Ravens Fall Apart, Blow 10 point lead

Dec 2, 2012; Baltimore, MD, USA; Baltimore Ravens wide receiver Torrey Smith (82) cannot hold onto a pass in the end zone while defended by Pittsburgh Steelers cornerback Cortez Allen (28) at M

WOW, did that seriously just happen?

-That was the worst fourth quarter I can remember from the Ravens in the past 2 seasons, nothing went right for them. The secondary was horrible despite their 2 INTs, Flacco couldn’t get 2 second to throw the ball, no one could get open, Paul Kruger committed the dumbest roughing the passer call ever, Harbaugh frivolously wasted the Ravens timeouts and in the end the Steelers were able to kick a game winner. unbelievable.

-Flacco was dreadful today, but it wasnt 100% on him. The WRs made some really stupid decisions. Pitta led Flacco into an INT when he didn’t come back to the ball on a busted play, Flacco deserves plenty of blame on that one as well but Pitta was also at fault. Boldin committed 2 stupid penalties on back to back plays that cost the Ravens 15 yards on what started as an extremely promising drive. Torrey Smith was playing lazy on his routes every time I saw him, he spent 80% of the game lightly jogging on streaks and giving up on passes. As a unit they dropped about 5-7 passes. The play of the offense was inexcusably bad.

-The defense wasnt much better. They couldnt cover anything in the middle of the field and Heath Miller shredded them. Statistically this should have been a much much worse defeat. The Steelers cost themselves at least 14 points off of bad plays that were unforced errors. Chykie Brown was absolutely horrible, Batch threw at him every single time he stepped on the field. Corey Graham blew at lest 5 zone coverages, lucky for him 2 of them were just flat out missed opportunities by the Steelers. Graham looked good statistically, but he actually had a horrible game.

-The Ravens pass rush was non-existant. sure they got a few sacks, but on every other play they didnt even get close to Batch, one play in particular I counted almost 8 seconds that Batch had to throw the ball. that is absurd. The Steelers OL is missing 2 starters and wasnt that good to begin with, this was just dreadful play by the Ravens front 7.

-Can I pile on Cam Cameron here too? I don’t like blaming Cam because i think he is extremely under-rated, but seriously what was the game-plan today? Did they throw any non screen/broken play throws under 10 yards? all I saw was a 15-35 yard throw on every damn play. That is something you can do if you get the opponent to crowd the box, the Ravens didnt do that though and they rushed just 20 times compared to 34 passes. if your opponent knows you are going to pass deep every play, it makes it incredibly easy to defend. how many times did Joe Throw deep and there were 2 Steelers draped all over a Ravens WR? I dont mind a pass heavy game plan, i really dont. but those passes need to be realistic, Flacco is a rhythm passer, if they would start to spread the field and throw inside 10 yards for a few plays each drive to set things up, then mix in Rice and Pierce with an occasional(read no more than 2 per drive) deep ball, this offense would be almost unstoppable.

-The only decent thing about the Ravens today was that Justin Tucker hit both his attempts. Im pretty pissed right now so maybe i am not seeing things clearly, but The only two players for the Ravens who were solid were Leech and Tucker. Williams wasnt terrible but he wasnt great either.

I need to take a step back for a while so dont expect another post for a couple hours. I have to cool down an hour or so. On the bright side, the Ravens are still 2 games up on the division with 4 to go and would still need a monumental collapse to lose this thing. They could have ended this thing next week no matter what with a win today, but instead this thing could drag on for 2+ more weeks.