Recovery and Father Time Present Challenges in Baltimore

The sight of Nnamdi Madubuike jogging onto the fields in Owings Mills on July 29 was one of the feel-good moments of training camp. Ten-plus months after a neck injury in Week 2 against Cleveland threatened to end his career — and just four months removed from April neck surgery — No. 92 passed his physical, came off the PUP list, and pulled the defense’s white jersey back over his shoulder pads. Even Lamar called it “phenomenal.”

But before you pencil in a double-digit sack season, let’s pump the brakes.

Two weeks into camp, Madubuike has yet to take a single team rep. Not one. His work has come off to the side — technique sessions with defensive coordinator Anthony Weaver, conditioning under the watchful eyes of the strength and conditioning coaches. He’s suited up, he’s sporting a throwback neck roll, and by all accounts he looks explosive That’s encouraging!

But it’s not football.

Jesse Minter has been careful with his words, and you should read between the lines. “It’s still a process to get ready to play football,” the head coach said. “There’s a timeline involved.” Eric DeCosta struck a similar tone back in July, noting this is “a different type of injury” than your garden-variety ACL. When the GM and the head coach are both hedging, pay attention.

This is a slow burn for the talented defender. The ramp up has been conservative. And with good reason. A career that was on the blink has seemingly been resurrected. But the nature of that injury is delicate, particularly for an interior defensive lineman – a leverage-and-violence position. Oh, and there’s no simulating a double team from a side field. Even if he’s cleared for team drills soon, the runway to Week 1 is short, and the runway to vintage Madubuike — the guy whose 21.5 sacks led all defensive tackles from 2023 until his injury — is longer still.

None of this means the season is lost or that the $98 million man won’t get there. The trend lines are all pointing the right way, and pairing a healthy Madubuike with Trey Hendrickson and Travis Jones could transform a pass rush that cratered without him last year. But September Madubuike may look more like a rotational piece than a wrecking ball.

Patience, everyone. The best version of Nnamdi Madubuike may not show up until the leaves turn. Given where he was in April, that’s still a big win.

Father Time Doesn’t Take a Play Off

Mark Andrews is everything you want in a Raven. The work ethic is unimpeachable. The connection with Lamar Jackson was, for years, the heartbeat of this offense. He’s the franchise’s all-time leader in receptions, receiving yards and receiving touchdowns, and nobody can ever take that away from him.

But my job isn’t to write love letters. It’s to tell you what I see. And what I see in Owings Mills this summer is a player fighting a battle no tight end has ever won.

Recent numbers support the eyeball test. Per Pro Football Reference and Pro Football Focus, Andrews finished 2025 with 48 catches for 422 yards and 5 touchdowns — career lows across the board for a full season. PFF graded him at 61.6 as a receiver, 31st among 37 qualified tight ends. Thirty-first. That’s not a blip. He averaged just 8.8 yards per reception and 6.0 yards per target — the kind of numbers that scream “possession guy hanging on,” not “Lamar’s binky.”

And camp hasn’t offered much rebuttal. The Athletic’s Jeff Zrebiec has noted that Andrews has had issues with drops early in camp, including a routine drop in seven-on-seven and a fumble in a rain-soaked practice, and wrote that the Ravens badly need a bounce-back year from him. When the most plugged-in beat man in town is flagging drops in July, pay attention.

History tells us how this movie ends. Over the past decade, the age-30 wall has claimed better athletes than Mark. Jimmy Graham was a matchup nightmare in his twenties and a decoy in his thirties. Greg Olsen strung together three straight 1,000-yard seasons, then couldn’t stay on the field after 31. Zach Ertz caught 116 balls at 28 and spent his thirties as a short-area chain-mover. Even Travis Kelce — the exception who proved the rule longer than anyone — finally looked mortal. PFF’s own research into tight end aging found that the position’s decline in the early thirties opens the door for younger names to take over, and the greats who beat the curve — Gonzalez, Gates — are Canton outliers, not templates. Andrews enters his age-31 season. You do the math.

Here’s why it matters more than ever. Declan Doyle is a former tight ends coach, and he confirmed this spring that the position remains “important” in his scheme because of the flexibility that multiple quality options with diverse skill sets provide — his Bears heavily deployed multiple tight end sets in 2025. Doyle’s offense wants to live in 12 personnel, dictate matchups, keep defenses guessing. That only works if the tight ends can win.

Can they? The room behind Andrews is Durham Smythe and rookies Matt Hibner and Josh Cuevas — a fourth-rounder, a fifth-rounder and a blocker. Most camp reports, including RSR’s, say the Ravens are hoping one of the rookies steps up to provide another pass-catching target behind Andrews. Hoping. That’s the word. And Ravens history with rookie tight ends — including Andrews himself, who eased in behind Hayden Hurst in 2018 — suggests hope isn’t a plan. Rookie tight ends drink from a firehose: protections, splits, run fits, hot reads. Most don’t surface until Year 2.

So connect the dots. A coordinator whose scheme leans on tight ends. A 31-year-old TE1 whose tape and metrics say the twitch is fading. Two Day 3 rookies and a blocking specialist behind him. That’s not depth — that’s a prayer with a chinstrap.

Maybe Andrews summons one more vintage season. Nobody in that building works harder, and I’d love nothing more than to eat this column in January. But the Ravens built a roster to win now, and they’re asking the position Doyle values supremely to defy both the aging curve and the depth chart.

You’ve heard it said many times – Father Time is undefeated.

And right now, he’s lined up across from No. 89.

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Source: https://russellstreetreport.com/2026/08/12/tltakes/madubuike-ramps-up/