Harbaugh, Ravens Managing Expectations for Potential Huge Season
OWINGS MILLS, Md. — The Ravens emerged from training camp without any new injuries to their key starters.
As a result, Baltimore is expected to bounce back from last year's 8-9 finish and make the playoffs for the fourth time in five years.
The Ravens had 19 players, including quarterback Lamar Jackson, finish the 2021 season on IR.
Coach John Harbaugh took drastic steps to ensure that doesn't happen again.
Harbaugh held most of his starters out of the preseason games and dialed back training camp.
Now, the Ravens are managing expectations for a potential Super Bowl run this season.
"Mark [Andrews] said it coming off the field here, ‘Every game in the National Football League is a massive challenge,’" Harbaugh said "Every game, all teams bring everything they’ve got, and they’re all very talented teams. You have to be your best – and it’s not just being your best in terms of being fired up, or being emotionally ready or being tough – you have to be at your best execution-wise. You have to be on point, you have to be sharp in order to win the game.
"You have to play winning football, and that’s a challenge every single week. So, I think the guys understand the magnitude of the challenge every single week."
While left tackle Ronnie Stanley, running back J.K. Dobbins and cornerback Marcus Peters might not be able to play in the opener against the Jets after suffering season-ending injuries last year, they should be available in the short-term.
The Ravens will have the rest of their staters available for the road trip to MetLife Stadium.
It will be 9/11 so emotions will be running high in New York.
"The openers are always different," Harbaugh said. "The opener is the opener, and you never really know where you’re at until you play the first real game. You get a sense in the preseason a little bit, but until you line up against somebody for real, you don’t really know where you’re at. Then, you kind of go from there, and all of a sudden, things are going fast. So, they’ll be doing things that we haven’t practiced for that they’ve been practicing. We’ll be doing things for sure that they haven’t seen that we’ve been practicing.
"That’s just the way openers are. Really, the first few weeks of the season are like that, then everybody kind of settles down into what they are. So, we have our work cut out for us – so do they. It’s an opener.”
— To leave a comment, visit our Facebook page or on Twitter.
