Washington Football Team: Defense gets timely wake-up call in blowout loss to Ravens

Should the Washington Football Team send out an apology for the performance they turned in on Saturday against the Baltimore Ravens?

Probably, but it was the final preseason game and hardly any one of the first-team regulars played, so we’ll let them off the hook.

When the fourth quarter game clock showed zeroes, Washington had mustered just 173 total yards of offense. Is that good?

For any fans who didn’t watch the game, all you need to know is that the Ravens won the time of possession battle 41:53 to 18:07. Let’s hope we never see a discrepancy like that at any point during the regular season.

We get everyone has bad days at the office, but we were especially taken aback by the showing (or lack thereof) from the Football Team’s defense.

Again, it’s duly noted that most of the starters didn’t see the field, but this loss might end up serving as the wake-up call Jack Del Rio and Co. needed.

The Football Team’s defense was humbled on Saturday night.

Think about it. Washington established themselves as a premier defense last season and the media spent the entire offseason hyping them up. There’s nothing wrong with a little reality check right before the start of the regular season.

After the Ravens’ opening drive, which stalled out thanks to a missed 40-yard field goal, they scored on five straight possessions. It would’ve been six had that FG not been botched. In other words, the Football Team’s defense offered very little resistance and did next to nothing to stop the bleeding.

We know Washington’s starters didn’t play — and the Ravens take the preseason a little too seriously — but that’s the kind of sluggish performance and result that could upend a team’s season.

Let’s also not pretend like Del Rio’s subs are scrubs. The Football Team’s defensive personnel is extremely deep, so they should’ve been able to hold their own against Tyler Huntley, who played all but one series and finished 24-of-33 (72.7%) for 285 yards and four (!) touchdowns.

Those numbers equate to a 138.3 passer rating and he also rushed for a score on one of his six carries. With all due respect to Huntley, by no means should Washington allow a quarterback who’s yet to throw a pass in the regular season account for five touchdowns, preseason or otherwise.

We haven’t even mentioned that the run defense allowed Baltimore to total 183 yards on the ground at 4.4 yards per tote. Eighty four of those came with hardly just a minute off the clock in the second quarter, so the Football Team really failed to set the tone in the trenches early on.

No, we aren’t overreacting to a preseason loss in which Ron Rivera benched all of his starters. We’re just hoping that Washington’s first-team defense learned a valuable lesson while they were watching their backups get steamrolled, and that is reputation and talent can only take you so far at this level.

Washington Football Team: Dax Milne bolsters roster case with beautiful sideline grab

Football Team receiver Dax Milne bolstered his case to make the 53-man roster with a beautiful catch near the sidelines against the Ravens.