficult to imagine Harbaugh straying too far outside the family. He has good options on his staff in Anthony Weaver and Chris Hewitt, both of whom have substantial legacies as NFL players and coaches, in addition to deep roots in the organization. The Ravens need to restock their defensive front, with an eye on more pass-rushing production, and Weaver qualifies as an expert on that subject. He coached for four other franchises before joining Harbaugh’s staff, so he would represent a bridge between stability and fresh ideas. The Ravens would generate more buzz by bringing Mike Macdonald back from Michigan, but if understated reform is Harbaugh’s goal, Weaver fits.
Shaffer: Martindale’s defensive schemes didn’t lack creativity. His simulated-pressure packages, designed to free up a pass rusher with complex presnap looks, are among the best in the sport. What the Ravens could get from their next coordinator, whether he has ties to the organization or not, is a new perspective on where modern offenses are trending. The Ravens had one of the NFL’s best run defenses this year, and what did it get them? Not a whole lot. The Pittsburgh Steelers, meanwhile, had one of the NFL’s worst run defenses, but they were decent enough against the pass to be an average unit overall.
That value proposition won’t change anytime soon. But even as the Ravens’ front office built their defense from the back to the front — then watched injuries blow that vaunted secondary to pieces — players reiterated that stopping the run was their top priority. That approach is baked into the franchise’s hard-nosed tradition. So, it seems, is the team’s history of promoting from within to fill defensive coordinator vacancies. But after a season where almost nothing went right, maybe it’s time to reevaluate both ideas.
Doon: With strong candidates already on staff in Weaver and Hewitt, it’s hard to argue with another internal promotion. Martindale’s reliance on blitzes and man coverage certainly enjoyed its share of success, with the Ravens creating more unblocked pressures than any team in football from 2019 to 2020, according to Pro Football Focus. With cornerbacks Marlon Humphrey and Marcus Peters returning to full health in 2022, it’s tempting to stick with that formula. But this might be a chance for the Ravens to shake things up, especially with a potential overhaul looming on defense.
Does Martindale’s exit change the temperature on Ravens offensive coordinator Greg Roman’s seat at all?
Walker: No. These were always separate evaluations, even though it’s natural for us to link them. The Martindale move told us everything is on the table when it comes to fixing this team, but we probably should have known that anyway. The decision on Roman is a philosophical one as much as a referendum on his abilities. If Harbaugh still believes in the concepts he touted as revolutionary going into the 2019 season, he should stick with his coordinator, who remains a master of the run game. If he believes the Ravens have gone stale and need to unlock Jackson’s passing potential with more wide-open, three-receiver sets, he should probably look elsewhere.
Though many fans have turned on Roman, he did not get a clean shot in 2021, given the injuries at running back and the troubles at tackle. Don’t be surprised if Harbaugh gives him one more chance to reverse the downward trends of the past two seasons.
Shaffer: You will not find a better summation of the Ravens’ coordinator situation than this: In the hours after Martindale’s departure was announced, “Greg Roman” was trending locally on Twitter. Does Harbaugh care that Joe Fan has soured on Roman’s offensive schemes? Almost certainly not. But public sentiment does matter to some extent. There were plenty of open seats inside M&T Bank Stadium toward the end of this season, and if season-ticket holders decide to give up their 2022 plan because they’d rather not watch a Roman-led offense, that will become abundantly clear to Ravens officials.
The most important criterion for his job security hasn’t changed, however. The Ravens’ offense has trended downward since Roman took over, from No. 1 in efficiency to No. 11 to No. 17 this season, according to Football Outsiders. Some of that has been out of his control; just imagine how the top-ranking Tampa Bay Buccaneers would’ve fared if quarterback Tom Brady missed a third of the season. Now more than ever, though, Roman’s future hinges on Jackson’s performance. If Jackson recaptures his 2019 form, the Ravens won’t move on from Roman (unless he moves on himself). If Jackson’s struggles continue, the Ravens will have to seek a fresh start.
Doon: Only if Harbaugh wants to consider a complete overhaul, which seems unlikely. Roman deserves a full season with healthy running backs J.K. Dobbins and Gus Edwards and wide receiver Rashod Bateman before we declare his tenure a failure. Jackson might never again be as efficient as he was in 2019, but he showed signs of progress as a downfield passer early in the season. With a strong backfield, a first-team All-Pro tight end in Mark Andrews and two talented receivers, the Ravens have the pieces to be one of the league’s best offenses in 2022. The pressure is certainly on Roman to get the most out of that group, but there’s no reason to make a change this offseason. Roman is the only offensive coordinator Jackson has ever known as a full-time starter in the NFL, and continuity is important for a young quarterback.
What do you hope to learn from Harbaugh’s end-of-season news conference?
Walker: To what degree does Harbaugh believe the Ravens need to freshen up their approach, and to what degree does he believe injuries undid them in 2021? We already received a partial answer to this question with his decision to replace Martindale. Harbaugh will always say the Ravens are in problem-solving mode, and we know they will look to shore up their offensive line and restock their defense. But will they change from the foundation up, as they did going into the 2019 season?
Shaffer: What the heck happened to the defense in the first half of the season and to Jackson in the second half of the season? And what does he want to see from the Ravens’ coordinators next season to fix those troubles? An update on the team’s offseason injury situation would also be useful, but that might take a couple of hours to complete.
Doon: Does Harbaugh believe the Ravens belong in the same tier as the Kansas City Chiefs and Buffalo Bills (and maybe the Tennessee Titans and Cincinnati Bengals) in the AFC next season? Is he confident the Ravens can keep building a winning team around Jackson if they offer him a big contract? Is this lost 2021 campaign explained away by injuries and bad luck or a sign that the Ravens are slipping further away from the top contenders? If the Ravens are confident they can bounce back, we need to hear why.
How would you grade the Ravens’ season?
Walker: C. The Ravens fell short of their own expectations, which will rankle them far longer than any disappointment they sense from the outside. They believed they were good enough to make a deep playoff run and put themselves in position to do just that with an 8-3 start. It was not their fault that injuries took the heart and legs from their roster. It would be hard to find a team that could sprint across the finish line without its franchise quarterback, its left tackle, its top two running backs and its top three cornerbacks. So we have to grade on a curve, even in the next-man-up context of the NFL.
At the same time, we have to acknowledge that the offense had sputtered before Lamar Jackson hurt his ankle, that the defense gave up too many explosive plays when it was still relatively healthy, and that this team was playing with fire, even when it was winning close game after close game. Aside from a dominant win over the Los Angeles Chargers, the 2021 Ravens never came all the way together the way they envisioned back in August. They came within a few plays of making the postseason, a testament to their fight and resourcefulness. But they missed their mark by more than a little.
Shaffer: C. Strip away the context from this season, and an 8-9 record and last-place finish in the AFC North look like benchmarks in a failed season. Same goes for the league-worst pass defense and inconsistent offense. But look at the Ravens who started over the final six weeks of the year, and that assessment starts to feel harsh. According to one analysis, the Ravens were not only among the NFL’s leaders in games missed because of injury in 2021, but the value of the players they lost was also among the NFL’s most significant. Quarterback, left tackle and cornerback are three of the league’s most important positions, and the Ravens played most of the season’s back half with replacement-level starters (or worse) at each spot. It’s hard to blame the Ravens’ results when their process was so thoroughly compromised.
Doon: C-plus. Anything short of a return to the divisional round of the playoffs has to be considered disappointing, especially since the Ravens were at one point 8-3 and atop the AFC. Yes, the team eventually succumbed to all of those injuries during a season-ending six-game losing streak, but it was just just a few plays away from beating the Pittsburgh Steelers, Green Bay Packers and Los Angeles Rams down the stretch. The Ravens’ defense deserves most of the blame, failing to make a critical stop time and time again. Don “Wink” Martindale’s unit finished 28th in Football Outsiders’ DVOA, the second-worst mark in franchise history, behind only the expansion 1996 team. Even a healthy and productive Jackson might not have been able to overcome that.
Did Lamar Jackson’s 2021 season change your thinking on his long-term value to the Ravens?
Walker: No. He played like an NFL Most Valuable Player candidate early in the season, and we saw how the Ravens stopped pulling out wins with his big-play ability removed from the picture. Jackson’s season was full of contradictions, and his internal clock seemed to go haywire as opponents assaulted him with pressure in the second half. But give him better health, adequate protection on the edges and his familiar powerhouse running game, and a lot of those problems will fade away. The Ravens don’t have to sign Jackson to an extension this offseason, but they do have to operate as if their team is going to be built around him for years to come.
Shaffer: Kind of. Jackson’s still plenty capable of being the best player on the field in every game he plays, a generational quality that’s tough to attach a dollar figure to. But two of his most valuable traits — his ability to run circles around defenders and to figure opponents out — diminished over the season. He averaged just 6.8 yards per scramble after the bye week, which would’ve been the lowest mark of his career, and his overall sack rate in 2021 was a career-worst 9%.
When Jackson took questions at the end of the season, he was asked what went wrong over his prolonged slump. “To be honest with you, I really don’t know,” he said. He repeated himself — “I really don’t know” — three more times over his answer. Maybe Jackson did know. Maybe he just didn’t want to give anything way to defensive coordinators getting ahead on their 2022 homework. But too often this season, Jackson either didn’t have the right answer as a passer or didn’t know what to do with the solution.
Doon: A tiny bit. According to RBSDM.com, if you go by the analytical measures of expected points added and completion percentage over expectation, Jackson most closely resembled second-year quarterbacks Jalen Hurts and Tua Tagovailoa. The former MVP has a much better long-term outlook than those two, but this year showed that Jackson’s floor might be lower than previously thought. His ceiling is still “perennial MVP candidate,” and that’s worth committing to long-term.