Yardbarker: Mark Clayton

How To Beat The Green Bay Packers

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 10:07:12 -0500

As part of our weekly stories, this week we turn to trying to figure out which Packers team will show up to protect the Frozen Tundra of Lambeau Field in Green Bay on Monday Night Football. Will it be the one that has one three in a row, including an impressive almost-shutout of the Dallas Cowboys (17-7) or the one that barely beat the 49ers and lost in Tampa Bay? I can pretty much guess which one both the Ravens and Packers' fans hope to see in what will be the first night game in D...

Roundup: Scouting the Ravens

Thu, 03 Dec 2009 08:14:00 -0500

Taking a quick spin through the headlines before the Packers return to practice ...WORTH READING* Pete Dougherty examines the second season of Ravens QB Joe Flacco, who has put up superior numbers but might be getting asked to do too much.* Here's the full scouting report.* I expanded on CB Charles Woodson's player of the month award and spoke with Ravens LS Matt Katula, a Brookfield native who is chartering a bus to Monday's game.WORTH WATCHING* Is it too soon to talk playoffs? M...

Is the Ravens' 2009 cup half-full or half-empty?

Mon, 30 Nov 2009 13:28:02 -0500

OK, raise your hand if you had Paul Kruger as the hero of Sunday night’s Ravens-Steelers game. Yeah, that’s what I thought. In the abbreviated version of Prediction Friday, our free drink tab for the week goes to Sean Quinn, who nailed the final score, a 20-17 Ravens win. Sean didn’t have it going into overtime, but when you get the exact score, you also get some slack. One of our regulars, Kevin In Iraq, had the Ravens winning with an OT field goal, 23-20, so a handful of...

Steelers priming former Raven for insider info?

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 09:00:00 -0500

News that the Pittsburgh Steelers had signed former Ravens cornerback Corey Ivy drew smiles from his former teammates Wednesday. But a few Ravens -- who welcome the Steelers to M&T Bank Stadium on Sunday night -- agreed that Ivy’s value in terms of providing inside information might be a little overstated. "With every team, you’re going to see a foundation under the offense," wide receiver Mark Clayton said. "From that, you have your variations, and we certainly have...

Ravens Victimized by Referee's Objective Error Again

Sun, 11 Oct 2009 17:17:00 -0500

Every team's fans gripe about officiating, especially when they've lost a couple. The Ravens, though, have been the victims of two officiating mistakes that resulted not from a judgment call, but from a blatant misapplication of the rules. In today's game against Cincinnati, Joe Flacco completed short pass to receiver Mark Clayton on the right side of the field. Clayton was brought down at the 25, losing the ball as his knee struck the ground. The officials correctly ruled him dow...

Clayton catches a ball and a break

Sun, 11 Oct 2009 13:14:38 -0500

Mark Clayton just let go of the ball as he went down near the Ravens 20-yard line. The ball was picked up by Bengals safety Chinedum Ndukwe and returned to the end zone, but Clayton was ruled down by contact and that call held up on replay. What a break for Clayton, who had the big drop last week in New England. The replay was very marginal. It looked like the ball was starting to come loose before his knee touched the ground, but it was not conclusive enough to overturn the ruling on t...

Late Rally Stalls off Clayton’s Drop; Pats Win 27-21

Sun, 04 Oct 2009 18:55:16 -0500

The Ravens looked prepared to put a day of critical mistakes and penalties behind them as Joe Flacco led the final drive to the end-zone as the clocked ticked away. But three incomplete passes in the last sequence with the last being a drop by Mark Clayton, which would have been a sure first down inside [...]

Injuries All Around!!!!!

Fri, 21 Aug 2009 21:20:36 -0500

Mark Clayton, Samari Rolle, Terrell Suggs and Ed Reed, among others have all been sidelined with injuries. Clayton still has his hamstring injury, which is either tweaked or strained or broken into 8 different pieces, who knows. All we know is that he’s been out for a while and he won’t play in the second preseason game [...]

Will Mark Clayton be there when counted on?

Thu, 06 Aug 2009 21:20:52 -0500

Let's see, this makes 5 times in the 5 year career of Mark Clayton that he's experienced hamstring problems. The condition seems to be chronic. This time Ravens head coach John Harbaugh said there is considerable bleeding problems with Clayton's hamstring, which says he has massive tearing. We may not see Clayton again until after the regular season begins. Thank God Derrick Mason decided to return , or else the Ravens receiving corps could be a crap shoot. Demetrius Williams has ...

FCA Meeting at Gilman

Thu, 08 Nov 2007 19:11:52 -0500

Tuesdays are considered a day off for players in the NFL, but many of us use the time to make appearances in the community. For me, I like to visit kids. Come roll with me on a visit to Gilman, a private school in Baltimore.

A Win is A Win is A Win

Mon, 08 Oct 2007 00:43:54 -0500

We won. Simple as that. It is good to get out of here with the W. It's never easy winning on the road and the 49ers have a hard nosed defense that did a good job today. Like Coach said to us after the game this one was winning by any means necessary. You don't always win pretty, we rarely win pretty, but this was a just get it done win. You have no idea how important this was. We have a six-hour flight in front of us and I can't imagine what it be like on that plane with an L instead of a W. The atmosphere will be a lot looser, guys will be laughing. Everything will be better, the food, the movies, everything because we won.

I'm Back!

Tue, 04 Sep 2007 18:36:20 -0500

What's good YB family? I hope everyone's been doing well. I apologize for not writing in a little over a week, I've been on the road a bit, and I forgot my password (I know, embarrassing), so I couldn't even get on my page! Either way, I'm back baby and ready for round 3, so lets go! Life's been pretty crazy recently, which is no good, especially because things are supposed to slow down a bit after the season. I just flew back from my buddies wedding out in Denver, which was AWESOME! It was a beautiful service and it was GREAT catching up with all my old teammates. The only strange part about it is that it's crazy to that my friends are getting married! We're 24 years old! I guess it's a part of growing up though, and it's only going to start happening more and more now, so I'd better get used to it. Oh yeah, watching people dance at Wedding receptions is one of the funniest things EVER. Between the 7 year old kid (who was still up at 12am) who was doing the running man like it just came out, to the elderly women getting down to Justin's Sexy Back, I was rolling the majority of the night. I didn't get to watch too much football this weekend which was a bit dissapointing, but I did catch the highlights! That cat from USC's one handed catch was ridiculous, and the return in the Cal game was hot as well, nothing like watching people go to make a tackle and getting shook. On the flip side of that, did anybody see the block in the LSU game last week? I was almost positive that dudes head almost fell off when he got hit, and when he stood up, my man definitely didn't know where he was. I give him credit though, he popped right back up, I may have been down for the count after that hit! Any thoughts on the iphone? I'm trying to decide whether it's worth picking up. The phone's I've got now work pretty well I think, and I'm on my Treo, I can check my e-mail and get on the internet and play music and all that good stuff, so I just can't seem to convince myself that an iphone is neccesary. Any thoughts? They look pretty cool, which may be reason enough to buy one. I'm still undecided though and would LOVE some advice on the topic. Also, I'm trying to plan a vacation somewhere, but can't really figure out where I want to go. Anyone been anywehre good recently? Any place nice this time a year? At some point this fall, I need to get a nice vacation going with my boys, so any suggestions for locations would be great. I just realized some people on here may have never seen a lacrosse game or practice or anything like that, so I wanted to post a video! I played in a tournament at the beach a few weeks back and a lacrosse website was there filming and put a short video together of me at the tourny, so here it is..http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVAF1M8X3og, check it out if you've never seen the sport before! I'm excited to play in the tournament in Vegas in a few weeks, I'm getting that itch again already! Reading Greg Oden's, Mike Conley, Mark Clayton and all these guys blogs that are about to start their seasons is making me want to play! All the preparation they've put in during the off season, all the excitement and hype leading up to the season, it's awesome! I'm excited to watch all of these great players perform well, and it's making me want to work that much harder to do the same when my time comes around again next spring/summer. I'm still trying to get a Nintendo Wii..I literally check Best Buy four times a week and they get in awkward shipments of like 4, or 7, which clearly sell out in 3 minutes. I get the whole create a demand tactic that Nintendo has got going, but it seems like it's about time to be making shipments of a couple hundred of those puppies, cause I know everybody is looking to grab one, including my father. I'll be sure to post videos of him playing the second we can actually get one! Anyone watch any of these reality shows on MTV? For one reason or another I've been getting into them lately. I can't STAND real world though, not a huge fan of the show. I feel like it's the exact same thing over and over again, but I guess all these show's are in a way, for some reason though I don't like that one. Eh well. Pumped for 50 and Kanye's albums to drop on Sept 11? I am! Both are gonna hot! Well, that's all I got for now, and now that I got my password down, I'll be sure to write a lot more frequently. I'll talk to you all soon, an have a great rest of the week. KH ps. 6 days until the Ravens first game baby....yup.

Finally!

Sun, 12 Aug 2007 21:05:48 -0500

Wow

Excitement Cut Short By Finger

Tue, 31 Jul 2007 04:13:06 -0500

You might notice that this post looks different than my last one. That's because I had to telephone it in and have someone write it for me. I wanted to type it myself, but couldn't. I had a pretty sore left ring finger during the first day of practice. It was kind of on the inside edge, like a little black sore. I went through the whole morning practice with it, but then I hit my hand against Chris McAlister's helmet. I almost started crying. I ended up finishing practice, but when I took my glove off, it was completely swollen. That little black spot moved all the way to the top of my fingernail. It hurt so bad that they brought the doctor in. He said they were going to have to do something about it before it spread down my entire hand. We tried to poke it to get it to drain, but they came back and ended up cutting half of my fingernail off and then cutting back into my finger to get it to drain. They numbed my whole hand and did it right there at training camp. I like practicing so I'll be out there tomorrow morning. I know that we can meet our expectation level this year. I felt outstanding and everyone looked great. It felt like we hadn't stepped off the field since last year. It was sweet.

My First Blog

Tue, 17 Jul 2007 23:57:39 -0500

Here it is, my first blog. I am excited about being able to blog and open up personally to the fans. I have been wanting to do something like this since my second year in the league and now it's started. Connecting with the fans is really important to me. I try to influence and have a positive impact on anybody I come in contact with. We may be athletes but we're regular people too. When we step off the field we have to deal with life issues too. I had a kid in the mall in Baltimore just stop and stare at me when I was checking out. He was right in front of me and it was to the point when he couldn't speak. I just said "what's up" and had a conversation with him. It was funny, but I never imagined anyone reacting like that to me. I want people to know that I'm just Mark. I happen to work in the entertainment business but I'm just a regular guy. That's the way it is in Norman, Oklahoma. It's such a close knit country town that everyone I have ever met has gotten the vibe that I'm just Mark. I try to get to Norman as much as I can. I've been there twice this month. I recently bought a house in Baltimore and spent most of the offseason there, getting better acquainted. I really like being in Baltimore. I love the East Coast. D.C. is right there and New York is two hours away. It just seems like there are so many things to do and so many big cities that are close by. You can visit and hang out. I like having that variety. In Oklahoma, it's just open land. It's unique. It's got it's own thing going on. I get to experience both extremes and I like it.