Lamar Jackson and the Ravens stunned the league last year on their way to the best regular-season record in the league. Coming into the season, there were a lot of questions about how this team would perform after they flopped against the Chargers in the playoffs the previous season. Lamar and company wasted no time in proving the doubters wrong as they scored eight touchdowns week one and finished the season as the highest-scoring team. The Ravens were full of fantasy stars as they had a top-five QB, TE, K, D/ST, and Mark Ingram finished the season as RB11 (sat out week 17 otherwise would have finished top 10). The Ravens are bringing back the majority of the offense and are expected to draft a receiver or two in the upcoming draft to give more help to Lamar in the passing game.
Lamar Jackson was QB1 by a mile last season, as he averaged over 6 more points per game than the second quarterback. He had double the amount of rushing yards than any other QB and still only lost two fumbles all season. This past season, Jackson broke Michael Vick's single-season rushing record for a quarterback, so there might be some doubt that he can duplicate his performance and be QB1 again if he's not as productive on the ground next year. Jackson had 415 points this year and a big part of that was his 1200 yards rushing and 7 rushing touchdowns. If you deducted the 7 rushing touchdowns from his 415 points, he would still have had 36 more points than the next closest quarterback. If you want to take it one step further, you can deduct half of Lamar's rushing yards. That would bring his total down to 313 points, which would have finished as QB4 on the season. Not bad for a quarterback who is still often looked at as a rushing quarterback with bad accuracy. Lamar Jackson is in a similar situation that Patrick Mahomes was in a year ago. He had such a remarkable 2018 season that it seemed only an injury would prevent him from being QB1 again, which was only half true. The difference between the two arguments is the rushing figures. Lamar holds such a higher risk than most quarterbacks because of the number of times he carries the ball, but if he stays healthy there is no way he finishes worse than QB5. Lamar will probably be drafted in the second or third round of drafts and, although that's usually too early to draft a quarterback, with his rushing ability he's a league winner if he stays healthy.
The Ravens running attack is led by Mark Ingram who had a great first year in Baltimore and seems to fit perfectly alongside Lamar. Ingram averaged 5 yards per rush, which was only trailing Derrick Henry among backs with more than 200 carries. Despite having to share carries with Lamar, Mark Ingram is still the clear goalline option as he had 10 rushing touchdowns last season, which was good for seventh in the league. Early projections look like Ingram is around RB20 and projected to be drafted late round five or later, which is amazing to me. There are a lot of young backs in the league that have the potential to blow up this year and some definitely will, but if you can get the starting running back for a team who ran the ball nearly 600 times last year in round four or five you can't pass that up. Also, Gus Edwards is a must-own handcuff or a nice late-round draft stash. He's one of only three players to average five yards per carry each of the last two seasons (Chubb and Breida), so if Ingram happens to get injured Edwards would instantly become an RB2.
Baltimore's receiving core is almost non-existent. The only fantasy relevant receiving names currently on the Ravens roster are Mark Andrews and Marquise Brown, who are both young guys with lots of potential. Marquise Brown made his NFL debut week one against the Miami Dolphins, where he had four catches for 147 yards and two touchdowns. He went on to finish the season with more catches than both the second and third receivers combined. He's been seen working with Lamar this offseason which is always a good thing to see, so they can get their timing down. Hollywood Brown is currently being projected around WR35 to WR40 and going in round 7 or later. Brown was very boom or bust his rookie season, but with only two games scoring above 20 points and eight games of scoring under eight points, he was more bust than boom. Brown's speed and the lack of wide receiver competition in Baltimore makes him a little appealing, but the inconsistency and lack of targets are why you should pass on Brown. With that being said, his rookie season stat line of 46/584/7 is very close to Tyreek Hill's rookie season (61/593/6), so if you think he can find ways to capitalize on his speed as Hill does then he will be the steal of the draft.
Mark Andrews finished last season as the fifth-best tight end and was the only one with double-digit touchdowns. Andrews nearly doubled his production from his rookie season and if he takes another leap this year, he could quickly find himself in the conversation for the best tight end in the league. Lamar broke the record for rushing yards last year and he still managed to target Andrews enough to make him a top-five TE. If the Ravens decide to change the offensive gameplan this year to protect Jackson and throw the ball more Andrews will be the main beneficiary. He has a lot of upside and is the number one option in the passing game, but his projected draft position of round four is a little too high for my liking. His ten receiving touchdowns were more than everyone not named Kenny Golladay and with only 64 catches total, I find it hard to believe he will duplicate those redzone numbers. I'm staying away from Mark Andrews and the rest of this passing offense and either taking Kelce or Kittle early or waiting until later in the draft.
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