Baltimore Beatdown
Fullback Patrick Ricard says the team’s championship window is every year of his MVP quarterback’s career.
After closing out the 2022 regular season with a win over a Baltimore Ravens team that was resting several starters, Cincinnati Bengals franchise quarterback Joe Burrow told reporters that his team’s ‘Super Bowl window’ was his “whole career” and that “things are going to change year to year but our window is always open.”
At the time, Burrow’s comments were viewed cocky and confident but in truth, they were a reflection of his naivete because, in his first full season as a starter, he took his team to the Super Bowl and came up short of winning the franchise’s first-ever championship to the Los Angeles Rams. While the Bengals returned to the AFC championship the following year after making those comments, they are coming off back-to-back seasons of finishing with a 9-8 record and missing the playoffs.
Making a deep playoff run in the NFL is harder than it is in any other major professional sports league because of its single-elimination format. It makes the criticism of quarterbacks not named Patrick Mahomes or Josh Allen for their shortcomings in the postseason overblown, harsh and often unfair.
No player has been dragged by the media more for not winning or even making it to a Super Bowl than Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson. The two-time league MVP who will likely be awarded the honor for a third time in the coming weeks isn’t going to be able to put the false narratives about him not being able to make it to or win the big game for at least another year.
The Ravens fell to the Buffalo Bills in the divisional round of the 2024 playoffs this past Sunday despite Jackson’s incredibly valiant efforts to lead and nearly complete second-half comeback. He was visibly and verbally frustrated following the loss and understandably so given the familiar nature of how it unfolded similarly to most of the team’s premature postseason exits since he became the full-time starter midway through his rookie season in 2018 with several key turnovers leading to their ultimate demise.
“We can’t have that [expletive],” Jackson said. “That’s why we lost the game, because as you can see, we’re moving the ball wonderfully. It’s just hold onto the [expletive] ball. I’m sorry for my language. I’m just tired of this.”
While Burrow made his own proclamation about his team’s chances to win it all with him at the helm, Jackson’s teammates did the proclaiming for him. In the eyes of five-time Pro Bowl fullback Patrick Ricard, Jackson winning a Super Bowl isn’t a matter of if but rather when because he views it as an eventuality, not just a possibility.
“It’s inevitable. He’s going to win a Super Bowl, and I want to be a part of it,” Ricard said Monday during the Ravens locker cleanout. “It just sucks that it hasn’t happened yet. I, personally, feel bad for him because he deserves it,...
