Is Center Ethan Pocic a Fit in Baltimore?

For months now, the center position at 1 Winning Drive has felt like a game of musical chairs – only someone forgot to bring the chairs. Tyler Linderbaum took the Raiders’ three-year, $81 million offer — $60 million guaranteed — and headed for the desert. GM Eric DeCosta admitted after the draft that center remains “a position in a state of flux,” noting the board didn’t fall the right way to address it in April.

Problem unsolved – until yesterday. Maybe.

The football gods may have just tossed Eric a lifeline. Per ESPN’s Adam Schefter, former Browns starting center Ethan Pocic, who tore his Achilles last December, was recently cleared by Dr. Norman Waldrop to participate in training camp, and a source describes him as a “full go.”

So, the question Ravens fans should be asking: does the big man from LSU fit what Dwayne Ledford wants to do up front?

The Scheme Fit

Ledford is an outside-zone teacher who preaches speed off the ball, and his track record with the Falcons speaks for itself — when Atlanta lost its starting center to free agency, Ledford elevated Ryan Neuzil, who finished as PFF’s sixth-highest graded center, one spot behind Linderbaum. The man develops pivots. He adjusts.

As for Pocic, he has spent the last four years living in a zone-blocking world in Cleveland, and the analytics people took notice. Since moving to center in 2020, Pocic’s PFF grade increased each season, peaking at a career-high 78.9 in 2022. At 6’6″, he’s an unusually tall center, but the tape and the grades say he moves well enough laterally to live on the stretch plays Ledford will feed Derrick Henry. He isn’t Linderbaum — nobody on this roster is — but he’s a professional who has made a living reaching defensive tackles and climbing to linebackers in a zone scheme. That’s a fit for the job opening in Baltimore.

Compare that to the in-house options. Danny Pinter has appeared in 77 NFL games with just 10 starts, Jovaughn Gwyn brings three years under Ledford in Atlanta but precious little game action, and Corey Bullock spent last season as Linderbaum’s backup. Pocic has started 97 of 114 career regular-season games. That’s not a competition; that’s a professional veteran walking into a room full of interns.

What PFF Says

In 2022, only Kansas City’s Creed Humphrey graded higher than Pocic among all NFL centers, and in a Halloween win over the Bengals, Pocic graded out as the best player on the field for either team at 94.0.

Heading into last season, PFF noted that across the previous three seasons Pocic had produced a top-10 overall grade at the position (74.8) and a fifth-ranked PFF WAR total (0.74) among centers, ranking him the No. 12 center in football entering 2025. The most recent data is more middling — Pocic earned a 63.8 overall PFF grade in 2025, 20th among 40 qualified centers, allowing 14 pressures, 2 sacks but just 2 penalties across 826 snaps. At the end of the day, “20th of 40” would still represent a massive upgrade over an undrafted free agent or a career backup snapping to the franchise quarterback.

Couldn’t be happier for a guy that worked his ass off to become a starter after being signed as a backup in 2022

While he struggled in pass pro- Ethan Pocic is still one of the best run blocking centers in the NFL

Teams would be lucky to have him pic.twitter.com/S4i9rOIuLU

— Mac (@tha_buffalo) July 15, 2026

What Would Pocic Cost?

Here’s where it gets fun for a GM who counts cap dollars in a way that might trigger the envy of Ebenezer Scrooge. Pocic is coming off a three-year, $18 million contract, and Spotrac projected his market value at $10.6 million annually — roughly a three-year, $31.8 million deal. But that projection was pre-clearance, back when the Achilles was still a giant question mark. Per Over The Cap, Pocic has earned $26.8 million in his career — he’s not desperate, but a soon-to-be 31-year-old center coming off a ruptured Achilles in mid-July isn’t likely to command $10 million a year, either. The realistic play is a one-year, incentive-laden prove-it deal, likely in the low single-digit millions with per-game roster bonuses and playing-time escalators. That’s Eric DeCosta’s love language.

The Achilles Question

There’s no denying that an Achilles rupture is a brutal injury for a 320-pound man who makes his living driving off his back foot. Pocic suffered the injury in December, leaving a relatively short runway to training camp, and getting cleared by a specialist of Dr. Waldrop’s caliber represents a significantly faster and cleaner recovery timeline than many similar injuries produce.

But if you want a reason for optimism, look no further than Brandon Brooks. The Eagles’ right guard tore his Achilles in the divisional-round playoff loss to the Saints in January 2019, returned for the 2019 regular season in September, and was named to his third straight Pro Bowl that December. By November of that comeback season, Brooks had played 618 snaps with one penalty and zero sacks allowed. After one dominant game against the Bears, he graded out on Pro Football Focus as the best lineman in the NFL — better after the tear than before it. So, big men can come all the way back from this injury. Brooks proved it.

The Bottom Line

Baltimore led the league at 5.3 yards per carry last season, but Lamar Jackson was sacked 36 times in 13 games. The tackles are set, Vega Ioane is a beast, and Ledford is the right teacher. What’s missing is a grown-up in the middle — someone Lamar can trust with the protection calls come September. Ethan Pocic won’t make anyone forget No. 64. But a proven zone-scheme center with a first-team All-America pedigree, a top-two PFF season on his resume, and a clean bill of health, available at a discount in July?

Pocic doesn’t represent a luxury signing, folks. He is more like a needed suitcase for the journey of the 2026 NFL Season.

It’s time to pack.

Your move, Eric.

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