NFL analyst attempts to crack the mystery of the Ravens’ biggest challenge leading into the coming season.
They’re called the three phases for a reason. Offense, defense, and special teams… They say offense sells tickets, and defense wins championships. Often, special teams are left out of the discussion, but there’s an old saying. You never know what you need until you need it. Imagine if Justin Tucker had joined the Baltimore Ravens one year earlier. Might we be discussing back-to-back Super Bowl wins to end Ray Lewis’ career?
That wasn’t history’s plan. Instead, we watched in horror as Billy Cundiff’s field-goal attempt sailed wide of its mark. The New England Patriots advanced to Super Bowl XLVI. There, they’d lose to the New York Giants. Tucker joined the franchise one year later, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Tucker would be named a First or Second-Team All-Pro eight times during his 13 seasons in Baltimore, but as everyone knows, his time has ended. There are currently two kickers on the Ravens‘ roster competing for the right to be his successor. NFL.com’s Jeffri Chadiha lists finding a kicker as Baltimore’s most significant and most formidable challenge of the offseason.
“The Ravens are looking to replace Justin Tucker, which means this is the first time in over a decade that they’ll have major questions at kicker heading into a season. Tucker was released in May amid allegations of improper conduct during massage therapy sessions. (He received a 10-game suspension from the league in June.) Tucker connected on a career-low 73.3 percent of his field goal attempts last season, but even that decline left his career accuracy at 89.1 percent, ranking first in NFL history. Now the Ravens are trying to assess whether sixth-round pick Tyler Loop or undrafted rookie John Hoyland can come close to being that reliable. There isn’t much to criticize about the roster Baltimore has assembled. That also won’t matter if the kicking game can’t deliver in high-pressure situations.”
Truth be told, if this is Baltimore’s most daunting task of the summer, there’s much to be excited about. This team is loaded, and that’s a testament to how Eric DeCosta has built the roster.
Still, a legitimate contender needs a kicker, and they need to find one quickly. As history has taught us, postseason wins and losses can come down to a moment or two.
Again, sometimes no one knows what they need until it’s too late, and there may not be a more guy-wrenching way to see a season end than by watching a field-goal attempt sail wide of its target. Ravens fans might not recover if they were ever to meet that fate again, to close a deep playoff run.