The Baltimore Ravens have focused their team around Lamar Jackson on offense and Roquan Smith on defense, and they’ve given both players big contracts.
This means they have to be careful with spending in other areas.
“You can’t have 10 players making $20 million a year. You just can’t do it on a $258 million salary cap,” said general manager Eric DeCosta. “Every team has a different approach — how they pay players and what they value.
We try to be balanced and pay our top players as much as we can, knowing that sometimes we can’t keep everyone. If we could, the roster would look different. But it’s not, and we understand that. It is tough to let good players go, but that’s the business we’re in.”
DeCosta spoke with reporters on Thursday, a week before Baltimore’s season opener at Kansas City.
It was a difficult offseason for the Ravens. They did manage to sign running back Derrick Henry and extend receiver Rashod Bateman.
Baltimore also gave defensive lineman Justin Madubuike a new contract, but they lost linebacker Patrick Queen and edge rusher Jadeveon Clowney. They also lost three starters from the offensive line.
The Ravens are trying to fill those offensive line spots with players already on the team, with guards Andrew Vorhees and Daniel Faalele possibly stepping up. They also drafted tackle Roger Rosengarten in the second round.
“You just simply can’t pay everybody, and we decided to go young on the offensive line as best as we could,” DeCosta said. “We’ve had a lot of success developing offensive linemen before. I could list many players we drafted or even picked up from other teams who became good for us.”
