Originally Posted by Megatron96
So I just looked over the numbers for the game, and was surprised that our defense actually played a fairly decent game overall.
Baltimore came into the game as the league's leading offense, and LJ came in as a 133.6 passer rating. I think we can ignore his stats in week ! against the 'Fins, and just look at his stat line against the Cards.
24-37 for 272 yds 2 TD 0 INT 7.4 yds/Att 104.8 passer rating
16 rushes 120 yds 7.5 yds/carry
Today, Jackson's numbers:
22-43 267 0 TD 0 INT 6.2 yds/Att passer rating 70.6
8 rushes yds 5.75 yds/carry
Jackson completed less passes for less yds, though not by a huge margin, but our D did not give up a TD pass, his yds/Att dropped by more than a yard from last week, and if you do include the Miami game, where his yds/Att was 16.2, we dropped him down by 10 yds/Att. And our secondary, in spite of some obvious gaffes and a couple truly lucky heaves, cut his passer rating in half, from 133 to 74.
Baltimore as a team (Jackson, Ingram, Edwards,etc.) has averaged rushing 205 yds/game. Today, instead of giving up more than our opponent's average, which we've been doing for a couple years now, we actually only gave up their average, 203.
And playing the Ravens is kind of like playing Army or Navy in CF. They run a crap ton, and their attack is like no other. We won't see another offense like them unless we see them in the playoffs.
So, IMO, giving up just their average, particularly when our D has consistently given up more than the opponent's average for a while now, is a success for us right now. And let's be honest, everyone gives up a lot of rushing yards to these guys.
And now the best part: our guys have only been playing together in Spag's scheme for a few weeks. That, people, is what we call progress.
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