The Baltimore Ravens must find balance on offense this season

The Baltimore Ravens must find balance on offense this season if they want to win games.

To say the Baltimore Ravens were a pass happy team last season was an understatement.

If you look at Joe Flacco’s numbers last season you would think he had a career season. Technically, he did, but if you look deeper into the stats, the offense production as an wholewasn’t there. Out of the 455 pass completions last season 424 where short passes. With Marty Mornhinweg’s pass happy style of play, the Ravens seemed to completely abandoned the run last season. 66.26% of the offensive snaps where pass plays compared to 33.74% that where runs.

Does that sound like the Baltimore Ravens to you? This is a team that’s been built on the run game over the years as a franchise. With the likes of Jamal Lewis and Ray Rice, the Ravens have been all about smash mouth football. They got away from that last season and it needs to change.

There needs to be balance

I’m not saying completely abandon the passing game. If anything, the Ravens should be committed to it especially with the addition of Jeremy Maclin. However, there needs to be balance. You cannot win games when you only rush for an average of 91.4 yards per game.

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It makes your offense one-dimensional and that works when you have Aaron Rodgers or Tom Brady, but not Joe Flacco. Flacco isn’t a quarterback that is going to win you games by throwing 400 yards and 3 touchdowns. That’s just the reality of it. But Flacco can put you in a position to win with his arm, but it’s when there’s an established ground game.

Flacco’s best two seasons came in 2010 and 2014. Both of those years there was a 1,000 yard rusher. It’s proof that the run and pass game can coexist in this offense. We’ve seen it before, it’s just all about committing to it for a full season.

Dixon suspension shouldn’t change anything

Part of me is worried because Kenneth Dixon is suspended for the first four games of the season, that the Ravens will rely too much on the pass when he’s gone. The suspension shouldn’t change anything at all for the offense. They still have two very competent backs in Terrance West and Danny Woodhead.

As we saw last year, West is able to carry a full workload. He did this for a number of games before Dixon began to emerge on the scene late in the season. The Ravens signed Danny Woodhead in part because of the Dixon suspension. He isn’t the kind of runner that Dixon is, but he can be a threat on the outside and in the slot.

The Bottom Line

The Ravens offense will not get anywhere without a balanced regimen. We saw what happens when they rely on the pass and it makes them an average team at best. Luckily for the Ravens they added in a great senior offensive assistant in Greg Roman. He’s very familiar with the Ravens and has had a ton of success with other offenses in the NFL.

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We know Marty Mornhinweg’s tendencies and as much as he says the offense will commit to the run, I will believe it when I see it. It’s crucial to the team’s success this upcoming season.