Will The Dark Knight Finally Rise in Baltimore?

The 2024 NFL Draft is in the books. The Baltimore Ravens had a critical weekend to hit on several key areas of their team to come away with possible starters and bolster their overall depth. All signs point to a successful draft – at least in my mind. They came away with a cover corner in Nate Wiggins who has the upside to be among the best; a starting tackle candidate for RT with the flexibility to play LT in Roger Rosengarten; and a pass-rusher in Adisa Isaac who is disruptive and explosive. 

In Round 4, the Ravens drafted the first wide receiver of the class – Devontez “Tez” Walker from North Carolina. 

Had they not signed Rashod Bateman to a contract extension the day before, would General Manager Eric DeCosta been more aggressive to target a receiver earlier?

My guess is yes. Be that as it may, Bateman got his new deal, and for the Ravens’ sake, it gave them clarity going into the draft. It also squashed the need to make a decision on picking up his fifth-year option, which looked like a legitimate tough call and loomed large. 

Over $14 million for a player who has never topped 600 yards receiving seems absurd. But that’s the market today. It’s a market in which Gabriel Davis and Darnell Mooney just received deals worth $13 million per season. 

However, the team and Bateman agreed to give it another shot, despite what has been a rocky start to his career as a former first-round pick.

Remember when Rashod was drafted?

The consensus was the team finally got their guy from that 2021 class. He looked like the alpha they had been looking for. The former Minnesota Gopher is as tight and clean of a prospect as I could think of – crafty route runner, release variation, advanced understanding of space and leverage, explosive after the catch. A bigger receiver with electric footwork and stop/start ability. I likened him to Keenan Allen. Generally receivers aren’t so smooth with their technique before they are coached up at the NFL level.

All of the talent was there, on display, but injuries really robbed the pass catcher of any momentum he could have gained as a starter.

In 2021, he missed the first five games of the season after suffering a groin injury in training camp. In 2022, he suffered a Lisfranc injury which eventually forced him to miss over 10 games that season. The Lisfranc can be devastating to wideouts especially given they have to rely so much on their foot for explosion and breakaway speed.

2022 was by far the worst of it because Bateman started that season like the Human Torch. His first 3 games of the season, he averaged over 75 yards, scored 2 TDs and caught three passes for gains 30+ yards, including a 75-yard TD. He showed off big-play ability, which wasn’t his most prominent trait during his college career — run-after-the-catch explosiveness.

RASHOD. BATEMAN.

Ravens go up 14-7 over the Dolphins

(via @NFL)pic.twitter.com/hJpkxNx1pj

— Sports Illustrated (@SInow) September 18, 2022

Once the foot injury occurred, Bateman wasn’t the same, and that seemed to carry over into 2023. Although he went through all the off-season steps to make it back by the start of the season, he never quite looked as explosive as in 2022 and was mostly gutting it out. 

That didn’t, however, stop him from being one of the best separators in the NFL in 2023. In December, according to Pro Football Focus, Bateman was the best in the league at getting separation on all routes. 

Despite how often he was getting open, the fourth-year receiver wasn’t getting targeted. And the reality is quarterback Lamar Jackson might not have always trusted “Bate.” They had an obvious lack of chemistry at times that led to missed plays and even turnovers. Whether that was on Bateman not running the right route or getting to the right depth – we don’t know for sure. Or perhaps that was Lamar not making the right read or misplacing the ball? Probably a combination of both factors. 

Final 2023 rankings for how well WRs separated and how they performed at the Catchpoint + YAC pic.twitter.com/RcXEPo24Kb

— Jrfortgang (@throwthedamball) January 11, 2024

Where do the Ravens and Bateman go from here?

It’s pretty obvious, despite all the early bumps in the road, DeCosta and head coach John Harbaugh are big believers in the talented wideout. DeCosta was on our friends’ UK Ravens podcast and said Bateman was his top choice for having a breakout season in 2023.

There were some who thought maybe all the praise was an attempt to drum up interest in Bateman to enhance his trade value. However, the team instead doubled down on their belief and extended him through 2026, locking him at the hip of Jackson and wide receiver Zay Flowers for three more seasons.

DeCosta has been vocal saying Bate and Zay will be the team’s starting receivers and the organization is excited for that. 

At his absolute worst, Bateman is a high-end No.3 in this league. The bar is really a No.2. And the upside could still be there for even more, which was always a true No. 1. 

What makes Bateman’s career trajectory so hard to map from here is that he’s an outlier. I took a look at all the WRs drafted in the first round since 2006. There are basically no other use cases like Bateman at this juncture, going into their fourth years. Either the WRs have already broken out by now or they were obvious busts. 

There are some closer comparisons. Jerry Jeudy for instance has never put up a 1,000 yard season so you could argue he’s been a disappointment. And now he’s on his second team. 

Brandon Aiyuk and Mike Williams had similar underwhelming starts in the first two seasons of their careers, but even those two put up better yardage production. In the case of Williams, he wasn’t even a starter. By their third year, they had over 1,000 yards.

That brings us to Bateman. The one thing you could say is that he hasn’t been fully healthy his entire career, so there is a valid argument to be made that his career has been more of an exception. 

How can Bateman get to that next level?

Aside from health, there are other reasons to like his chances to right the ship. 

For one, the team is fully committed to getting him more involved in the offense. Bateman was woefully under-targeted in 2023. But it’s also quite evident that’s because he was essentially splitting snaps with veteran Odell Beckham Jr. 

The two receivers rotated and offensive coordinator Todd Monken was also juggling playing time for Nelson Agholor. All of those receivers were vying for snaps and targets, and Monken also had tight end Mark Andrews to prioritize for the bulk of the season. 

Taking a step back, Bateman should not only get more chances, but it’s the types of targets he gets that will also matter for his production. He was used a lot as a field stretcher on clear out routes. And he was also targeted on vertical routes, which is where the lower-percentage misconnections happened with Jackson.

While Bateman can stretch the field, that’s not what he should be counted on, especially if the idea is to get him the ball more. He’s elite at creating space on underneath patterns and getting open quickly off the line. It’s incumbent that Jackson is able to get him the ball in rhythm and on time. 

What should help Bateman is the arrival of Walker, who is one of the best vertical threats from the class. 

Walker has center-fielder-like ball tracking ability, 4.3 speed and has a large catch radius. His vertical leaping ability is also special. He’s a bigger target who can fly. DeCosta compared Walker to Torrey Smith. That comparison also makes sense when you consider Smith was said to lack route-running refinement and diversity as a rookie from Maryland.

With Walker, the route tree was limited at North Carolina. He needs work. But he can be that vertical option in the offense who is tasked to take the top off the defense.

For Bateman, having Walker means he’s able to work the intermediate and underneath area of the field, along with Flowers. Although both WRs are also fully capable of making plays downfield, you could argue they function better all over and in space. Bateman is quite good after the catch and that may be even better for him with another offseason to recover from the Lisfranc. 

The job for Monken is quite simple – find ways to get Bateman the ball. Now there is a runway to make that happen. 

And for Bateman, he has what he needs from the team in the way of a financial and personnel commitment to finally put it all together. 

Time for Bateman to turn into the Dark Knight for the offense.

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