Baltimore Beatdown
In one of the most pivotal drafts in recent years, can DeCosta nail it to keep the Ravens’ championship window open?
The Ravens are in a rare position. Just an handful of hours until the draft officially opens and the Ravens are in the special spot of being able to field a championship-level 53-man roster and play a football game right now if needed. Most teams go into the draft with significant needs, some starting spots in question and talent missing. For the Ravens, their biggest needs are backup players and hoping to add a young talent infusion to other rooms. There are things the team would ‘like’, but there are no immediate needs for this team. They don’t have to force any picks.
This makes this the most important draft from Eric DeCosta in his tenure so far, and maybe ever.
This 2025 draft for the Baltimore Ravens is a treasured spot for a team in a contending window. Let's set the table. Franchise quarterback Lamar Jackson’s cap hit jumps up to $74.5 million for the next two seasons after 2025. Nearly 55% of their cap space for 2025 is between eight players. The Ravens also have a ton of players they are going to lose or spend a lot of money re-signing next season. Mark Andrews, Derrick Henry, Kyle Hamilton, Tyler Linderbaum, Isaiah Likely, Travis Jones, Odafe Oweh, Kyle Van Noy, plus more are all going to be free agents in 2026, have expensive fifth-year options, or get middle to top-of-the-market extensions.
More cap space is being used, talented players are being lost, and holes that will need to be filled. That’s a typical offseason for the Ravens. They are usually one of the best at bolstering the roster before the draft, allowing them to enact their ‘Best-Player-Available’ (BPA) strategy that they are known so well for. But even then, most years, there’s a massive glare still. Last season they needed an instant starting defensive back and offensive line player. They got Wiggins and Rosengarten. In 2021 and 2023, there were massive questions about the receiver room, they got Batman and Flowers. In 2022, they didn’t have a center, they got Linderbaum. In 2020, they didn’t have any starting linebackers so Patrick Queen was picked. Whether those picks were entirely the BPA strategy or slightly weighed by need is only known by the front office, but they worked out.
There can be no questions about talent level this year. No doubt on reaching for a player. The Ravens are in full championship mode. And the window for that could close at any moment. Jackson only has so long on his contract, and while an extension is expected, he only has so long on his career as well. Championship windows like this with a generational historic player only come so often. Drafts like this during those windows are even rarer.
Look at the San Francisco 49ers. They lost a ton of talent this year, have aging veterans and...
