Knee-Jerk Reactions: Ravens 30 Bears 16

The Ravens kept their season alive with a 30-16 win over the Chicago Bears in Week 8, behind backup quarterback Tyler Huntley.

Russell Street Report staff react to the win here.

Chris Schisler

Hey victory, how have things been? I missed you. The Ravens played a good game. There were issues – some of them familiar, but this was the type of effort you expect from the Ravens. That’s a very positive start to getting back into the right direction. Tyler Huntley was phenomenal. You can’t ask for more from a backup (maybe he should have been in there sooner, but hey you only heard it from an entire spoiled fanbase).

Defense means something in Baltimore and that’s evident again. Zach Orr called a good game; give him credit. The pressure, particularly from blitzes up the middle blinded Caleb Williams in key moments. If the Ravens play with this kind of energy and the MVP comes back, there is hope.

It’s not exciting being 2-5 but I’ll take it. The season is still alive.

Chad Racine

Are the Ravens back? They’re certainly not the abysmal Ravens we’re accustomed to so far this season. A balanced solid game on both sides of the ball. After the first drive I was ready to accept the same thing we’ve been seeing this season. Very glad to see I was wrong.

Defense has stepped up in a big way and played with heart. Mike Green with a very impressive first sack, Kyle Hamilton with another sack, interception by Nate Wiggins and big plays by others such as Roquan Smith, Travis Jones, and Marlon Humphrey. The bye has rejuvenated the team. This could create the momentum and belief in themselves they needed. Winning cures a lot of problems.

The offense has also turned a corner with Tyler Huntley igniting the fire they needed. Another fire in the offense is they finally let Keaton Mitchell get involved in the offense. I have been screaming for that all season. Look what happens when you let an explosive player such as Mitchell touch the ball. We better see more of that the rest of the season.

I’ll be at the Miami game on Thursday where I expect we’ll continue to see a much improved team.

Nick Polinsky

It feels so nice to finally be back in the win column. This was the cleanest game the Ravens played all year by far. Just six penalties and most importantly no turnovers.

Tyler Huntley was basically perfect. No glaring misses and he looked very comfortable in control of the offense. I thought Todd Monken called a great game with a nice mix of pass and run and it worked very well.

The defense played well, though they still did struggle to get pressure at certain times. Regardless for a struggling defense this is an important stepping stone to keep building off of.

The Ravens will have a chance to win their second game in five days and if they do, maybe we can get this thing rollin’.

Rob Shields

Huge win.  Maybe season turning.

All the Lamar practice drama bs aside, this is what the team needed.  They got healthy and were able to win with a backup QB.  This week was different than other backup QB games because they were healthy everywhere, which is different than what we saw against the Rams and Texans.

Now, it means nothing if you lose to Miami, who looked very good today.  But you need to go win that game and then the season looks completely different and maybe you go make a trade to help the defensive line.

Jared Pinder

The butterfly effect on this game is insane. If Williams doesn’t play like poop all game, the Ravens season ends on an awful note. From the drama leaking out after yesterday’s debacle with Lamar this had to be a win for the Ravens. All things considered I thought Monken called a good enough game today. Yes there were still some red zone issues, but he was able to put up thirty points with a backup quarterback. As for Zach Orr and the defense, I still don’t think he was terrific, I just think Caleb Williams had some awful turnovers that made Orr look good.

For better or worse the ravens saved their season for now, but this long uphill battle can’t end today.

Will Lamar play Thursday? Was the defense just helped out by a terrible game from Chicago? When will they actually help this O-Line not play like garbage? Most importantly, what in the world happened the last two days that led to Huntley playing today?

These questions will have to be answered soon with a short week and a trip to Miami.

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