Ravens change conditioning program after injury-plagued season

In total, the Baltimore Ravens placed a whopping 25 players on injured reserve during the 2021 NFL season, and head coach John Harbaugh vowed in January "to turn over every stone" to fix the problem moving forward. 

As Jamison Hensley wrote for ESPN, Baltimore's altered offseason conditioning program now includes more stretching during warmups and fewer workout reps at this early stage of the process. Specifically, drills that previously included 10-12 reps are now at eight-to-10 reps. 

"I think it means you can believe in the process more because you know that the coaches and the organization is trying the best to take care of us," fullback Patrick Ricard told reporters on Wednesday. "They are conscious of the injuries we've had. In my opinion, you can't do the same things over and over again and get a different result. You're just going to be insane."

Meanwhile, Ravens head strength and conditioning coach Steve Saunders admitted to making "little tweaks" to the voluntary program. 

"We're going to say, 'OK, we don't know what these guys have been doing. Let's take a little step back and maybe spend a little more time in the evaluation process, add some other things to the program,'" Saunders remarked.

Baltimore began the 2021 campaign at 8-3 but couldn't overcome injury woes and ultimately fell to 8-9. According to Hensley and ESPN Stats & Information, the Ravens became the first NFL team in the past 19 seasons to go from being a conference No. 1 seed to out of the postseason tournament six weeks later.