Joe Flacco, Ravens Too Flawed to Make Legitimate Run at AFC North Crown

The Baltimore Ravens defeated the Cleveland Browns 28-7 on Thursday night for their second straight win. The victory took the Ravens to 5-4 and insured that regardless of what happens Sunday, Baltimore will leave Week 10 with at least a share of first place in the AFC North.

That's the good news.

The bad news is that for the second straight week, the Ravens looked flat on offense, even in victory. The team once again struggled running the ball. Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco continued one of the shakier seasons of his nine-year NFL career.

And the Ravens, although they are in first place, once again failed to make a real case as to why they should be considered a serious contender in the AFC.

It wasn't all bad in Charm City on Thursday night. For starters, the Ravens got a convincing victory. Yes, it came against a winless Browns team that is redefining the concept of futility with each passing game, but on a short week, you take what you can get.

As it has most of the season, the Baltimore defense played well. The Ravens gave up only 144 yards of total offense. Four different Baltimore defenders, including outside linebacker Terrell Suggs, picked up sacks. Safety Eric Weddle and cornerback Jerraud Powers hauled in interceptions. And Suggs was a monster, adding a forced fumble and a batted pass that led to the Powers pick.

Flacco gave credit to Suggs and the defense while speaking with sideline reporter Heather Cox after the game: "He's unbelievable. He's been doing this for a really long time now. We're not really surprised on our sideline. We know what he can do, especially when he gets rolling. Our defense is playing with a lot of confidence right now. They're playing really good football. They're helping us out a lot."

Unfortunately, that's just about where the good times ended for the Ravens.

I wrote earlier Thursday that it was imperative the Ravens get the run game going against a Cleveland squad that could be run on by a Pop Warner team. It was important to take advantage of a matchup that should've allowed them to establish positive momentum on the ground.

Yeah, not so much.

Sure, the Ravens ran for 119 yards, a significant increase over their last few games, in which they ran for 50 and 11 yards against the Steelers and Jets, respectively. But that effort came on 34 carries for an average of 3.4 yards a pop. Both of those numbers were substantially lower than what the Browns' AFC-worst run defense has been allowing in those categories (146.4 yards, 4.6 average).

If you can't run on Cleveland, you just can't run.

And while Flacco threw for 296 yards and a season-high three scores and posted his highest passer rating since Week 1 (97.2), he also tossed a pair of interceptions deep in Cleveland territory. Like end-zone and 1-yard line deep.

The inability to run the ball effectively and sloppy turnovers may not have cost the Ravens against a god-awful Browns team (they are just so bad), but Baltimore doesn't get to play its progenitors every week.

Even wide receiver Steve Smith admitted to the NFL Network after the game that the offense isn't playing especially well: "We're trying to find our identity on offense. We're not playing as well as we need to play on offense compared to how our defense is playing. ... They're playing lights-out."

As an aside, Smith is a national treasure. He will be missed when he retires.

But in short, it was just about as unimpressive a blowout victory as you're apt to see—a game that hammered home just how far the AFC North appears to have fallen in 2016.

Record-wise, the Ravens are the best of a flawed group of teams in the division. But it's getting harder and harder to see them holding on to that mantle.

Yes, Baltimore beat the hated Pittsburgh Steelers in Week 9. But that was the first game back for a hobbled, rusty Ben Roethlisberger. When those teams meet again in Week 16, it could be a healthy Big Ben and a Steelers offense that is light-years better than Baltimore's.

Ask the Kansas City Chiefs what the Steelers at home firing on all cylinders look like. They will tell you they look like a 43-14 buzz saw—the kind of dominant signature win the Ravens don't have in 2016.

And no, last week doesn't count. Baltimore didn't win because it played well. It won because it played better than Pittsburgh—in a game where the bar was limbo-low.

The Ravens won't see the disappointing Cincinnati Bengals for the first time this season until Week 11. In a normal campaign, at 3-4-1, the pitching, lurching Bengals would already be all but out of it in a fiercely competitive AFC North.

But this is not a normal year.

The Bengals have made the playoffs in five straight seasons and are the deepest team in the division. They've had their bye week to get it figured out in advance of Monday night's trip to the Big Apple to face the New York Giants.

With the way the Ravens are playing on offense, it's difficult to imagine them holding off one of those teams, and it's nearly impossible to see them holding off both—especially when you consider they close the season against them.

There's still time to get it figured out. The defense is playing at a high level, and to his credit, Flacco is a veteran who has risen to the challenge before. If the Ravens travel to Dallas in 10 days and beat a Cowboys team that has the best record in the NFC, this narrative could change.

Flacco insisted to Cox that the Ravens are headed in the right direction. "We're gaining confidence and putting ourselves in a good position in November to play (meaningful) December football," Flacco said. "Give ourselves a shot at the playoffs. That's all you can ask."

The bad news is that against the worst team in the NFL, we didn't see anything to indicate Flacco's words were more than that. That the Ravens are figuring it out. That they are anything more than an OK team in first place in a bad division.

And even in a down year for the AFC North, with seven to play that probably won't be enough.

     

Gary Davenport is an NFL analyst at Bleacher Report and a member of the Fantasy Sports Writers Association and Pro Football Writers of America. You can follow Gary on Twitter @IDPSharks.

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from Bleacher Report - Baltimore Ravens http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2675392-joe-flacco-ravens-too-flawed-to-make-legitimate-run-at-afc-north-crown