With 12:50 left in the fourth quarter of Baltimore’s Sunday night matchup with New England, Ravens running back Derrick Henry took in a 2-yard touchdown to give his club a 24-13 lead.
Baltimore had two more possessions in that game.
Henry didn’t touch the ball. In fact, he wasn’t even on the field.
Ravens head coach John Harbaugh admitted in the immediate aftermath of the game that he would’ve liked Henry to get touches. He expanded on that in his Monday press conference, while also acknowledging that Baltimore ran just six plays on its penultimate possession. Henry is not typically on the field in known-passing situations, especially in a two-minute drill.
“Well, we have a rotation,” Harbaugh said, via transcript from the team. “The rotation is Derrick [Henry] and Keaton [Mitchell] are our first- and second-down backs. We came to that in the last few weeks and made sure that on all those plays, it was one of those two guys. And that [in] obvious pass [situations] was third-down only, for Rasheen [Ali], which I think he had nine plays on. Then, the rotation was two to one, as far as starting the series off, and depending on how long the series goes, Derrick gets four or five – three, four, five runs, and he’s ready — he needs a break. So, Keaton comes in or vice versa.
“The last series was a conversation between [running backs coach] Willie [Taggart] and Derrick, and they decided that Keaton was going to start the series off as part of the rotation. Then, Derrick was going to come in on that series. Looking back at it right now, to your point, I’d have grabbed it, and I would have said, ‘No, put Derrick in the game.’ But that’s not really the way it works in real time.”
Harbaugh continued that there are plays that are more set up for Mitchell than Henry, and they were part of that drive that began with 8:52 left in the fourth quarter from Baltimore’s 31.
Where the Ravens likely erred, Harbaugh noted, was not getting Henry in the game after Tyler Huntley’s 8-yard completion to DeAndre Hopkins for a first down on third-and-6.
“I would have at least, probably, would have wanted [Henry in] after we got the first down, Harbaugh said, “if I’d have grabbed it; if I’d have seen it. But I’m also looking at the play — the play that was set up on first down was a play-action pass, initially. That’s a sweep play that Keaton takes most of the time. So, that’s going to draw eyes and draw attention to the play. I can see why you’d want to put Keaton out there in that play.
“So, I think there’s a lot of layers to it — in game — [and] things are moving fast, and that’s the way it goes. You look back at it, and you say, ‘I think there’s logic going the other way for sure.’ And you just put Derrick out there for whatever the play is, and we would have all been happy with that as well. So, that’s how it went.”
Further pressed on the subject, Harbaugh noted generally, the conversation on the sideline at that point isn’t really geared toward who is or is not going in the game.
“[P]lays are getting called fast. Players are running on the field fast based on the gameplan, what the rotating coach decides to do, what the tag on the play is, and who’s got that play, and there’s reasons for all that that are in the gameplan,” Harbaugh said. “So, I’m not defending all that and … you can pick plays or who goes in, or when they go in, but it’s not just as simple as, ‘Oh, Derrick Henry didn’t play the whole fourth quarter.’ It was those plays back-to-back; he was going to go in. That was part of the plan, and it was felt, in making those decisions, guys are running on and off the field as players are being called in the rotation to go in that direction.
“As I look back on it, I’m like, ‘Sure, I see the point.’ But I’m also not in the midst of saying, ‘Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa. Timeout. Keaton, come on. I want Derrick in the game,’ in that moment. So, that’s a reality, too. So just — I’m not trying to make excuses for it, but I am trying to put it in perspective. That’s how it works.”
Harbaugh noted that he has put in players or taken out players before in certain situations. And he agreed that, in retrospect, it would have been helpful to have Henry out there to try and close the game.
“I’m not arguing that,” Harbaugh said. “That’s why I’m saying, if I look back at it now, I’d rather have [Henry] out there, absolutely. I’m not arguing that at all on a fundamental level.”
Particularly given the game’s context — quarterback Lamar Jackson was out with a back injury, Henry was averaging 7.1 yards per carry on his 18 rushing attempts — it’s pretty clear the Ravens did not handle that situation as well as they could have. With Baltimore’s postseason chances now hanging by a thread, we’ll see how that Week 16 loss will affect the club moving forward.
