Ravens HC Frustrated by Inexcusable Struggles

"I don't know the exact comparison from last year to this year, it's hard to say," head coach John Harbaugh said in a press conference. "The biggest change [is that] we're not effective. It's been ineffective, basically, and that's been – I'd have to say it's been surprising. We have not been able to punch the ball in, which last year, we were able to do it."

This critical and reoccurring flaw proved to be fatal in the Ravens' Week 6 home loss to the Los Angeles Rams. They only managed to come away with 3 points on three trips into the red zone, with the most pivotal sequence coming at the end of the first half when they were denied from inside the 1-yard line on three straight attempts, with only one going to All Pro running back Derrick Henry, and turned the ball over on downs as a result.

"[The Rams] were loaded up for it, but you still should be able to push it in there," Harbaugh said. "If you look at all the situations where we didn't get in down there from the 1- or 2-yard line, it's been basically the same [situation]. So, we have to work really hard on that."

Instead of going into halftime up 10-3, it stayed at a 3-3 stalemate. The costly missed opportunity was compounded and turned into a complete downward spiral coming out of the half when the Ravens turned the ball over on both of their third-quarter drives, the first of which gave the Rams the ball back deep in Baltimore territory less than a minute after they took their first lead of the game.

"To me, the game turned right there; then it turned [again during] the start of the second half with turning the ball over, and the next thing you know, it's 14 points just like that," Harbaugh said.

In his mind, improving in that critical aspect of the game is the Ravens' top priority on offense moving forward, as they need to be better at it coming out of their Week 7 bye when they are expected to have both Jackson and potentially Ricard back for their Week 8 interconference clash with the Chicago Bears.

"We've never struggled in those areas [before], and I don't really understand why we are [now]," Harbaugh said. "I do look at the plays [on film], but you want to step back and say, 'Why is this happening?' We're just not getting the job done. So, if we want to be the kind of team that we have, if we want to have a chance, we have to get that fixed. That should have been fixed. We've been talking about fixing it for weeks, and we've been trying to fix it for weeks, but we haven't done a good job."

The Ravens coaches will spend the next week "looking at every aspect" of why they're struggling in short-yardage despite having a Pro Bowl center in Tyler Linderbaum, a 370-pound right guard in Daniel Faalele and the best power back of his generation and arguably of all-time in Henry.

Harbaugh was dismissive of the idea of lining up Henry under center to execute quarterback sneaks instead of one of their tight ends, who have had more experience and had had success executing that play.

"We like Mark doing it. He's a good ball handler, and he's had experience doing it," Harbaugh said. Derrick, that I know of, has never taken a snap under center, so we'd have to teach him how to do that. Why Derrick over Mark? Why would that be better?... I don't know where that idea comes from, but that wouldn't be a thought."

While Henry doesn't have previous experience taking snaps under center for quarterback sneaks to Harbaugh's knowledge, he taken direct snaps lined up as a wildcat quarterback both for and against the Ravens and has tremendous success both running and passing the ball out those formations. In his final season with the Tennessee Titans in 2023, he ripped off a 63-yard run against the Ravens over in London, and in last year's Wildcard win over the Pittsburgh Steelers, he gashed them for a 34-yard gain and capped it off with a vicious stiff-arm of his former college teammate at Alabama, All Pro safety Minkah Fitzpatrick.

Including the playoffs, Henry has five career passing touchdowns as a wildcat quarterback, with the first coming against the Ravens in the infamous 2019 Divisional Round upset win by the Titans. All five of those scores were on jump passes where he charged toward the line of scrimmage and floated a pass over the heads of the overaggressive defense selling out to stop the run.

The Ravens had Henry attempt a pass in the red zone in Week 3 against the Detroit Lions and he nearly threw an interception. In that instance, they had him rolling out on the play instead of running straight ahead. They should coach him to just tuck the ball and try to score himself if there isn't either a wide-open target uncovered in the end zone or a clear mismatch with a tight end or Pro Bowl wideout DeAndre Hopkins over an undersized defensive back or linebacker.

Being more creative in the red zone is big reason why the Lions have a nearly identical touchdown conversion rate through six games in 2025 with a mark of 74.1% as the Ravens had all last season. First-year offensive coordinator John Morton pulled out a beautifully designed and executed fourth-down call against the Ravens near the goal line that saw three of his best players touch the ball with a chance for two of them to score. It paid off by giving Detroit the lead on the first play of the fourth quarter.

Ravens' offensive coordinator Todd Monken has had some moments and stretches of brilliance as a playcaller and sequencer this season and throughout his first two years on the job in 2023 and 2024. There's a time for creativity and a time when he shouldn’t overcomplicate things and just dial up the clear and obvious. The balance of not getting too cute and forcing the opposing defense to stay on their toes by occasionally catching them off guard is a trait that he has lacked or struggled to find at times.