 These Baltimore Ravens, they always leave you with so much to talk about. And this off season, it has been no different. And more recently, the talk of the town has been Lamar Jackson not being in town for OTAs, but that's not a big deal. And we can give you so many reasons why, but in this episode, I brought on a special guest, a very special guest to give you a few reasons why it's just not that serious. And we're gonna also dive into whether or not the Ravens have done everything in their power up to this point to give Lamar Jackson reasons to stay. And there's of course so many different things that we're also gonna cover in this episode. But without further ado, you know what? Let's just get into it. Yeah, this feels like a dream. You too, team, keep it clean. You see my boy, he like got him made it. Got him made it. Boy, that's my homie, A.T. Grayler. The team keep it clean. Very, very special guest in the building today. We got Sarah. And you know what? Before we get into it, introduce yourself to team. Even though they already know who you are, but you can introduce yourself to team. Let them know what you do, what you did, where you from, all that good stuff. Yeah, so what I do is I'm mostly just on Twitter now. I worked for the Ravens for 13 years. Started there in 2005. And I ended there a couple months after Lamar was drafted. So now I watched him a little bit in OTAs in the beginning of the camp and training camp. And then I was gone from there. We moved to Ohio. So, but you know, that purple runs in my veins. I know you're down in Florida. I'm in Ohio. When it's in your veins, it's in your veins. You just can't let it go. Yeah, you ain't lying. And where can everybody find you at? The link is gonna be there in the description, but where can everybody find you at? Yeah, mostly on Twitter, like I said, at SG Ellison. And perhaps I will have an announcement to make later, maybe right before training camp. So. Oh, okay. Perhaps. I hope it is what I think it is, but I'll be patient. Okay, cool. That's good to know. So you said that you left when Lamar came in. Yeah. Right now, we had OTAs and Lamar Jackson, he hasn't come in yet. Yeah. How big or little of a deal do you think that is? Yeah, I think from a football perspective in terms of the 2022 season, I don't think it's that big of a deal. Assuming that he's there at least by mandatory camp. Sounds to me based off of his Twitter, based off of Marlin Humphrey's comments, based off of Mark Andrew's comments, he could be in before then. So I don't think that the fate of the season will be decided in May. But Lamar is a polarizing figure. He's always been that way, Aang, we know that. And so everything he does is scrutinized. There's other players that are not there, nowhere near getting the coverage as Lamar. And of course he's the quarterback. I do think that, I get the argument, I mean, look, he's got a new center in there. He's got some wide receivers that wanna prove themselves. He's got some new tight ends, you know, all of that. So I get that to a certain extent, but even still, I feel like from a football standpoint, it's an overreaction. The, I will say this, I will say this. Lamar not being there is out of character for I think who he's been up through now. And what I mean by that is, and again, like I said, he could be there next week. And this will all be forgotten about in a couple of weeks time if he is. So, but Lamar, I remember, you remember these days, Aang, remember people complaining about Joe Flacco, right? It was always like, why doesn't he have more passion? Why doesn't he get his receivers together in the off season? And you just wanted to get this feeling that he was all in, right? And that was never Joe Flacco's way. It was never his personality. But to some, you would read it as he's not all in. And here comes Lamar. Lamar is like, he gets his receivers together, you know? And Lamar does, he even did it at the end of the last off season because they had asked about what happened. Why couldn't the offense be consistent? He was like, he's like, you know, I just want to bond this off season. And then he said, you know, I don't want to just be receivers that I get together. I want it to be offensive linemen and the whole unit. I want us to bond. And so I will say, you know, this is the time to do it. He did, he got Bateman there. It looked like Pochette was strong and strong. And who knows, maybe there was more that he didn't put on social media, I don't know. And so just knowing that about Lamar and my impression of him is it's always been that he takes advantage of every little opportunity. You know? And so for him not to totally take advantage to me is a little bit of a deviation from like what he's been about. It's like his DNA. Does that make me concerned? No, but at least I am going to note it. It's like, oh, that's a little bit different for Lamar. And then I think for others who are concerned, everybody wants Lamar to be a Raven with the contract not being signed. I think that adds to it. And you start to snowball with the questioning. So I hate to demonize anybody that is a little bit nervous about it because I get it, it's to me, it's a change from what Lamar has done. But let's see how it unfolds. And, you know, I don't think he's holding out. I don't think he's angry at the Ravens. I don't think any of that. But you wonder why he doesn't have to tell us let's put voluntary back in voluntary OTAs. Let's remember that and keep in perspective who Lamar is. Okay. And with all that being said, do you think that the Ravens this off season up to this point in Lamar Jackson's career right here, right now, do you feel like the Ravens have done enough on their end as far as personnel and scheme and philosophy and just the team as a whole? Do you feel like they've done enough to make Lamar Jackson happy to where he would want to stay? Yeah, well, I don't think they're done yet. I do think Eric Dacosta is going to bring in a veteran wide receiver. And I do think he's going to bring in another outside linebacker. I think it's going to be Justin Houston. I don't even know what that tag is. That's crazy. Yeah. So it's an unrestricted free agent, Tenda. So if he doesn't sign a higher deal by I think the first day of training camp with some other date, then he'll go to the Ravens. That was my first time ever hearing about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was the first time I heard about it. So before I even had heard about it, I thought that Houston might be the guy to come back. He just clicked so well. He loved the order. He took a pay cut to come here. He kept coming to EDC. And EDC was like, I don't even want to insult you with an offer based off your career. He's like, just make me an offer. So Houston seems like a logical fit. So anyway, so I don't think they're done. That being said, do I think they've done enough for Lamar to make him come back? If it's true that Lamar's request to the Ravens was an offensive line, because I've been on team, build a wall around Lamar for sure. I don't think Eric Dacosta could have done much more in terms of offensive line. Like, there are so many different combinations of the way this could work out. From Stanley to Juwan James, to where is McCary, who just got a new contract. I mean, he literally could be a starter. I wouldn't put him, now he's not at center, now he's not gonna be at right guard. He could be at right tackle. He could be at left guard. I suppose if Stanley wasn't healthy, he could even do left tackle. Maybe prove people wrong there. Anyway, so I mean, from the draft, Falele, Linderbaum, bringing in Morgan Moses, Zitler last year. They've got, you know, you've got Cleveland coming back, Tyree Phillips. I mean, there's a lot of options there for I think the best offensive line since 2019. And that 2019 line was the bomb, right? It was the, I'm sure we'll talk about that later. I know we're gonna get into 2019. But I think it's gonna be a much improved offensive line from last year, obviously. So, yes, I would hope, I would think if I'm Lamar, I'm not, if I were Lamar, I'd be pretty happy with Eric DeCosta did. Tight ends, I see Nick Boyle coming back. I still got my guy, Mark Andrews, who's basically wide receiver one in that tight ends body. His production is, his production is, you know what I mean? The way people talk about wide receiver one, they usually talk about it in terms of production and being a guy that could be there for the quarterback. That is Mark Andrews, obviously, where he's at in routes and all that is very different. But production wise, he's wide receiver one. Then we'll see what comes from those rookies. Wide receiver, Eek. You're right. So, hey, listen, you know, I do a lot of stuff with Cadre Ishmael. And maybe he's got me, you know, buying into this. And I think I am, it's hard to do this, but he just keeps like this, for the passing game, you have to rethink this, you have to rethink it. It's tight end centric. It's tight end centric. When I was going back to look at the 2019 squad, cause that's what everybody's talking about, right? Like what was 2019, right? And it's just to put you in this framework. So in 2019, there were 3,300 receiving yards. 60% of those receiving yards came from tight ends and running backs. 40% were wide receivers. And that was in a historic offense. I don't, I'm not saying the Ravens are going to repeat that to have that, that history again. But it, but I do think there is weight in recalibrating our minds a little bit and thinking this is a tight end centric offense in the passing game behind running game, which is number one. And so, and so it's hard, it's hard to do that cause all you want to think about are the big name wide receivers you see throughout all the NFL. And then it's nice if you have a good tight end on top of it. And here, like 60, 40 split, I need to do a study to see what other teams are like, but 60, 40% of your receiving yards came from wide receivers. So I don't know, I don't know how Lamar feels about having a loaded tight ends group and Rashad Bateman and maybe a couple of other guys. I'm sure he would love to have both loaded. So, so I don't know. I can't speak for Lamar, but I do think he's got an offensive line. He does have a sweet tight ends group and he loves his tight ends also. And, and, and let's see what happens with Bateman. And I still think Eric Dacosta has got to sign somebody else. Right, right. Now, when you talked about the offensive line, you talked about all the different possible options and combinations that they have that they could put together to make the offensive line. Patrick McCurry and left tackle, right tackle, right guard, he could be anywhere. Morgan Moses, Daniel Farley, Ronnie Stanley, hopefully he comes back healthy, but they have a lot of different options. And then another plus is that some of the guys like Atari Phillips, some of the guys who may not be starters and even Patrick McCurry too, depending on how things work out. Some of the guys who may not be starters, they have starting experience. So that'll help them too. But, but as far as options, another thing, another scenario, another timeframe when the Ravens have a lot of options was about a month and a half ago. Well, yeah, actually about a month ago and that was during the draft. How did you feel about the Ravens draft? Cause I never got to get a recap from you since it's the first time you've been on here in a little minute. How did you feel about that Ravens 2022 draft as a whole? Yeah, well, in terms of value, oh, I hope I have this right. It's been a minute since I looked at the stat, but I believe that they got, let's see, okay, so it's Kyle Hamilton, Linderbaum, Travis Jones, and then it was Falele, right? They definitely got, oh, a job, oh, there we go, a job off. I'm, this is like a mental thing I do. I like to pretend that I got to wipe them out. And then if he happens to come back in October, then I'm going to be like, okay, I didn't expect that. Now I'm going to love it, you know? Yeah, he is a bonus. Yeah, so then Travis Jones up to the first round picks, that's four players that were in like consensus, I believe it was top 40. Top 40, four players that are rated in your top 40. That has some potential right there. And so I do like the Ravens philosophy of trading for value or drafting for value rather than position. Nobody looks back in, if we were to go back and look at the Ravens last five draft picks, we wouldn't look at say 2017 and say, oh, but this was a need at that time. And so we're going to evaluate this draft five years ago based off of those needs. No, none of us do that. We go back and say, who became a pro bowler? Who became a starter? Who became a contributor? Who was a bust? That's all we do. We don't evaluate it with need in mind. And so, but we do it totally in the moment, which is backwards. And I think the Ravens have it right. So I think seeing Hamilton fall, the four team. Oh, Jabbo fall to the second round there. I'm sorry to remember exactly what number it was. To get a first round pick out of Hollywood Brown, I think Arizona overpaid. So, you know, he didn't get a wide receiver. He didn't hit some of those needs, but when we look back in three years, I don't think we'll care. I think it'll be like, wow, let's see what these top four guys are doing. And if they're starters, which all of them, I mean, I'd have a hard time saying none of them will be starters within the three years. And two of them already gonna be starters this year, for sure, the top two. Let's see what Jabbo does. And Travis Jones in the next two or three years, why couldn't he be a signature piece? Yeah, yeah, that's true. Especially with Kaleas Campbell up there. And we'll see how Michael Pierce does. Wait, how did you, how did you rate it? I thought they got that. I feel like it was a really good draft. I feel like it was a really good draft. You got to say it with a straight face at all. You already brought it up, but I feel like it was a really, really good draft. They got the center. They got safety at the future center. I mean, safety and center of not even the future, but now. They got depth at running back, depth at on the offensive line, Jabbo, he'll be a nice bonus when he gets healthy and just thinking about Duffy away and they were the Jabbo and still with Tyus Bowser too. So they got a lot of nice pieces. They just, of course, they got the two corners. So that's nice depth as well. And then they went crazy with the tight ends too. And I saw that with those tight ends going into the 2021 season, the college football season, those were the number one and two ranked tight ends. So for them to get those two, it ended up working now. And this is a, like you said, a tight and centric offense. So they'll be just fine. And especially likely, likely he'll move around a lot too. Ain't gonna do no corny cheesy dad jokes about likely's name right now. But anyway, so I felt like the draft was great, but my only gripe that I had with it was in the first round, when they, because me, I mean, you know, me, you know, I talk about wide receivers all day every day. I felt like they needed a significant wide receiver even before Hollywood got traded. So then when they traded Hollywood, I was like, okay, yeah, for sure. Oh yeah, they're getting a wide receiver. Oh, it's coming. It's happening in the first round. And I actually thought before the draft, so obviously before the Hollywood trade, I was for sure that within the first three rounds that they were going to draft a wide receiver before Hollywood even got traded. So then when he got traded, I was like, oh yeah, for sure it's going down. It's happening. They just got rid of Hollywood. Oh yeah, they first three rounds for sure. And it didn't happen. I was like, oh, okay, okay, all right. And then I just wondered like, hmm, with these Ravens, how, because Hollywood said he had been wanting to get traded for the past couple of years, talking to Eric DeCosta about it and whatnot. But I wondered like, it made me question like, huh, they knew Hollywood wanted to be traded. They knew they were going to trade them and whatnot. Why didn't they act sooner as far as replacing him? But, because right now it's just, yeah, Bateman Duvenay, Pro Shae Wallace, and they had some guys from last year, like Benjamin Fitton. Like 500 undrafted rookies and yeah. And then I'm thinking about this, even before the undrafted rookie class. So I'm like, why weren't they proactive with that? So we'll see what they do, but as far as, yeah, so I feel like they nailed everything except wide receiver. And as far as this roster as a whole, I feel the same way about the roster as a whole because they have like, they got quality depth in a lot of spots, man. It's like from really top to bottom, like you got like 20 tight ends right now. You got like about 17 running backs. Obviously your quarterback situation taking care of, you have two full backs cause you got Pat Riccardo and they got Ben Mason too. So they even got depth at full back. Offensive line. We just talked about that. Defensive line. Defensive line. You got it. Yeah. Linebacker, it's a little thin, but it might be because of the safeties and how, who knows, how much they'll be in like dime packages. Yeah, yeah. Safeties, they already had a million safeties and then they added another one. Oh, add another two, Marcus Williams and Kyle Hamilton with corners. I really, really liked that Kyle Fuller signing from yesterday or by the time that I see this video, maybe two days ago, but I really liked the Kyle Fuller signing because we know, and it was nice. I didn't even realize, like I've been thinking this whole time. Yeah. Marcus Peters coming back from season ending injury. Marlon Humphrey coming back from season ending injury, but it never quite clicked to me until yesterday. I'm like, hold up. Marlon Humphrey, he's back out there. Yeah. I know. He's been going. Everybody's talking about Lamar. It's like Marlon Humphrey and Odafe Owe who are massive pieces in this defense, didn't even have to wait after surgery, didn't have to wait till training camp. They were day one in OTAs. That it was excellent news. Yeah. And I hadn't even realized that. So they have so much depth at most spots, but just the wide receiver, that's the spot that I questioned. Well, there's not much depth there. They do have, like you mentioned, a lot of undrafted free agents, a lot of undrafted rookie free agents. And so they look nice. So they look nice when I watch the field on them. Like, okay, let's go like Makai Pope. That's one that stood out. It was Amike Emezi, but I don't know what happened with the deal there. He ended up going to the Panthers. But then Devin, his last name is slipping my mind right now. He's from Oregon, the wide receiver. I want to say Devin Williams, but I think I might have his last name wrong, but either way. So they got some guys that got the potential to make the roster, but still, that's my biggest area of concern right now. Now, when it comes to wide receiver, do you- That's just facts. That's not even like, that's just facts. Like that's not even like being like emotional or nervous about it. Like wide receiver is by far the thinnest. I mean, it just is. So, and so your question of like, would Lamar be happy with that? I mean, it's usually a quarterback, wide receiver kind of a thing, you know, in this league. So that's why, I mean, I would be surprised if Eric DeCosta didn't add another wide receiver. I would be surprised, but sorry to interrupt you. No, no, no. I just wanted to support what you were saying and that it was facts for sure. Yeah, yeah, interrupt the way. I don't mind. So, and with wide receivers, it's funny because, and not even just with wide receivers, but with wide receivers, they apparently have been trying. They've been all these reports and whatnot about the Ravens apparently trying to get different wide receivers. There was a report about Jalen Rager from the Eagles even though when I was like, I don't know about that one, but they were apparently interested in him. The report came out that they were interested in Jarvis Landry, but that was one that I wouldn't have minded, but I never thought it was gonna happen. Yeah, that one, I got a feeling of an agent trying to gin up, right? Where it's like, yeah, Eric DeCosta made a phone call because, duh, they need a wide receiver. But like, I kind of, those reports somewhat bother me because I do think, I mean, whatever, give us all the reports, whatever, but we do know that a lot of these reports are agent-driven. And sometimes I just think it makes it look like Eric DeCosta can't put together a deal when it's like, he makes a million phone calls a day. And obviously, so an agent saying, wide, like Ravens with the wide receiver, they're an easy one for an agent to say because maybe there was a phone call, how deep the interest, I don't know, but everybody will like eat that up because obviously the Ravens don't have a deep wide receiver core. So it's like, I would just say pump your brakes on like whether or not Eric DeCosta can like pull off these deals or how much he was really trying on at least Landry, maybe the trade, maybe that has more substance because it sounded like there was like an offer for, what was it? Was it, was it Chuck? Yeah, Chuck Clark and the Eagles and Jalen Riga. Yeah, yeah. With the, with a lot of the interest from the Ravens that gets reported on, especially this off-season, this off-season has been, whoo, it's been a crazy one as far as interest from the Ravens because whenever the Ravens there's reported interest with them in a player, it doesn't end up having it. With every single Ravens free agent signing this off-season, there hasn't been any talk about it. There haven't been any reported, oh, Ravens are interested in this player. All of it has been the first time you hear about it, Ravens signed this player. Yeah. Because before the free agency started, they were, oh, Ravens are interested in Tyron Matthew. I was like, oh, okay, I ain't mad at that one because I didn't think they were gonna sign to Sean Elliott back. And if they did, I thought maybe they may sign it to a one-year proven deal but they didn't re-sign them back and they went and got Marcus Williams. And it's like, even though there were some people that said Marcus Williams made, since there was no official, like, all right, Ravens are interested in Marcus Williams, it just ended up happening. Then I remember the next signing after that, me and my wife, we were watching a movie. Man, I forgot what the movie was called. It was a really good movie on Netflix. We were watching the movie and I turned my notifications off. I went from, because I wanted to watch a movie. The movie was so good. It was about like this healthcare lady that was taking advantage of these older people in these healthcare homes. But anyway, so we were watching it. I'm all into the movie. Then all of a sudden, and this like at 11 o'clock at night, I just checked my phone. Maybe I went to go to use a bathroom or something real quick. So I checked my phone, got all these messages. I'm like, oh Ravens signed Morgan Moses. Like what? Where did that come from? So that came out of nowhere. Patrick Recall, I mean, I think most people figured Patrick Recall would be back. So I don't think that one was a surprise, anything like that. That's different when it's a returning player. Yeah. Right, right, right. But even Kyle Fuller the other day. Yeah, that was out of nowhere. Exactly. But when there's interest, like the interest in a Bobby Wagner. So there you see that. That's a whole another story right there. But the interest in a Bobby Wagner, the interest in Jarvis Landry, the interest in Emmanuel Agba, that was early, early on. But when there's the reported interest, it just, it doesn't end up coming to fruition. So if I hear about the Ravens being interested in somebody soon, we'll talk about it, but I ain't gonna get too hyped about it because I don't really think it's gonna go down like that. Right, because that's definitely agent driven. Ravens aren't calling up Ian Rappaport and being like, hey, hey, we called over to see if Wagner's, you know what I mean? It's not coming from the Ravens. Yeah, it's not happening there. Mike Davis too. That was another one. That was out of nowhere. Yeah. So, and then, but yeah, agent driven. One thing that I think most Ravens fans, I think they were all like, they all felt it that it was agent driven was the Melvin Gordon. Cause when reports came out that the Ravens were interested in Melvin Gordon, I remember seeing the people being like, what, Melvin Gordon? Like, why would we add another running bag? But then like a month later, they said, I'm Mike Davis, so there you go. Yeah. So again, Ravens, this off season, they've been staying ready, so they don't have to get ready.