In a year in which the teams from the AFC have more question marks than years past, the Ravens have one at quarterback. Opinions on whether or not Joe Flacco is good enough to bring the Ravens to the Super Bowl have varied greatly. If the Patriots had a decent defense, they would be the obvious choice to represent the AFC in the Super Bowl. They still have Tom Brady, but their defense is one of the worst in the NFL. As for the Ravens, their defense has been just fine. It’s their offense — led by Flacco — that has taken plenty of criticism. Clearly, Flacco has been bothered by it.
“If you look at the teams that won (the Superbowl in recent years), yeah you can look at the quarterbacks but that’s just because you guys, ESPN, everybody wants to pump them up as being the best quarterback that year,” Flacco said on Wednesday according to the Baltimore Sun. “It’s really going to come down to what team is the best. I’m sure if we win, I’ll have nothing to do with why we won according to you guys. It is what it is. We’re going to do our best to try to win it and it doesn’t really matter what the reason is.”
The Sun noted that Flacco never sounded combative during the interview and had a smile on his face, but clearly he has been bothered by the media this season. After all, this is not the first time he complained about the coverage the Ravens have received. Flacco then called the media out for wanting everyone to throw the ball all the time like Aaron Rodgers and Tom Brady do.
“You guys want everybody to be Aaron Rodgers and be Tom Brady, but you guys do realize, those guys’ (teams) don’t run the ball?” he asked. “If we try to do that, the criticism that we’d take around here would be ridiculous. We could win eight games like that and we could lose one and you guys would be like, ‘Oh man, what are you guys doing?’ This is what you guys said you wanted and if you lose one game, oh my God. You guys got to remember that. You guys want an elite quarterback. You have to stop complaining when we go out there and throw the ball 60 times a game.’”
The Patriots and Packers pass the ball so much because the strength of their offense is their quarterback. Whether it annoys Flacco or not, he is not the strength of the Ravens’ offense. Ray Rice should be their focal point 90% of the time, especially with a defense that plays as well as Baltimore’s. At the moment the Ravens have a chance to reach the Super Bowl by beating a couple of inconsistent AFC teams. Flacco should focus more on that and less on whether or not the media considers him to be elite.
Chest bump to Shutdown Corner for sharing the story with us
