Ravens routed in August-closing clunker.
Green Bay, WI, Saturday, August 24, 2024. The Baltimore Ravens will soon enter their 29th season, and they are living up to somebody that age. They have grown up fast, moved into a new house with some recently snazzy additions, married a devoted fan base, acquired plenty of children/young kids (some of whom have achieved more than others), and had plenty of success.
On Saturday, they also did something many 29-year-olds can fortunately still do: visit their grandfather. The team played its last and only road 2024 preseason game at the NFL’s most venerated venue, Lambeau Field, against a Green Bay Packers team that took a young team to a big playoff win last year and is high on its chances in the NFC Central Division this year.
The Ravens couldn’t maintain their year-round high standard of play and ended their August schedule with a 1-2 record by losing to the Pack, 30-7, in front of an announced sellout crowd. Like most preseason games, the air wasn’t filled with footballs thrown by Packer quarterback Jordan Love – who blossomed unexpectedly last year – or the Ravens two-time league Most Valuable Player Lamar Jackson, who hasn’t played a preseason game since 2021.
What else wasn’t there for the Ravens in Green Bay? It was superior depth, team culture, and execution. So, will this team be prepared for the season when, in less than two weeks, the team is back on the road for a monumental national TV opener in Kansas City against the league’s reigning dynasty, Thursday, September 5, 8:20 p.m.?
It won’t if it plays as it did this Saturday. The home-standing Packers smothered the Ravens’ short routes, and the first quarter ended with six Packer first downs to none for Baltimore. Green Bay struck first on an Anders Carlson 54-yard field goal four minutes into the game. He added a 34-yarder as the second period extended the lead to six points.
Then, out of nowhere, the Ravens struck. Wideout and 2021 fourth-round receiver Tylan Wallace, who’s developing rapidly into a big-play threat, cut sharply across the field, gathered in a 49-yard bullet, and ran for a 7-6 Baltimore lead.
But the Pack, egged on by a sellout crowd, used effective probing runs until Pepe Williams got outleaped in the end zone for a 19-yard score–and another lead change–midway through the second. That lead grew when center Nick Samac, making his first August start, was carted off the field, and the Ravens subsequently allowed a sack and touchdown for a 20-7 halftime deficit, the outcome of third quarterback Devin Leary being blindsided.
The Packers scored ten more points in the third quarter on a short pass from Sean Clifford to Malik Heath and a 55-yard FG from Greg Joseph with 2 minutes left in the stanza.
Now it’s on to KC for that highly anticipated opener. First, though, the fate of the so-called “bubble guys” will be decided on Tuesday, August 27, “Cutdown Day.”
