Lamar Jackson has missed four of the Ravens’ five practices so far, participating in only an hour of Wednesday’s work.
The team announced Friday that the quarterback “continues to undergo further evaluation and receive care from our medical team.”
Coach John Harbaugh addressed Jackson’s illness after practice.
“He’s fighting through an illness, working with our doctors,” Harbaugh said, via video from the team. “He’s doing all the tests, even more tests, to make sure we get everything covered. I’m confident he’ll be back pretty soon. It’s just [an] unpredictable deal. I mean, you guys have been sick before. You know sometimes it’s not easy. So, that’s what we’re dealing with.”
Backup Josh Johnson has taken the first-team snaps in Jackson’s absence.
The reigning league MVP has missed at least one practice in each of his seven seasons with an illness.
Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson is out of practice again.
The team announced that Jackson will not practice on Friday because of an illness. Jackson also missed the first three practices of camp and he made an early departure when he returned to action on Wednesday.
Neither Jackson nor the team has made any comment as to the nature of the illness. According to the team’s announcement on Friday, Jackson “continues to undergo further evaluation and receive care from our medical team.”
The Ravens were off on Thursday, so he’s now missed four of their five practice sessions.
Josh Johnson is the team’s top quarterback with Jackson out of action. Rookies Devin Leary and Emory Jones are the other quarterbacks on the roster.
Lamar Jackson lasted only one hour in his training camp debut Wednesday, Jamison Hensley of ESPN reports.
The reigning NFL MVP missed the first three days of the Ravens’ training camp with an illness. He left midway through Wednesday’s workout.
Hensley said Jackson “looked weary” as he left for the team facility after throwing one completion and one interception in team drills. Jackson split snaps with backup Josh Johnson before leaving.
“We are going to work him back in, for sure,” Ravens offensive coordinator Todd Monken said. “I know I’m being kind of a smartass. You’ll have to ask him how he feels. But he was great in meetings. When we were on the field at the start [of practice], he said he was feeling good.”
Jackson has missed at least one practice in each of his seven seasons with an illness.
Thursday is the team’s first off day.
The Ravens quarterback has returned to the field.
After missing three practices with an illness, Lamar Jackson is back on Wednesday.
The reigning league MVP, Jackson’s specific illness was not disclosed. But the club sent him home on Saturday when he exhibited symptoms. Head coach John Harbaugh noted that Jackson would return when he wasn’t sick anymore.
In Jackson’s absence, Josh Johnson had been taking the first-team snaps with the offense. Baltimore also has Devin Leary and Emory Jones on the roster at quarterback.
During his tenure with the Bengals, Willie Anderson was widely regarded as the best right tackle in the NFL, and was chosen a first-team All-Pro for three straight years from 2004 to 2006. But Anderson isn’t in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and he thinks Sandra Bullock has something to do with that.
Anderson thinks Michael Lewis’s book The Blind Side and Bullock’s hit movie adaptation of that book, led Hall of Fame voters to conclude that left tackles were the truly great linemen, and right tackles were afterthoughts.
“The media had a bias because they just didn’t understand the importance of the guys we blocked over there [as right tackles] were some of the best rushers of all-time,” Anderson told Kay Adams. “The whole Blind Side thing got taken out because of the movie and the right side guys got pushed away.”
Asked if he thinks The Blind Side movie negatively affected his Hall of Fame chances, Anderson replied, “Absolutely.”
“The media push of The Blind Side left tackle is a huge deal,” Anderson added.
Anderson is in the Bengals’ Ring of Honor and was chosen to their 50th Anniversary Team, and he has been among the 15 Hall of Fame finalists in each of the last three years. Last year he made the cutdown to the final 10 candidates but missed out in the end. He’s trending toward eventually getting into the Hall of Fame. If he makes it, Anderson will be the first right tackle who played in the 21st Century to be enshrined.
Safety Eddie Jackson was able to take a walk down memory lane after agreeing to sign with the Ravens last week.
Jackson has been reunited with familiar faces from every level of his football life since coming to Baltimore. He grew up in the same area as quarterback Lamar Jackson and played at Alabama with cornerback Marlon Humphrey and running back Derrick Henry. Jackson then spent more than four seasons playing on the same defense in Chicago as linebacker Roquan Smith before Smith was traded to the Ravens during the 2022 season.
Smith helped lobby the Ravens on signing Jackson and Jackson said on Monday that all of the pieces in place helped make it an easy choice to join the band.
“It just felt like a perfect fit,” Jackson said, via the team’s website. “Just knowing what they have in this building and the tradition of things, I just knew it was a perfect fit for me to come in and compete and do what I do to help the team get better and hopefully win the Super Bowl.”
The Ravens also have Kyle Hamilton and Marcus Williams at the back end of the defense and Jackson’s addition gives them increased flexibility in how they will attack offenses this fall. That’s been a strength of Ravens defenses in the past and the results should be good if the fit is as perfect as Jackson believes it to be.
Derrick Henry turned 30 in January, the age when running backs tend to fall off the cliff.
Adrian Peterson, Frank Gore and Raheem Mostert are the only running backs in the past decade who have had a 1,000-yard season at 30 or older. Don’t bet against Henry joining them this season.
“That’s always going to be said when a running back gets up in age, the stigma on the position,” Henry said, via Jamison Hensley of ESPN. “But I just focus on me being healthy, doing my job when I’m here and then let my play speak for my age.”
Henry averaged 68.6 rushing yards per game and 4.2 yards per carry in 2023, both of which were the lowest of his career, but he again led the league in carries with 280 and had 1,167 yards. He has had 1,000 yards five of the past six seasons, gaining 937 in 2021 when he played only eight games because of an injury.
Henry has led the league in carries four times in the past five seasons and has averaged 306 carries per season in that time.
“I don’t really try to worry about that,” Henry said. “It’s kind of funny: Ever since high school, sometimes I got 56 [carries] in the game, 57 the next week. In college, it was 44, 46. In the NFL, it was 30, 35. I really think it’s just your mindset, how you take care of your body and not get too caught on ‘he say, she say.’ If it works and you feel good, just keep working and keep doing what you do.”
The Ravens haven’t had a running back with more than 300 carries since 2010 when Ray Rice had 307.
Earlier this month, we commemorated the 15th anniversary of the killing of Steve McNair. Next month, Netflix will unveil a documentary focusing on the crime.
Untold: The Murder of Air McNair debuts on August 20.
Quickly ruled a murder-suicide committed by McNair’s 20-year-old girlfriend, suspicion still lingers that it was a double execution.
Whatever it was, McNair was a victim. Dead at only 36, not long after finishing a career that saw him share league MVP honors with Peyton Manning in 2003. McNair also led the Titans to Super Bowl XXXIV, in which Tennessee nearly forced overtime against the Rams.
The Ravens didn’t take any big swings on receivers this offseason as they opted to roll with returning members of last year’s team as targets for quarterback Lamar Jackson’s passes in 2024.
That approach puts Rashod Bateman in a key role for Baltimore. The 2021 first-round pick returned from a foot injury that limited him to six games in 2022, but he only posted 32 catches for 367 yards in 16 regular season appearances. The team showed faith in Bateman by signing him to a two-year, $12 million extension and head coach John Harbaugh made it clear on Monday that the team has high expectations for the wideout in his fourth season.
“Rashod’s been working to make plays — To see him come out and make those catches, those are great catches,” Harbaugh said. “Traffic catches, one catch he plucked off the ground there. I was excited, everybody was fired up about it. That’s what we expect from Rashod Bateman. He’s expected to be a top receiver in the league for us. That’s what we’re planning on.”
The Ravens will also be looking for Zay Flowers to take a step forward and getting bigger things from both of the former first-round picks would be a big step in the right direction for their passing offense.
Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson is out for a second consecutive day of training camp.
Jackson was sent home with an illness before Sunday’s opening practice, and he remains out Monday, Jonas Shaffer of The Baltimore Banner reports.
Ravens coach John Harbaugh said Jackson’s timetable for a return was unclear after the reigning NFL MVP fell ill Saturday. Harbaugh said Jackson will return “when he feels better, when he’s not sick anymore.”
Backup Josh Johnson is taking Jackson’s first-team reps, with rookies Devin Leary and Emory Jones the other quarterbacks on the roster.
“It’s definitely good to have Josh,” receiver Rashod Bateman said, via Shaffer, after Sunday’s practice. “He’s an old head around here, so he’s a good leader for us. He teaches us a lot when it comes to the game of football, and he definitely leads us in the right direction. So it’s good to have him out there.”