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Ravens retain OT Eugene Monroe with five-year, $37.5 million deal

Eugene Monroe will be in Baltimore for the next few years. (David Banks/Getty Images) After he was traded from the Jacksonville Jaguars to the Baltimore Ravens
Doug Farrar|
Ravens retain OT Eugene Monroe with five-year, $37.5 million deal
Ravens retain OT Eugene Monroe with five-year, $37.5 million deal

Eugene Monroe will be in Baltimore for the next few years. (David Banks/Getty Images)

After he was traded from the Jacksonville Jaguars to the Baltimore Ravens last October, left tackle Eugene Monroe became one of the better pass-blocking linemen in the NFL, giving up just 24 total pressures and four sacks in 467 passing snaps. That's an impressive total when protecting a quarterback in Joe Flacco who isn't exactly mobile and who takes a lot of longer drops. After the 2013 season, Monroe said that he wanted to command somewhere in the neighborhood of $10 million per year.

"You have to get the absolute best because you put forth your best effort all the time, every single day in this league," he told Baltimore radio station WNST in February. "So there are definitely no discounts, and you have to have you and your family's best interests at heart in terms of negotiating these deals."

Monroe didn't get quite was he was asking for on a per-year basis, but he will be staying in Baltimore, according to several reports, with a new five-year, $37 million deal. Monroe and the Ravens had maintained a dialogue throughout the offseason, and Monroe was certainly a major priority. In 2013, Baltimore's run game fell apart, and with several injuries to Flacco's receiving targets, the defending Super Bowl champs limped to an 8-8 record.

Jacksonville's first-round pick in the 2009 NFL draft out of Virginia, Monroe has played in 76 NFL games through his career, starting 73.

Grade: A. If we're living in a world where Rodger Saffold can get a five-year, $42.5 million deal (and we apparently are, according to the Oakland Raiders), the Ravens struck a great deal here. Monroe has all the physical tools to be a top-level offensive lineman, and he took some big steps forward once he left Jacksonville.

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Doug Farrar
DOUG FARRAR

SI.com contributing NFL writer and Seattle resident Doug Farrar started writing about football locally in 2002, and became Football Outsiders' West Coast NFL guy in 2006. He was fascinated by FO's idea to combine Bill James with Dr. Z, and wrote for the site for six years. He wrote a game-tape column called "Cover-2" for a number of years, and contributed to six editions of "Pro Football Prospectus" and the "Football Outsiders Almanac." In 2009,  Doug was invited to join Yahoo Sports' NFL team, and covered Senior Bowls, scouting combines, Super Bowls, and all sorts of other things for Yahoo Sports and the Shutdown Corner blog through June, 2013. Doug received the proverbial offer he couldn't refuse from SI.com in 2013, and that was that. Doug has also written for the Seattle Times, the Washington Post, the New York Sun, FOX Sports, ESPN.com, and ESPN The Magazine.  He also makes regular appearances on several local and national radio shows, and has hosted several podcasts over the years. He counts Dan Jenkins, Thomas Boswell, Frank Deford, Ralph Wiley, Peter King, and Bill Simmons as the writers who made him want to do this for a living. In his rare off-time, Doug can be found reading, hiking, working out, searching for new Hendrix, Who, and MC5 bootlegs, and wondering if the Mariners will ever be good again.

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