How the Ravens Have Changed Since the 49ers Last Faced Them

The last time the 49ers and Ravens faced each other, four years ago, Baltimore had a different offense and quarterback Lamar Jackson.

Greg Roman, the 49ers offensive coordinator under Jim Harbaugh, was the offensive coordinator for the Ravens back then. Roman is widely known among Niners.

His scheme has an incredibly complex, multi-layered running game that covers every conceivable idea, and a passing game that is remarkably straightforward for an NFL offense.

For a few years, before teams caught up, Colin Kaepernick worked well with Roman’s system. Jackson is such a powerful and explosive rusher that Roman’s approach helped him earn the MVP Award in 2019.

But eventually, defenses caught up to what Roman was doing in Baltimore, too. Defenses always catch up with Roman, because he runs a gimmicky system.

It’s not sophisticated enough in the pass game, and the NFL is a passing league. So the Ravens fired Roman and replaced him with Todd Monken, who is a passing specialist.

Suddenly, Monken has simplified the Ravens overly-complex run game, and it’s still one of the best ground attacks in the league.

In addition, Monkey has greatly improved the Ravens’ play-action passing game and drop-back passing game, and challenged Jackson to improve as a passer.

This is the evolution Jackson needs. He doesn’t need a coordinator who focuses on his rushing ability — Jackson can run effectively no matter what the play designer draws up.

What he needs is a coordinator who pushes him to grow as a passer, just as Andy Reid pushed Michael Vick to grow as a passer in Philadelphia.

So when the 49ers face Jackson on Christmas Night, shutting him down won’t be as simple as defending scrambles and zone reads. They’ll have to defend a pocket passer as well.

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