The Baltimore Ravens boasted a pretty dang good defense in 2019, but their 2020 unit looks to be one of their best in franchise history.
They say offense sells tickets, but defense wins championships. The Kansas City Chiefs learned this from 2018 to 2019. 2018 saw the Chiefs lose in the AFC Championship game because the defense couldn’t stop a nose bleed. Their 2019 defense was much improved and saw the franchise win its second Super Bowl title. The Baltimore Ravens look to be the next team to learn this lesson.
In 2019, Baltimore’s defense was pretty dang good. The team ranked third in PPG (17.6), fourth in total YPG (300.6), sixth in passing YPG (207.2), and fifth in rushing YPG (93.4). Across the board, those are some pretty good stats, but they all must be taken in context.
For starters, the team’s fifth rank run defense was gashed for 4.4 YPC, which tied for 20th in the league. That’s a pretty hefty amount of yards to surrender per carry and it was inherently obvious in the team’s playoff loss to the Tennessee Titans. Derrick Henry was running amock and no one could slow down the big man. The low rushing YPG is likely more attributed to the Ravens offense getting off to huge leads offensively and forcing teams to abandon the run and throw the ball more.
To put it in words, the Baltimore Ravens 2019 defense simply wasn’t good enough despite a plethora of talent. The front office has come to realize this and now we are seeing some major investments to get better.
Everything we’ve seen so far has us thinking that this defense will be able to keep up with the offense and looks championship-caliber in its own right.