Baltimore Ravens beat Dolphins 40-0: 3 big things

1. The Ravens simply hid their problems:

The Ravens hid their problems the way I used to hide things under my bed and tell my mother that I finished cleaning my room. It wasn’t like the Ravens saw all their problems vanish into thin air. They got the ball out of Joe Flacco’s hands quickly. They used tempo and they leaned on the running game. The Ravens didn’t let the Dolphins’ pass rushers beat them. The running game went at the Dolphins hard. This is how the Ravens offense needs to do it. They need to stay in their comfort zone. They must be ultra conservative though; This was perfect.

The Ravens still don’t have a lot of answers at wide receiver. Flacco threw a dime to Maclin in the end zone. Maclin was the only receiver on the field who was capable of making that play. When Maclin was out, that made a bad situation worse. When Maclin is in the game the receiving group is passable.

Where there’s a will there is a way

The Ravens know who to turn to on the offense. It’s a healthy dose of Alex Collins and Buck Allen, then Maclin, Mike Wallace and Ben Watson give Flacco three veteran receiving options. It’s not the best group on offense, but with solid play from Flacco and a half way passable offensive line it’ll have to do.

One thing to note is that the running game got going early. In the Ravens losses they have run the ball well when it didn’t matter. Alex Collins, for example, had some big runs against the Jaguars but it didn’t mean anything because of what the scoreboard read.  Matt Skura made a big difference. Yes, we’ve gotten to the point where we’re praising Skura. If Skura can continue to run block like this, the Ravens offensive line is almost really good.