Ravens Bye Week Update & Quick Glances at AFC North

By:  Marcus Wyche

Hey sports fans, it's bye week time for my Ravens and I thought I would take this time to talk a little about my team.

The Ravens have some key personnel injured that they need to get healthy, such as Jimmy Smith, Ben Grubbs, Lee Evans and Chris Carr that our team desperately needs. Smith and Carr are needed at this point, primarily to shore up a very thin secondary. Foxworth is done for the season, leaving us with basically nothing but rookies playing at this time, who are playing surprisingly well.

Evans is needed to mentor Torrey Smith and help him learn the speed routes while opening things up for Anquan Boldin underneath. I think once Evans his healthy and back on the field doing his thing, the offense will look like it did when the Ravens destroyed the Steelers. As it stands right now, I would rank the AFC top 5 in this order:
1. Patriots
2. Ravens
3. Texans
4. Chargers
5. Bills

With the Titans a close six. Yes, I ranked the Ravens over the Titans even though they beat us, but when you look at the Ravens schedule versus the Titans schedule then you will know what I mean.

I have taken a hard look at Joe Flacco and his numbers compared to other quarterbacks in the division and what I found sort of surprised me...and not in a good way. Flacco is ranked 2nd in the AFC North when it comes to Quarterback Rating, but he is 22nd when taking the whole NFL into account [Editor's Note:  This does not surprise me at all when you consider that the other AFC North quarterbacks are Colt McCoy(will never be good), Andy Dalton(just a rookie) and Ben Roethlisberger(run game/defense makes him look better than he is, I don't buy the whole "2 Super Bowl Argument")] Here are the numbers at a glance:

 Flacco QBR = 79.9 (22nd)
 Roethlisberger QBR = 89.2 (20th)
 McCoy QBR = 78.7 (24th) [Editor's Note: His yards per attempt is an embarrassing/pitiful 5.2]
 Dalton QBR = 76.9 (27th)

As the numbers show, Flacco is not doing as well as I thought he was. He is great in the first quarter, but sometime during the second and third quarter's his accuracy falls by the way side as he starts overthrowing his receivers and making bad decisions. I am not sure if he is just not seeing the adjustments that the defenses are making or his offensive line is not giving him enough time, but either way Flacco needs to make better in game adjustments and/or presnap reads.

I do understand that Flacco needs time to develop better timing with his young/new receivers speed and all, but that does not account for all the bad throws. I just think Flacco needs to study more film and try to limit the mistakes, his completion percentage must get better than the current 49.3%. Flacco is a good quarterback on his way to being a great quarterback and no matter what anyone says, out of all the young quarterbacks that have been drafted within the last 4 years, I would take "Joe Cool" over them all.

My take on the Steelers is an odd one. I expected the Steelers to be better then they are, but to my surprise, the defense seems old and a step behind (until the Titans game). Now this could be due to age or it could be that teams have made adjustments against the Steelers blitzing style of defense.

On offense the Steelers have had problems running the ball and that's not something anybody is used to seeing from them. Roethlisberger is having issues with turnovers (6 INT's & 4 Fumbles) and his offensive line, and if they do not get the line fixed and limit the number of hits he is taking, he will not survive to the end of the season. In fact I was just trying to figure out who has been hit more, Roethlisberger or Michael Vick? I may have to look into that, but this is Steeler time and Roethlisberger needs help. Now with Rashard Mendenhall hurt, can Isaac Redman toe the line until Mendenhall is fully healthy? With the offensive line playing the way it is, I would say no.

On defense, the Steelers have always had great linebackers and a good D-line(front 7), but the secondary has been suspect for years. The pass rush that the linebackers create, hides many of the secondary's faults, but Sunday, the Steelers proved that they are not the old and feeble defense that we all thought they were...including myself.

It's funny how things change from week-to-week in the NFL, and this week the Steelers showed why they are the defending AFC Champions. They came back and beat the brakes off the Titans and showed they are still a power in the AFC. A win is a win no matter how pretty or ugly it is.

Now the Bengals need some help, and I am not sure where to go with this. They have problems scoring and stopping people from scoring, but against the Jaguars, they won. It's not saying a lot that they beat Jacksonville. Neither team lit it up with stats, but when it counted, the Bengals defense did what it needed to do and that's all that matters. Now the Bengals needed a 22 yard punt into the wind to help set up the game winning drive, but hey it is what it is. [Editor's Note:  The Bengals are 3-2 and seem to be playing solid defense (No. 6 in Total Defense) and appear to have a nice young offensive core with Andy Dalton and A.J. Green]

The Browns had a bye week and they really need help, more so then the Bengals. The Browns have a point differential of -19 and have only scored 8 touchdowns. That's not going to get it done in the NFL. For Browns fans, I am sorry and I wish you all well, just not against my Ravens.


Follow Marcus on Twitter:  @Mwyche2

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