When news of Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco’s back injury first emerged, the team expressed confidence he’d be back in a week. Four weeks later, they’re still waiting.
It’s become an odd-to-the-point-of-comical situation. Most recently, offensive coordinator Marty Mornhinweg managed to unleash a one-man Abbott and Costello routine while discussing Flacco’s status. Now, merely 17 days from the opener, no one knows when Flacco will be back.
Ryan Mallett continues to be the starter in Flacco’s absence, and with nearly a month elapsed since owner Steve Bisciotti crowdsourced the question of whether the team should sign Colin Kaepernick, the fact that they haven’t probably means that they won’t.
Meanwhile, the fact that a guy on the wrong side of 30 has a back problem that has knocked him out of practice for four weeks and counting raises legitimate concerns that, once the back problems go away, they could at any time be back.
With coach John Harbaugh arguably under pressure to win this year, not having a healthy Flacco and not having an ideal replacement could make it a lot harder to throw water on rumors that Harbaugh will be headed elsewhere in 2018.
