ARLINGTON, Texas — The 2024 Ravens might turn out to be a good team, maybe even a great team. Bad teams don’t often leave Dallas with a win, and these Ravens were utterly dominant here for three quarters, silencing Cowboys fans (except for the rare chorus of boos) with one punishing run after another, one third-down stop after another.
But as the Ravens white-knuckled their way to a 28-25 win Sunday at AT&T Stadium, their worst impulses and most destructive tendencies surfaced yet again. And, in those times, the Ravens do not look like a good team. Far from it.
“Definitely got a sour taste in my mouth based on how good we started, what the score looked like,” outside linebacker Odafe Oweh said in a near-empty locker room that was light on celebrating the team’s first win. The Ravens had entered the fourth quarter with a 28-6 lead. They’d needed a late put-away drive from quarterback Lamar Jackson and the offense to hold on and avoid a potentially doomed 0-3 start.
“At the end of the day, it’s getting that W, getting the win, and we got it. But we definitely got some things to clean up. Same story.”
This one had a happy ending. Or at least not an especially bleak one. But Sunday’s game had all the increasingly familiar hallmarks of a flawed Ravens team.
Start with the penalties. Oweh was flagged for one of them, a dubious roughing-the-passer call late in the fourth quarter that turned what would’ve been a third-and-10 near midfield into a first-and-10 at the Ravens’ 34. Five plays later, Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott found wide receiver KaVontae Turpin in the end zone for a 16-yard score, Dallas’ third touchdown in a six-minute span, drawing the Ravens’ once-enormous lead to a field goal.
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As of Sunday night, no team had been called for more penalties (31) or assessed more penalty yardage (278) than the Ravens. On Sunday, their final tally was 13 flags for 105 yards. The damage has been substantial on both sides of the ball. By expected points added, a measure of efficiency that accounts for situational factors such as down, distance and field position, the Ravens’ offense has lost 8.10 points through penalties, according to TruMedia, the most in the NFL. Their defense has lost 6.74 points, tied for the second most.
With another two touchdowns in their favor, the Ravens could be 3-0 entering next week’s “Sunday Night Football” showdown against the 2-0 Buffalo Bills. Without them, they are 1-2. Barely.
“We need to eliminate the penalties,” coach John Harbaugh said when asked why they keep happening. “That’s what we need to do. They’re hurting us. They’re costly. Whether you think they should be called or not — I’m sure we’ll look at the tape, I’m sure there’s some questionable ones — you guys might know more than I do. It doesn’t matter. We just have to eliminate the penalties.”
The Ravens were not an especially penalty-avoidant team last season; they finished 2023 with the 10th most in the NFL. More baffling is their pass defense’s disappearing act.
By almost every metric, the Ravens had one of the NFL’s best secondaries last year. By almost every metric, they have one of the worst this year. Against two star quarterbacks — the Kansas City Chiefs’ Patrick Mahomes and the Cowboys’ Prescott — and a vagabond starter — the Las Vegas Raiders’ Gardner Minshew — the Ravens have allowed an NFL-worst 875 passing yards. The Los Angeles Rams are second worst, with 746 yards. Only six defenses total have given up 700-plus.
The Ravens cannot blame a leaky front for destabilizing their back end, either. In Week 2, the Raiders finished with 27 rushing yards and 1.6 yards per carry; Minshew still finished with 276 yards through the air, most of them in the second half of a frantic, pass-first, pass-second comeback. On Sunday, Dallas (1-2) rushed for 51 yards (3.2 per carry); Prescott still went off for 379 yards, the most by any quarterback this season, and two touchdowns. The bulk of that production, too, came in the second half, as the Ravens’ pass rush slowed to a crawl after an impressive start.
Postgame clarity was limited. The Ravens’ locker room cleared out soon after their news conference ended, and a few starters either declined to talk or said they couldn’t, citing obligations elsewhere. Harbaugh, asked whether he was concerned about the team’s late-game defensive struggles despite another favorable late-game script, said only: “We want to get those stops. We definitely want to get those stops.”
The Ravens didn’t need them, ultimately. Because the second-half offense that sandwiched just 57 yards, two punts and a missed field goal in between an impressive touchdown march and an equally impressive clock-melting possession was good enough. Because Jackson, who finished with 269 total yards, two touchdowns and the Ravens’ final, decisive first-down run, was more than good enough. Because running back Derrick Henry, who ran wild for 151 yards (6 per carry) and two touchdowns not far from his offseason home, was close to unstoppable for the game’s middle two quarters.
There was much to celebrate, even if there were more relieved grins than braggadocious smiles among the Ravens preparing for their long flight home. The game’s near-collapse hadn’t hollowed out the victory. The Ravens had avoided major injury. They’d won before a national TV audience. They’d gotten major contributions from sources both expected (safety Kyle Hamilton, outside linebacker Kyle Van Noy) and less expected (punter Jordan Stout, right guard Daniel Faalele, wide receiver Nelson Agholor).
But certain downward trend lines were obvious, even if explanations were less so.
“I can’t dial it down to one specific thing,” left tackle Ronnie Stanley said of the Ravens’ trouble with finishing games, “because I feel like we’re doing a lot of good things out there. When it comes down to having a lead, keeping a lead and extending it when we really need to, we’re just not doing it right now, and that’s what we need to figure out.”
