Four Verts: Chin up Ravens; shut up nerds about Anthony Richardson; and score one for the ‘RBs matter’ crowd

Week 1 was all over the place, but it was amazing to have football back, no matter how sloppy most of it ultimately was. There are a lot of takeaways to dig through from the first week of the season from the supernova experience of Anthony Richardson, to competing theories on running back value. This week’s Four Verts column starts in Baltimore, where no one should be hitting the panic button just yet.

Ravens defense will be just fine

Someone has to lose, even when two elite teams take the stage. The Ravens are currently 0-1 after losing a heartbreaker to the Chiefs at Arrowhead on opening night, but sometimes that happens against the team that’s won back-to-back Super Bowls. Baltimore has undergone a lot of change this offseason, with one of their biggest losses coming when defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald was hired to oversee the Seattle Seahawks as their head coach. Linebackers coach Zach Orr was promoted to defensive coordinator and was immediately tasked with slowing down the best quarterback in football. It didn’t quite go as planned, but there isn’t any reason to panic about this defense yet.

First: The Ravens defense still has a ton of good football players. Roquan Smith, Kyle Hamilton, Marlon Humphrey, Nnamdi Madubuike and Marcus Williams are five legitimate cornerstone players on that side of the ball. Then there’s still the young contributors they would like to continue developing like Nate Wiggins, David Ojabo, Travis Jones, Odafe Oweh, Trenton Simpson and others. They have enough depth to pair with the star power to make sure that they can endure the rigors of an NFL season, even if some of their younger players are still figuring out life in the NFL.

That talent is incredibly important as they integrate a new defensive coordinator in the midst of trying to finally cash in on regular-season success and win the Super Bowl. The Ravens will always have a high floor on defense as long as these players are healthy. That’s talent that can buoy…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/four-verts-chin-up-ravens-shut-up-nerds-about-anthony-richardson-and-score-one-for-the-rbs-matter-crowd-144601094.html

Author : Yahoo Sports

Publish date : 2024-09-11 14:46:47

Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.