Ravens News 8/5: Franchise value and more

NFL should scrap the schedule it originally planned for 2020 and do this instead - John Breech

Regular season

The first big change here is that the regular season will only be 12 games long. Another major change here is that AFC-NFC matchups will be completely scrapped from the schedule because it doesn’t make sense to have those games during a shortened season.

Week 1 thru Week 7: Division games only. Every team will play each divisional opponent twice for a total of six games. Although this can be done in six weeks, there are seven weeks here for contingency purposes. More importantly, the bye week could also be used to make up any games that were postponed due to coronavirus.

Weeks 8-14: One advantage of being a bad team is that you get a last place schedule, and although my proposed season will only be 12 games long, I think it makes sense to keep the integrity of the last place schedule intact. With that in mind, the second set of six games will look like this: All first and second place teams from 2019 will play all other first and second place teams in their conference while all third and fourth place teams will play all the other third and fourth place teams.

Postseason

This is going to sound crazy, but in this revamped format, TWENTY-FOUR teams are going to make the playoffs. The NHL is having a 24-team playoff and it makes sense. If you’re taking away regular season games, teams don’t have a full season to prove themselves, so you should open up the playoffs to more teams.

Week 17 (Jan. 2-4): Welcome to the second round of playoffs. The top four seeds in each conference will play in this round after getting two weeks off.

Mark Ingram Believes Year 10 Could Be His Best - Clifton Brown

“This is my 10th season and I’ve never seen a team that didn’t either bring in a running back or draft a running back,” Ingram said. “That’s the norm. So, it didn’t surprise me. I think that it was the high-value pick right there. I don’t think many people thought he would be there.

“I’m not necessarily surprised. We run the ball a lot, we put emphasis on running the ball. So, being able to have our backfield – me, Gus, Justice, add J.K. to the mix, I think it’s an elite backfield [with] guys who I think can start anywhere in this league. We’ll be competing. We’ll be working together to have the best rushing attack again.”

“We didn’t finish how we wanted,” Ingram said. “We wanted to be champions. That’s the standard here, nothing less – it’s championship mentality.

“I just try to do everything necessary to make sure I’m bringing my complete package to the table and have my best season in my 10th season. That’s what I worked on, and I’m thankful to everybody who helped me.”

Ravens strength coach: Hollywood Brown ‘got after it’ this offseason - Todd Karpovich

Ravens’ strength and conditioning coach Steve Saunders was impressed by Brown’s offseason work.

“Hollywood was in and out early on, but it’s really … He took it upon himself to … It must’ve just clicked for him this offseason, really, to get healthy, to start eating right, to start training harder,” Saunders said. “And last year, he dealt with some things and it was his rookie year. He got through it, but I give him so much credit for, really, using this time – as well as all the other guys.

“It would’ve been really easy to sit in the sofa the past four months and do nothing,” Saunders said, “and I think we can all ask ourselves that, ‘Have we really utilized the past four months of this pandemic time?’ I think to ‘Hollywood’s’ credit, he got after it; he got after it a couple of hours a day. I saw him in the hall and I’m excited to take where he’s at now and keep building on that, just like the other guys, and keep going.”

Ravens’ Miles Boykin makes list of NFL’s breakout candidates, one teammate earns honorable mention - Aaron Kasinitz

Boykin took the No. 6 spot in a ranking of the Top 25 prospects in 2020, defined as under-the-radar young players who could break out this season. Players were eligible if they were drafted after the second round or entered the NFL as an undrafted free agent sometimes since the start 2017. The list also discounted players with more than 500 career snaps on offense or defense.

“The college production shows Boykin as a touchdown machine, with 11 in 77 career college targets at Notre Dame,” Rivers McCown of Football Outsiders wrote. “Lamar Jackson is a much more accurate quarterback when targeting the middle of the field right now, and Boykin is mostly going to be a perimeter operator in an offense that already has plenty of mouths to feed. That doesn’t mean Boykin won’t offer a lot of value: He caught 10 of 15 targets from Jackson on the outside last year for 166 yards.”

Baltimore Ravens drop to No. 32 on Forbes’ ranking of most valuable sports franchises - Jessica Iannetta

The Baltimore Ravens dropped three spots on Forbes’ most recent ranking of the world’s most valuable sports franchises, despite increasing in worth by an estimated $160 million over the past year.

The Ravens came in at no. 32 on the annual list with a value of $2.75 billion, up 6% from $2.59 billion last year, according to the publication. This is the second year in a row the Ravens have dropped in the rankings, after falling from no. 27 to no. 29 last year. Forbes notes that owner Stephen Bisciotti — one of just three billionaires in the region — bought the team in 2004 for $600 million.

The rival Pittsburgh Steelers jumped two spots to come in ahead of the Ravens at no. 28, with a value of $2.8 billion.

The top of the list has stayed relatively unchanged for several years now, with the Dallas Cowboys taking the no. 1 spot for the fifth year in row with a valuation of $5.5 billion. They were followed by the New York Yankees, valued at $5 billion, and the New York Knicks with a value of $4.6 billion.