The Baltimore Ravens beat the Denver Broncos 23-7 in a late afternoon game on Sunday. The talk of the game, though, was in the final three seconds. Normally, the winning team’s quarterback kneels to run out the clock if they have possession, but Baltimore instead decided to run the ball because they wanted to tie the NFL record of 43-straight games with at least 100 rushing yards.
The Ravens snapped the ball and Lamar Jackson ran for 5 yards, tying the record as time expired. There were mixed emotions after the game: one side happy for the win and record, the other expressing anger and feeling distraught. Denver was also down their starting quarterback as Teddy Bridgewater left the game early for concussion protocol.
John Harbaugh, the Ravens coach, looked at the criticism in a different light. He compared it to what teams do at the end of blowout games, and what the Broncos, in a sense, were doing in their game. The losing team (in this case, the Broncos) tried to score a touchdown in the fourth quarter, even when they were down by more than just six points.
But in the Ravens case, it was a simple play for five yards and had no implications for the game, other than the fact that it could tie them with the record. Harbaugh made it clear to his players that if they got the ball back, they might go for the record, and they did.
It is interesting to note that Fangio has a past with the Ravens as he used to be an assistant coach from 2008-09, so if he were still there today, he could have agreed with Harbaugh’s decision to make it into the history books.
But now, their relationship is different as he takes on the challenge of coaching the Broncos this season. This game poses the question if these two teams will meet again in the playoffs and if bad blood will be there moving forward.
Featured Image courtesy of Wallpaper-Mania
Anonymous • Oct 14, 2021 at 12:33 am
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