Soccer Dad

The billick era is over

I don't follow football as closely as I follow baseball, but almost two months late, it's safe to say that the Billick era is over.
Brian Billick came to the Ravens from the Minnesota Vikings where he had been the offensive co-ordinator. Ironically, offense has been the Ravens's weakness since he's been here.
Even in their Super Bowl year, the Ravens won with defense and special teams. The offense was adequate. Then the next year they figured, if we could win it all with Trent Dilfer imagine what we could do with a real quarterback.

Elvis Grbac, though, set the team back. He seemingly couldn't move the ball when the Ravens were within their opponents 20. Backup Randall Cunningham, at the end of his career, seemed more effective and I have no idea why he didn't play more. It appeared that with Trent Dilfer, the Ravens adjusted to his shortcomings and with a game plan that used him to his fullest advantage, but they don't seem to have had any success since then at quarterback.

The past few years, I believed the hype that the team had just acquired the one player they needed. But for the past few years that hasn't seemed quite enough. It's not that these guys are quitting, as you might hear on talk shows or read in the sports pages. It's that they're not that good. (WHOOPS: I left this out: This year the only teams they've beaten so far were starting third string quarterbacks.) And in the past few years the team, resting on its laurels hasn't identified the weakness.

(A friend says that it's the offensive line, which, I assume are the players who protect the quarterback and other offensive players. If Jamal Lewis isn't running well it may have less to do with a loss of ability than a loss mobility resulting from inadequate protection.)

I'm not denigrating Billick. Not many coaches win the Super Bowl. Fewer in their second year. But there are lingering problems with the Ravens that haven't been properly identified. I suspect that he's the one most (but not solely) responsible for that failure. The team needs to commit itself to a painful and hopefully short rebuilding process.

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