Ravens to release/trade Earl Thomas

[BareYourTeeth]

5 hours ago, DreamKid said:

Seems like he started in a good place(If the information in that is accurate), but it didn't take long for personal and professional issues to become the norm in his life. 

Clowney can rush as an OLB, End, or from the defensive interior. Commands doubles. Super versatile chess piece, and as you said a great fit. Opens up so many combinations for us.

Would be sick if we brought him in. 

 If we sign Clowney this thing will just look more like another ultimate finesse move by EDC. 

[berlin calling]

not sure Clowney would sign for just a year since i can't imagine EDC spending another 15m+ of cap in the front 7 with so many guys on offense due for extensions.

whats the story on Logan Ryan? still unsigned and probably the best FA DB available.

[BareYourTeeth]

Clowney isn't getting $15m+ Everson Griffen wanted that kind of money too but you see what he settled for. 

Logan Ryan is asking for at least $10m. No thank you. We'll be fine at safety as long as they play Clark at FS. They need to use the extra money on another pass rusher.

[diamondbull424]

8 hours ago, Danand said:

I also wonder what the process was like. DMB mentioned the team decided to send him home, maybe to make sure he didn't get injured so he could be traded.

I don't know about cap implications, but it still surprised me that it was not possible to get a trade in place and get some compensation for Thomas.

While the stories about missing meetings, cheating on his GF being lucky Pierre in a threesome with a woman and his brother is weird, and the punch thrown in TC is a bad look and a bad sell, his play last year was good to great and he showed improvement while getting to know the system. Any team with some cap room should be interested in ET to man that single high centerfielder role for a very small compensation.

We rolled the dice, and I am surprised other teams didn't do the same for a player with his ability.

After the more recent article that spoke on ET not feeling like he fit in, it makes me wonder if the Ravens front office simply decided to bite the bullet and release him so that ET could finish his legacy on his own terms. He’s a fringe HOF player considering the history with safeties (not) getting in. If he falters, he might not make the HOF and thus out of respect for him, as a player (not professional), they’re allowing him the chance to make his own way. Especially if opposing teams were only in firesale mode where they would only offer 5th round picks for ET. I mean knowingly choosing to potentially ruin a guys legacy by sending him to a bad team for all of a 5th round pick or so wouldn’t be worth it.

That and if we knowingly trade him to a team, it could be something where we are knowingly asking them to pick up the tab. If ET gets even worse there than here they might feel like we didn’t paint the entire picture and feel less inspired to make deals with the team in the future if they feel they got screwed on this one.

So it could be some combination between respect, strategy, and low compensation.

[diamondbull424]

Just saw another interview and it brought up an excellent point about Earl. Obviously our offense wasn’t completely dialed in against the Titans and obviously we didn’t have the best offensive gameplan in the 2019 playoffs against the Chargers.

But the Chargers have great RBs and had a quality QB in Rivers, yet a defense with lesser safeties undressed them. If we have 2020 playoffs Lamar in that game, we win, perhaps handedly.

Obviously Henry isn’t just anyone, but now that we know ET was missing meetings and late for meetings and the like. Makes me wonder if ET and his lack of focus adversely impacted our defenses ability to thrive in that playoff series.

 

I’m looking at these plays now and thinking, ET may have played a huge role in our upset loss.

He bites on both of those plays. It’s PA pass and Henry was killing it so it plays a part in biting. But the Henry pass certainly seemed avoidable- even at the time. And the first play, is it possible that he was SUPPOSED to have cover 2 responsibilities and cover Humphrey over top but blew the assignment to go for Henry?

[SalvadorsDeli]

2 hours ago, diamondbull424 said:

After the more recent article that spoke on ET not feeling like he fit in, it makes me wonder if the Ravens front office simply decided to bite the bullet and release him so that ET could finish his legacy on his own terms. He’s a fringe HOF player considering the history with safeties (not) getting in. If he falters, he might not make the HOF and thus out of respect for him, as a player (not professional), they’re allowing him the chance to make his own way. Especially if opposing teams were only in firesale mode where they would only offer 5th round picks for ET. I mean knowingly choosing to potentially ruin a guys legacy by sending him to a bad team for all of a 5th round pick or so wouldn’t be worth it.

Yeah there's zero percent chance any of this figured in our thinking. There's zero love or respect for Earl in this org and we're coming for his bag now, really don't think there was much thought about his 'legacy' through this process. Nobody was gonna trade for him with the contract he was on knowing how much of a pain in the *** he we'd rather him be anywhere else but with us. It's not like unceremoniously releasing the dude in the middle of training camp for 'conduct detrimental to the organization' is gonna do wonders for his 'legacy, ' either. 

Edited August 24, 2020 by SalvadorsDeli

[drd23]

3 hours ago, diamondbull424 said:

After the more recent article that spoke on ET not feeling like he fit in, it makes me wonder if the Ravens front office simply decided to bite the bullet and release him so that ET could finish his legacy on his own terms.

You don't release someone for conduct detrimental to the team to protect their legacy

[AngusMcFife]

2 hours ago, diamondbull424 said:

Just saw another interview and it brought up an excellent point about Earl. Obviously our offense wasn’t completely dialed in against the Titans and obviously we didn’t have the best offensive gameplan in the 2019 playoffs against the Chargers.

But the Chargers have great RBs and had a quality QB in Rivers, yet a defense with lesser safeties undressed them. If we have 2020 playoffs Lamar in that game, we win, perhaps handedly.

Obviously Henry isn’t just anyone, but now that we know ET was missing meetings and late for meetings and the like. Makes me wonder if ET and his lack of focus adversely impacted our defenses ability to thrive in that playoff series.

 

I’m looking at these plays now and thinking, ET may have played a huge role in our upset loss.

He bites on both of those plays. It’s PA pass and Henry was killing it so it plays a part in biting. But the Henry pass certainly seemed avoidable- even at the time. And the first play, is it possible that he was SUPPOSED to have cover 2 responsibilities and cover Humphrey over top but blew the assignment to go for Henry?

I don't think so. It is pretty clear to me that Clark has the deep middle third of the field, and Clark takes a couple false steps up to jump a crossing route, and Tannehill burns him over the top. The reply you show doesn't show a good angle. 

[diamondbull424]

EDIT: Nevermind, who cares.

Edited August 24, 2020 by diamondbull424

[RavensfanRD]

3 hours ago, diamondbull424 said:

I’m looking at these plays now and thinking, ET may have played a huge role in our upset loss.

He bites on both of those plays. It’s PA pass and Henry was killing it so it plays a part in biting. But the Henry pass certainly seemed avoidable- even at the time. And the first play, is it possible that he was SUPPOSED to have cover 2 responsibilities and cover Humphrey over top but blew the assignment to go for Henry?

I'll never not blame the coaches for this loss. They panicked down a TD (+2pt conversion) and got away from what made them a 14-2 team... running the football. And him blowing plays to me look like he was trying too hard to make a play based on how the game was going. Dunno though, just try to nuke the thought of that Titans game completely out of my head because of the absurdness.

[diamondbull424]

2 hours ago, AngusMcFife said:

I don't think so. It is pretty clear to me that Clark has the deep middle third of the field, and Clark takes a couple false steps up to jump a crossing route, and Tannehill burns him over the top. The reply you show doesn't show a good angle. 

Are you referring to another angle of the top play? That’s fair. I don’t think at the time I initially blamed ET for that first play.

However knowing that he was blowing meetings and seeing that practice play that ET posted where Clark is playing the deep FS role, you would normally think based on watching the alignment of the play that Clark busted in his cover 1 coverage over the top, but with that not being the case and the team confirming ET blew his coverage seems that its more likely that ET was lined up in the box but was supposed to be playing deep cover 2 protecting the deep right of the field... or he was supposed to be playing man coverage against (Mark Andrews?). We see Chuck point to a missed assignment and then throw his helmet off in frustration around the 7:30 mark in the video.

 

So all I’m saying is that while I initially attributed fault to the blown play against the Titans to Clark and Humphrey in the playoffs because it stands to reason that one of them blew the coverage, the reality is we really don’t know what coverages actually were, just the alignments... especially with how our defenses disguises its looks so readily. With how the second look of the play looks we see ET crashing up field, at the time I assumed this was his responsibility to participate in a run blitz. However knowing what we know now, while the play looks like cover 3, and the WR sneaking between Humphrey and Clark’s coverage... it’s “possible” that a play like this is one where its cover 4 and ET is supposed to be responsible for that area but Humphrey and Clark were trying to cover for his freelanced run blitz and thus were ill prepared.

It’s something that we won’t know from looking at the game, only the team can know which assignments were blown and which were not. Not trying to actively stake blame on ET for this play, simply saying... could plays like the one we saw in that posted practice have actively been hiding in plain sight as examples of his recklessness costing the team. Could this play be such an example?

 

52 minutes ago, RavensfanRD said:

I'll never not blame the coaches for this loss. They panicked down a TD (+2pt conversion) and got away from what made them a 14-2 team... running the football. And him blowing plays to me look like he was trying too hard to make a play based on how the game was going. Dunno though, just try to nuke the thought of that Titans game completely out of my head because of the absurdness.

Yeah I’m definitely not absolving the coaches of blame. The team in general just seemed ill-prepared from the jump. And its two years in a row where the offense had seemingly lazy, uninspired game plans where we just expected to run over everyone for an easy victory. But if ET’s lack of preparation cost this team a better chance at greatness (that squad if it wins the SB likely goes down as one of the best teams in NFL history IMO), then it would be far more annoying then it already is. We have no idea which plays he could’ve been blowing on a weekly basis and thats the annoying part.

[AFlaccoSeagulls]

Speaking of Thomas blowing coverages..

 

[berlin calling]

guess with more of this stuff coming out it is clear a clear cut was best for both sides.

[drd23]

In what world does Earl think "I needed to get my car washed" would fly as an excuse for being late?  😂

Either he is completely clueless or he was looking to cause trouble.

[DreamKid]

8 minutes ago, drd23 said:

In what world does Earl think "I needed to get my car washed" would fly as an excuse for being late?  😂

Either he is completely clueless or he was looking to cause trouble.

The COVID crisis has unfortunately ushered many people over the edge who were previously hanging on by a thread(Maybe even unbeknownst to themselves). That one extra layer of detachment or erosion of normality in their life and *poof*... 

Earl is tarnishing his legacy like a boss right now. An endeavor I wish him great success with.

I also love that Marcus Peters "The Locker Room/Coaches' Cancer" came here and assimilated seamlessly. He's already beloved and respected by the other players. While Earl Thomas "The Stoic No Nonsense Leader" alienated himself in record time. Just goes to show you can't truly get the measure of a player until they're in house. Luckily we struck gold with guys like Carr, Ingram, Campbell, and Peters.

Earl Thomas will go down in Ravens' FA history as the reverse Tony Jefferson.