One of the larger question marks coming into this season was the performance of the Baltimore Ravens’ offensive line. They didn’t really address the holes over the offseason, adding no free agents and only drafting guard Ben Powers in the fourth round. Instead, the Ravens chose to rely on the young talent already on the roster to step up.
After trading both Alex Lewis and Jermaine Eluemunor — who both were in the competition for the starting job at left guard — there looked to be a pretty wide open hole in the center of their offensive line again this season. But after struggling throughout the preseason, things all seemingly clicked for the unit in Week 1 against the Miami Dolphins.
Baltimore allowed just one sack in the game but generally gave quarterback Lamar Jackson plenty of time to throw the ball, including quite a few deep shots that took extra time to set up. They also opened up holes for all three running backs, who gained 265 yards and two touchdowns on the ground.
At Monday’s press conference, coach John Harbaugh thought the offensive line was excellent. He specifically called out left guard Bradley Bozeman who he said, “justified the fact he was in there as a starter.”
While Miami doesn’t appear to be the hardest opponent in the league right now, it was still nice to see the offensive line gel together quickly. Baltimore had been shuffling their offensive line around all preseason long and didn’t give the starting lineup a chance to play together very much. With time, they should actually improve as they get more used to playing next to each other and can finetune their communication.
Considering the Ravens just hung 59 points and 643 total net yards on a team, that’s a scary proposition if you’re on Baltimore’s schedule.
