3. 2019
Say what you will about Marquise Brown, he wasn’t a miss for the Ravens. Brown has had two seasons in the NFL now and he has 104 receptions and 15 touchdowns to his name. Brown showed flashes of brilliance in both seasons.
Talking about the immediate impact he scored the first touchdown of his rookie season and it didn’t even take a full handful of plays. Brown had four catches for 146 yards in two touchdowns in his first game with the Ravens. His last drive of the game reception in the home opener against the Arizona Cardinals the next week may have been one of the most memorable moments in Ravens history.
Brown played a big part in Lamar Jackson‘s MVP season. That boosts this draft up in the rankings. Brown is the best receiver the Ravens have drafted since Torrey Smith in 2012. Without Brown, the Ravens would have been completely desperate at the wide receiver position. Brown arguably had a greater impact than any of the rookies in the two draft classes ranked below this one.
The rest of the draft class didn’t do too much for the Ravens in the 2019 season. Miles Boykin had a couple of promising highlights including catching a deep pass against the Seattle Seahawks to get the team going in a big game. Jaylon Ferguson got a lot of playing time as a rookie. Now, it wasn’t a performance that blew you away, yet the amount of time he had on the field counts as impact.
It doesn’t quite count as instant impact, yet the help Ben Powers gave the Ravens in the 2021 season isn’t all that delayed impact. The Ravens found every right guard combination that was worse in the 2021 season, that was for sure. Powers started in the week 17 finale, where the backups led the Ravens to a win over the Steelers. That counts for something in every Baltimore heart, right?
It’s worth noting that the Ravens had a 12 game winning streak in the 2019 season and had the best record in franchise history. The draft didn’t build all that success, though it chipped in towards it.