Baltimore Ravens: Picking superlatives for magical season

The Baltimore Ravens regular season is over. Before we get to playoff football, here are the player superlatives:

When the Baltimore Ravens go 14-2 and earn the top seed in their conference, well, suffice it to say they had a successful regular season.

That’s where the Baltimore Ravens were this year, and though they have bigger fish to fry (hopefully of the Lombardi variety), it is impossible to ignore all the good they achieved this season — from winning the division to witnessing the rise of an NFL superstar at quarterback, to finishing the slate with an impressive 12-game winning streak that included some of the top teams in the league as its victims along the way.

Before the Ravens, and us at Ebony Bird, step fully into playoff mode, let’s take a minute to hand out some superlatives for the 2019 Baltimore Ravens. We’ve done this exercise after each of the first three quarters of the season, and some of these awards have remained the same. Others have evolved. Let’s take a look.

MVP — Lamar Jackson

When your quarterback throws for 3,127 yards and 36 touchdowns with only six interceptions, passing for a rating of 113.3, you have a clear-cut team MVP. When he also throws in 1,206 yards and has seven more touchdowns on the ground, while becoming the team’s clear-cut leader and a national superstar, you have a no-brainer MVP of the entire league. That’s Lamar Jackson, ladies and gentlemen.

Offensive Player of the Year — Mark Ingram

Ingram ran for 1,018 yards and 10 touchdowns despite sitting out the season finale with a calf injury. Add to that impressive figure the 26 catches and five receiving touchdowns he contributed, the leadership and hard-nosed approach he brought to the offense, and Ingram got the nod over other deserving players, like Mark Andrews and Ronnie Stanley.

Defensive Player of the Year — Marlon Humphrey

Humphrey shadowed the opposing stud receivers, played outside, played inside, contributed a blocked kick on special teams, sold popcorn in the stands and did everything else you could ask of a star cornerback. He was also terrific in run-support, and ended the season with 65 tackles and three interceptions. He made game-changing plays against the Pittsburgh Steelers, Seattle Seahawks and the New England Patriots. He gets the edge over Matthew Judon and Marcus Peters, who were both also very deserving of this honor.

Rookie of the Year — Marquise Brown

Brown started off the season with a bang, contributing a pair of long touchdowns against the Dolphins in the season-opener, and showed an impressive blend of speed, quickness, awareness and hands over the course of the season. He did this despite coming back from major foot surgery in the offseason and fighting through some nagging bumps and bruises along the way. He finished with 584 yards and seven touchdowns on the year, and expectations for the future are sky-high.

Coach of the Year — Joe D’Alessandris

The offensive line was supposed to be the Achilles heel of this Ravens team. Psst… it was not. Despite an injury to starting center Matt Skura, the line kept plugging along and became the first team in history to average more than 200 yards of offense on both the ground and in the air. This was a tight competition, as the Ravens coaching staff has been remarkable this season, from head coach John Harbaugh down to his coordinators and position coaches. But the line exceeded every expectation placed on it, so we give D’Alessandris the nod.

Unsung Hero — Chuck Clark

When Tony Jefferson went down with an injury, Clark was forced to step up in his place — both at safety and in wearing the infamous “Green Dot,” directing the defense on the field. Clark has shined, and been an integral part of the defense, bouncing back and forth between defensive back and substitute-package linebacker. Clark helped change the direction of this year’s defense with his contributions, and that growing defense helped this team grow into the regular-season monster it became.