Continuity could be the biggest key to the Ravens success in 2020

Every year in the NFL rosters, coaching staffs and front offices are never the same as they were the year before. Change is just a part of the natural order or circle of life if you will in the league that is undoubtedly the most adaptable of all the professional sports. Each of the 32 teams has to deal with losses among their coaching ranks and player personnel and the best teams deal with it more often than most.

The teams coming off a or multiple losing seasons trying to lure prized free agents as well as coveted coaches and executives from successful franchises in hopes of replicating their success and establishing a winning culture after years of perpetual ineptitude and mediocrity. Playoff teams are especially susceptible to the inevitable poaching of their player, coaching, and scouting talent.

The Baltimore Ravens were the best team in the regular season in 2019 and appeared destined for a deep run in the postseason before they were upset by the Tennessee Titans in the divisional round. They were a prime candidate to get picked clean of their pending unrestricted free agents and most assumed that their coordinators on both sides of the ball were going to be hot names that losing teams would be clamoring for to be their next head coach.

Thanks to some brilliant front office work by General Manager Eric DeCosta entering his second offseason at the helm since being promoted, the Ravens were able to extend a handful of key members of their 14-2 squad from 2019 before the season even ended—cornerback Marcus Peters, fullback Patrick Ricard, inside linebacker LJ Fort and receiver Willie Snead—and locked up others before the new league year began—signed safety Chuck Clark to an extension and franchise-tagged outside linebacker Matthew Judon.

DeCosta acquired Pro Bowl defensive end, Calais Campbell, just before the new league opened up, and in free agency, he let several replaceable players that played admirably in 2019 but weren’t long term answers at their positions walk. He also signed former Denver Bronco defensive tackle Derek Wolfe to a one-year deal after a three-year deal with Michael Brokcers of the Los Angles Rams fell through and resigned veteran defenders Pernell McPhee, Justin Ellis, and Jihad Ward. These moves coupled with what is considered arguably the best draft haul in the league has the Ravens’ roster ripe with a masterful blend of youth, experience, and elite-level playmaking ability.

This offseason when five head coaching vacancies became available, only two of them went to coaching candidates that were on the staff of teams that made the postseason last year. Kevin Stefanski went from the offensive coordinator of the Minnesota Vikings to head coach of the Cleveland Browns and Joe Judge went from special teams coordinator of the New England Patriots. The other three went to candidates with previous head coaching experience at the collegiate and professional level with Carolina Panthers’ Matt Rhule being the only one that hadn’t done so in the NFL before getting hired.

Ravens’ offensive coordinator Greg Roman was named AP Assistant Coach of the Year for being the orchestrator of the prolific and punishing rushing attack that ran roughshod all over the league last season and etched its name into the record books by breaking several single-season records. He had garnered interest from the Browns and Panthers, actually interviewed for Cleveland but was ultimately passed up for both jobs.

He was hired as the run game coordinator and tight ends coach in 2017 and promoted to his current during the 2018 season. Roman is among the best in the league at scheming up plays that pick up yards in chunks at a time by using a myriad of different run formations and personnel packages that not keeps defenses guessing, but also accentuates the strengths of his best players by putting them in the best possible position to succeed.

One could’ve made an argument that defensive coordinator Don ‘Wink’ Martindale deserved consideration for the top assistant coach award as well for the wonders he was able to work with the pieces that he had at his disposal last year. His unit finished as the top overall unit in 2018 but despite losing two of their top pass rushers—Za’Darius Smith and Terrel Suggs—and their 15.5 sacks and five-time Pro Bowl middle linebacker CJ Mosley to free agency in the offseason, starting slot corner Tavon Young in training camp, starting corner Jimmy Smith to injury for the first half of the year, and McPhee after just seven games, they were still able to finish third by season’s end after a rocky start to the year.

Much like the way Roman is a savant on his side of the ball, Martindale is a mastermind on his with the way he can dial up pressure packages out any formation and disguise coverages pre-snap that leaves opposing quarterbacks and their offensive staff bamboozled. He is an aggressive play-caller that loves to blitz but knows when and where to send the extra heat to disrupt the play right away by forcing a throwaway or ill-advised lob, get home for the sack, rattle the signal-caller or even force a turnover.

Martindale covets diversity among his players and empowers them with the free range to use their instincts to make a play instead of sticking to the confines of the called play. He garnered strong interest from the Giants and was in the rumor mill for a few other gigs before ultimately getting passed over like his offensive counterpart in Baltimore.

Both coaches signed extensions this offseason and even though they both desire to be head coaches one day, they both were adamant in stating that the perfect scenario and opportunity would have to present itself for them to seriously consider parting ways with the Ravens.

In the same way that Martindale empowers the defenders to do what they do best, Head Coach John Harbaugh does the same with not just his coordinators but his entire staff. That level of trust and confidence is hard to come by in today’s NFL where the head coach usually specializes and calls one side of the ball. As former special teams coach, Harbaugh is well versed in knowing how to bring together individuals from different position groups and coaching backgrounds to come together for a common goal.

This offseason has been unlike anything we’ve ever witnessed in any of our lifetimes with the physical contact and travel restrictions that teams have been and are still being forced to deal with due to the COVID-19 global pandemic. The fact that the Ravens will be returning the vast majority of their dominant team from last season and won’t be instituting a new scheme on either side of the ball or lose any of the brilliance of their two play callers because they stayed put gives the Ravens a huge advantage over many teams in the league that have a lot of new faces in new players on their rosters and their coaching ranks.

This level of continuity from one year to the next is almost unheard of in the NFL since the current free agency system was introduced on March 1st, 1993. It is extremely rare to see a team that enjoyed the immense amount of success that the Ravens did in 2019 return just about all of their pieces and even upgrade at others. Their continuity among their roster and coaching staff could be the biggest advantage that the Ravens have in 2020 even more than their ‘easiest’ strength of schedule according to the records of their opponents from last year or the fact that they killed the draft and travel the fewest miles of any team since 2015.

Continuity is key to any successful small business or professional sports franchise aiming to replicate and build on the success of the prior season or fiscal year and the Ravens are fortunate enough to be able to carry over most of their amazing staff from last year and even added a few new recruits that will fit in just fine and help them maximize their profit margins on the field in 2020 and secure a championship.