No, Just No!
NO.
I usually kick off ‘No Szn’ during the initial stages of free agency when every Ravens fan wants every star player on the market. And it’s justifiable fan demand, of course! The cap isn’t real, money doesn’t matter, and we all live in a modern era of instant gratification that’s tethered into our sports fandom, and when we don’t get what we want? We chastise billionaire owners and their front office personnel as if we all know best and it’s our play money that they’re refusing to spend to win us a ring, next season and beyond be damned!
Until next season is upon us, and we run it all back…
But I digress.
This offseason has been a bit different. It’s certainly felt like Ravens fans spent the early stages of free agency holding their collective breath and waiting for Lamar Jackson to sign his new deal. The LJ signing- coupled with the Odell Beckham Jr addition- seemed to be just enough to chill the preliminary wave of free agent demands.
Alas, we all knew it wouldn’t be an entire offseason of complacency, and as we’ve seen in the past week? The voices have intensified and the insistence to sign every player on the market is once again growing.
As such, it’s up to me to squash all hopes and dreams for anybody claiming “the Ravens just need to sign Player X & Y!” It’s not a pretty job, but somebody has to bring it all back to reality.
WR Deandre Hopkins
NOPE.
If you want the easy answer here, it’s that Hop is chasing a bag that the Ravens aren’t going to give him. If you prefer to dip and dive and justify the money, just make sure you don’t use “OBJ and Bate missed time” to defend signing Hopkins, who has missed 15 games in the last two seasons as well. We can also tack on the rumors of being a locker room issue, and the fact that signing him to a similar deal as OBJ (1 year, 15M guaranteed, voiding a helluva lot in the process) would still leave the WR room in 2024 wanting, and the potential uproar by Bate with this signing could further thin the room if he goes all Hollywood on the Ravens. If you really want another WR? Wait til the deadline. Maybe. But until then? We good.
RB Dalvin Cook/RB Saquon Barkley
Ew, NO.
I saw somebody recently suggest trading away JK Dobbins for Saquon Barkley. Yes, you read that correctly. They wanted to trade away a cheap RB to sign an expensive one who also missed a season recently with the same major ACL injury (and Barkley also has a recurring ankle injury pop up almost yearly)… make it make sense. As for the Cook angle, I genuinely don’t see the logic at all- he didn’t want to take a pay cut (allegedly) so the team parted ways with him. I’d imagine he is in search of a best-fit-one-year-deal much like the aforementioned Deandre Hopkins, and I have no interest in booting Gus or JKD for a Cook rental, especially knowing it’ll cost more than the entire current RB room for Baltimore.
EDGE Danielle Hunter
Y’all are gonna crush me, but this too is a NO. Believe it or not? It’s possible to love a player, but not want to make a splash and trade for them! In this case, there’s potential for the Ravens to add a top tier EDGE (he’s in that 10-15 range for me), but in order to do so, the Ravens would need to do three things:
- Send the Vikes a decent 2024 pick or picks (recent speculation has the starting price at a R2 pick in 2024) to acquire Hunter.
- Have a new top-of-the-market contract worked out with Hunter ahead of the trade, as he’s made it very clear he will not play on his current contract.
- Create ample cap room with one (or two) of the few restructures they have left available to them.
I’m gonna be honest… that doesn’t feel realistic for the Ravens. I know damn well somebody is about to say “but Roquan!” but let’s point out the key differences: Roquan was a mid-season add, came in cheap as hell, and didn’t get extended til the offseason which allowed the Ravens to evaluate the player fit prior to committing big bucks, while also giving them a potential high compensatory pick had he not resigned. This ain’t that. It’s a NO.
I NO it’s not a Madden-mentality, but I hope y’all NO I still love you Ravens Flock, NO matter what.
[Related Article: Ravens Paint by Numbers]
The post No, Just No! appeared first on Russell Street Report.
Source: https://russellstreetreport.com/2023/06/12/street-talk/no-just-no/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=no-just-no
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