Unfortunately, he still forces the ball into dangerous and ill-advised places a little too much. Case in point, the interception by Philadelphia’s DeMeco Ryans, thrown into basically triple coverage, would’ve made even Brett Favre blush. His two game films thus far are littered with interception-worthy balls that weren’t. With the glut of man-to-man defense and single deep-middle safety that they’ve seen against Cincinnati and Philadelphia, Flacco has gotten away with some **** Bavettas — just tossing up jump balls as is the typical read against those coverages.
Some have worked swimmingly, like the double-move touchdown to Jones against pressure in the Philly game. Others were very fortunate to have not been returned for touchdowns in the other direction, like the 25-yard completion to Jones in the Cincy game where the corner wasn’t fooled by the double-move at all, but badly mistimed his jump on the ball.
These are “faith throws,” which I’m not convinced makes this offense better in the long run. As I watched Flacco as his better self, moving the free safety wide with his shoulders and throwing a perfect laser to Anquan Boldin down the middle of the field for a 34-yard touchdown against Cincy, I’m even less convinced the George Michael quarterbacking concept makes sense for this team.
If Flacco continues to make risky intermediate decisions, the “go-get-its” only add another layer of risk, an unnecessary development for a team with one of the better offensive weapons in the NFL in Ray Rice, and a defense that continues to get turnovers.
The problem for the Ravens, as this stuff relates to the Pats, is they’ll see very little single-high safety or blitz packages, if any at all. If they still choose to throw “go-get-its,” they’ll likely be to an area with two defenders.
