What Eric DeCosta Quietly Revealed About The Ravens During The Draft

It didn’t take long for some of the inherent clues Ravens general manager Eric DeCosta left behind from the draft – both what he did with his 11 selections and what he didn’t do – to become readily apparent.

He barely addressed the offensive and defensive lines, and then quickly pounced on versatile defensive lineman Calais Campbell as we begged him to . And will surely be doing something sooner rather than later to land an NFL-level center.

The draft reinforced that in the top rounds, DeCosta is fervently in the “best player available at a position of need” camp, as he should be given where this franchise is right now. But when you consider this draft class in its entirety, and the offseason on the whole to this point, it speaks to me that the Ravens already believe very deeply in the impact that world-renowned health and performance coach Dr. Nic Gill can have on this roster right away.

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For starters, the Ravens finally stayed away to a large degree on taking chances on players with deep injury histories or who are coming into the league dealing with a surgery or remnants of a surgery or who other teams think might need a procedure far sooner than you would like. He used all 11 picks and was willing to lean into some of the older prospects who already have a fair amount of tread on their tires despite bemoaning that at the Liar’s Lunch.

I’m taking that at least as something of a nod to what they can do to strengthen and rebuild and rehab. Gill is considered at the vanguard of what sports science and nutrition and strength and conditioning can do for athletes… And he also would surely have some thoughts on certain players with medical situations that the Ravens probably shouldn’t be quite as quick to think they can fix as they enter the NFL.

And when you factor in what they have done in free agency, it also speaks to a beefed up medical staff that will clearly be changing some things significantly from how they were done under long-time head coach John Harbaugh. They turned away from Maxx Crosby for what the team is saying is medical reasons and they instead gave money to Trey Hendrickson, who has no shortage of issues himself. And Campbell takes tremendous care of himself, but he’s going to turn 40, which is highly unusual for any football players let alone one who battles at the line of scrimmage.

This team is going into the season with a top pass rusher, potential starting DT (Campbell), starting left tackle, starting running back (age 32!) and starting tight end - for starters - who have some serious age-and-or-injury concerns. That implies some things.

Gill’s work with the “All Blacks” rugby team in New Zealand clearly didn’t get overlooked. You don’t make a hire like this and woo someone with this resume to Baltimore if his input isn’t going to be highly valued. And in many ways, watching this organization pivot and operate through this draft has me expecting this team will also be practicing on a very different schedule and training these players in a manner unlike anything they’ve done before.

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