Here we go, the throw down for the ages, the battle of the brothers, the Harbowl, which to me sounds like you're saying hair ball with a thick southern drawl, but I digress. We have two of the best defenses in the NFL today as well as the most athletic quarterback to start in a Super Bowl in NFL history. The Ravens come in with the best defensive player of the last decade, one of the best Linebackers of all time, and a guaranteed first ballot Hall of Famer in Ray Lewis. The Matchup of the night will be Kaepernick against Ray Lewis and Ed Reed, if Kaepernick can beat them consistently the 49ers should win this game.
For the Ravens to be successful on offense they need to forget everything they know about offense and throw the ball. The offense has to go through Joe Flacco and Anquan Boldin if they want to have a chance. The biggest matchup for the Ravens will be their offensive line against Aldon and Justin Smith and Ahmad Brooks. If Michael Oher and Bryan McKinnie can shut down Brooks and Aldon Smith they will be off to good start. The Ravens will have to throw on the sidelines for the most success as the 49ers weakest link is their secondary. They are not that bad but they are worse than the rest of the defense, and the easiest to exploit. If they can get the ball to Anquan Boldin and Torrey Smith on the outside they could open up the middle for throws to the Tight End, Dennis Pitta and get Ray Rice some running room.
The biggest thing the 49ers have to do is neutralize Terrell Suggs and Haloti Ngata and keep them out of the backfield. They also will want to shut down the deep pass and force Flacco to stay patient and check it down, Flacco is bound to try and force something eventually and give the 49ers defense a chance to make a play on the ball. If Kaepernick is allowed to get out of the pocket the Ravens could be in for a long game. The biggest threat the 49ers have is the read option plays out of the pistol as the Ravens cannot simply play Kaepernick as the Falcons showed us last week when they got gashed by Frank Gore and LaMichael James.
The Pistol will make the Ravens have to do something they don't very well, play restrained and disciplined defense. They will not be able to feed off of the emotion of Ray Lewis's last game as much because if they are out of position at any point they will be in danger of giving up a big run. If they start to overplay the run they'll be in danger of getting gashed by the play action however, so they have to remain disciplined at all times. If the Pistol can keep the Ravens off balance the way I think it will then the 49ers will win this game.
Final Score Prediction
Ravens 23 (Flacco pass TD, Rice rush TD, early defensive TD)
49ers 35 (Kaepernick 2 Pass TD, 1 Rush TD, Gore Rush TD, pick six off of Flacco to ice the game)
As much as I'm pulling for Ray Lewis I just can't see Flacco not screwing this up. Kaepernick becomes the first of the the read option quarterbacks to win a super bowl and ushers in the beginning of the era of the Pistol Offense in the NFL.
what the hell ......ravens got this all the way son
ReplyDeleteI hope so, pulling for Ray Lewis, I just feel that the option schemes the 49ers run could be the Ravens undoing as their defense runs off of pure aggression and emotion more than off of playing disciplined. Also I have a hard time believing in Joe Flacco.
DeleteThey have a very disciplined D. How do you Stop Brady and Manning? My only fear is the power run game. It will be running into the teeth of the D which will churn up TOP and wear down the D. Then again, they did play like 240 snaps in three weeks and still managed to keep two teams who ran the ball well at the end of the season in check. Not to mention they had HOF QBs.
ReplyDeleteWith Brady and Manning you can be more agressive because you know they aren't going to take off with the ball. If you get pressure up the middle against Peyton or Tom they'll dump it off or throw it away at best. Against Kaepernick he can outrun the guy to the boundary and either throw it or find a seam to run for a huge gain.
DeleteYou're putting to much faith into a style of QB that is hit or miss. The Ravens coaching staff can adjust. The only real losses for the Ravens came at the hands of Texans and Broncos where they decimated them with the run game and timely passing. If the 9ers were smart they would most certainly use the big bodies early and often for Gore. Those two games the Ravens were also short a Ray Lewis. Right now both teams are hot and it's the team who stays more disciplined will come out on top. Jim is a hot head, and his players are falling in love with thier own brief legend, mainly Kap. Kap's swagger will be tested, crumble and the Ravens will prevail. I'm predicting 31-14 Ravens. To each their own though, hell, even the guys on NFL.com mostly got it wrong. Kimberly Jones and Steve Wyche I believe are the only two to correctly predict the SB
DeleteI'm not putting faith in Kaepernicks running ability, I'm putting it in the scheme that between Gore and Colin they will be able to destroy them with the running game. Kap's a lot more humble than people give him credit for.
DeleteFlacco has matured and he will not attempt to do things he knows he can't do. He will have some big plays as he normally does and avoid turnovers as the Ravens will run a fairly balanced offense. Ravens O vs SF D is a known quantity, so based on what SF has given up on D so far in playoffs & what Bal has scored in playoffs, Ravens should score about 24 pts.
ReplyDeleteThe real question is how the SF read-option does against this vaunted BUT aging Ravens D. It's possible that Kap & the offense goes crazy and has the type of explosion it did against the Pack, win, and in effect revolutionize the game once and for all. On the other hand, Kaepernick has yet to face a defense as good as the Ravens D so far. If SF scored 28 against the Falcons, Ravens may be able to hold them even lower. So far if you don't include Denver's two special teams TD's, Ravens have given up no more than 21 pts. I'm not sold on the read-option overcoming football precedents yet, and I concur w/the first "Anonymous" on what the Ravens have already done to two HOF QB's. So I'm leaning Ravens right now.
Flacco has matured but he still scares me to death in the big game, earlier this season he was screwing up royally. I think the 49ers score around 28 on offense and that will be more than they give up to the Ravens. I hope I'm wrong because I really like Ray Lewis, but as it stands now I think Kaepernick does what Brady and Peyton can't do, run, and wins the super bowl.
DeleteWhy in the world do you write like you have ADHD. Ok jokes aside, but you go from one team, to the next sentence to another team, then back to the other, and so on. It's chaotic in there. My point being most readers will get boggled down trying to figure out which team you talking about, rather than having them split up in neat sections; one or two paragraphs long.
ReplyDeleteI agree 49ers win, and Kaep ushers in new era. This is my first time at this blog. For those who wish to levy opprobrious attacks my way, come with your full word-hoard, ok... Yes, I'm sort of a expert, at least in training. This is just helpful advice sir.
Hahaha good luck finding someone to levy opprobrious attacks your way. I agree that this article could have been organized better, but I feel like it came out pretty good and I appreciate the advice.
ReplyDeleteKaepernick ushers in a new era regardless of who wins this game in my opinion because you still have RGIII, Cam, Tebow, and even backups like Josh Johnson and Tyrod Taylor who can all run this style of offense to some extent. Heck you even have Brad Smith still holding on by a thread up in Buffalo.