Lamar Jackson takes pressure off Derrick Henry in Ravens offense | Pro Football Talk | NFL on NBC

Chris Jones will be in the building for the Chiefs and they'll need him because as you mentioned Derk Henry who played for the Titans his entire career he's now joined the fry and one of the big criticisms of the Ravens from the AFC Championship they only ran the ball 11 times I got a feeling that with Derrick Henry back there they probably will run the ball more than 11 times on Thursday night here's derck Henry on whether he wished he could have been around for the Ravens to help that ground game that never really got going in the AFC title game in January hell yeah I I was I was I could suit up that day watching that game um but yeah uh but now it's my turn so you know got toh take advantage of it it's going to be hell of a game I mean at the end of the day it's just football I've been playing since I was 5 years old but the atmosphere and um you know it being the first game at night you know them coming off a Super Bowl that being at home at Arrowhead which you know the environment is going to be loud it's going to be um it's going to be hostile but that's what you want I mean especially on opening night you know everybody watching the first game of the year to kickoff the 2024 season so I'm excited um it's going to be fun so I'm looking forward to it Derrick Henry is I think the closest thing we've seen to Jim Brown in the modern game the way he runs you give him a couple of yards he's got a head of steam and he he he just will blow through you knock you down with a stiff arm Etc but he is 30 I wasn't sure whether or not he was 30 he turned 30 in January he's got a lot of wear and tear 2030 rushing attempts another 155 touches in the passing game 9500 rushing yards 5,000 yard seasons one 2,000 yard season in 2020 and I think back to Eddie George who was a great member of the Titans and again this is something you and I might have discussed cuz I can't remember who the hell the co-host is on any given day but with Eddie with Eddie George the wheels never really came off with one big incident it just kind of got to the point where couldn't do it anymore and I just wonder because it's going to happen for everyone who's playing in the NFL and the closer you are to the action the more banged up you're going to be and you're just going to get to the point where it's like all those guys are faster than me all those guys are stronger than me I don't know what's gone on yeah what's gone on is a career of playing football and getting banged around remember the knock on and it's still there for Alabama running backs under Nick Sabin they get chewed up and spit out by him how intense he is at practice and how he uses him in games there was always a concern that Derrick Henry wasn't going to have tread on the tire when he got to the NFL and here we are he's at age 30 which is like you know 50 or 60 God forbid for a for a running back I I just wonder whether whether it's a little faulty to assume we're taking Derk Henry Titans and plugging him in and he's going to be the exact same guy I hope he is he's fun to watch and I hope that he's able to Stave it off but we know from experience that with running backs you know it can change for Frank Gore it didn't for Adrien Peterson it didn't at least not until deeper into his 30s for Derrick Henry we're about to find out well yeah and look I think what the the two interesting elements that are on that graph that we were just showing F can put that back up I mean if you look at the yards per carry for Derrik Henry last year it was a 4.2 right and so even though he was second in the league in rushing he didn't even make it to 12200 yards and so when you've got somebody who had the most attempts in rushing you know 280 and he only had 1,167 yards that to me says lot about the state of rushing in the NFL but it also says something either about the offensive line or what was going on with Derrik Henry in terms of where his physicality is and how he can still be productive in terms of where we are in the NFL today so that also could say something about the offensive line you know so it's interesting because when you have Lamar Jackson and you have Derrick Henry at the same time I mean that is an absolute nightmare for teams that have to defend you in short yardage situations I mean if it is third and one third and two I I just I don't know what you're going to do to stop that because all they got to do is go Zone re and you know if you overplay Derk Henry then Lamar Jackson is going to take the ball and he's going to go for 10 yards if you try to play Just Lamar Jackson then boy you better be strong at the point of attack and Derrick Henry because you're not g to stop him for just one or two yards most the time I mean it's just not going to happen so that's it it really presents a lot of challenges for defenses and I think it takes some pressure off of Derrick Henry for sure if he is playing in the same backfield as Lamar Jackson I think that alone should make him a little bit more productive when it comes to yards per carry I mean if he's not at at least four and a half then we do then that's when I would say okay yeah the the the physical cliff you know the father time that's what's really come for Derek herry if he's not averaging four and a half yards a car the 4.2 matches a career low it was back in 2017 when he was sharing touches with DeMarco Murray and hadn't fully blossomed into a Workhorse tailback his best two seasons 2019 and 2020 when he had 1540 yards and 2027 respectively in 2019 he averaged 5.1 yards per carry in 2020 he averaged 5.4 yards per carry so that really is going to be one of the issues and has it been offensive line is it quality of quarterback play there's a lot of factors that go into how many yards a running back is going to gain when he gets the ball in his hands but that's one of the big questions that we're going to resolve starting tomorrow night what Derk Henry is going to look like as a member of the Baltimore Ravens how he's going to perform in that offense and I I'm just inclined to bet the over in my own mind because I just want to see Derrick Henry play like we've seen Derrick Henry play it's fitting because you know he's kind of playing for Jim Brown's Brown I knew you were going to do this I knew you going to do this don't you dare stop it stop it stop it I'm not gonna I'm not going to let you sit here and talk about the Ravens which are technically an expansion franchise and they do not have the name image likeness colors of the Browns if you really want to talk about who's the successor to 32 is number 24 for the Cleveland Browns and his name is Nick chub and he is one of the only players the only players who continues to average over five yards per carry this far into his career so don't even don't even go there with me Mike I'm not uhuh no way no way don't don't do it we can quibble about how the Ravens and Browns came to be but you can't call the Ravens and expansion franchise because there was an existing franchise that just happened happened to have an address in Northeast Ohio that relocated to Baltimore with all the teams with all the Personnel in the front office with all the coaches except Bill bich who they fired and who get I think it's the Browns that get accused of firing bill bellich from time to time it's like no wasn't the Browns anymore when Bill bich got fired right it that is correct it was the unnamed Baltimore franchise I'm glad that you pointed that out because so many people get that wrong and it's not fair that the Browns did not fire Bill bich Art Modell did yeah great owner he was all right you know I hope that made you feel better cuz it made me feel pretty good to point that out and that was I always look for the gratuitous opportunity to point out that the Ravens are the old Browns and the Browns are the new Browns that were the expansion team from 1999 so I was just I was glad that that came along and it took me a while for the synapses to fire but it happened okay you have a chance to win $1 million in the NBC sweep Stakes on Yahoo fantasy just download the redesign Yahoo fantasy app or go to nbcsports.com fantasy million for additional details what are you waiting for hi it's Mike Florio thanks for watching PFT on YouTube hit subscribe for the latest news and Analysis from pro football talk