With big contracts elsewhere, the Ravens chose to spend less on the offensive line this offseason

OWINGS MILLS, Md. (AP) — The Baltimore Ravens have built their roster around Lamar Jackson on offense and Roquan Smith on defense, and they’ve paid both players accordingly.

That means having to cut corners elsewhere.

“You can’t have 10 players making $20 million a year. You just can’t do it on a $258 million salary cap,” general manager Eric DeCosta said. “Every team operates with a different strategy — how they pay players, what’s important to them. We try to be balanced across the board, and we try to pay our best players as much as we can, understanding that sometimes we just can’t keep every single player. If we could, the roster would be different. But it’s not, and we understand that. It is challenging, sometimes, to let really good players leave, but that’s the business we’re in.”

DeCosta took questions from reporters Thursday, a week before Baltimore’s season opener at Kansas City. It was a tough offseason for the Ravens to navigate. They did manage to sign running back Derrick Henry and extend receiver Rashod Bateman. Baltimore also gave defensive lineman Justin Madubuike a new deal, but the team lost linebacker Patrick Queen and edge rusher Jadeveon Clowney. Three starters on the offensive line are also gone.

The Ravens are trying to replace those offensive linemen with internal options, with guards Andrew Vorhees and Daniel Faalele potentially playing bigger roles. They also drafted tackle Roger Rosengarten in the second round.

“You just simply can’t pay everybody, and we made the decision that we were going to go young on the offensive line as best as we could,” DeCosta said. “We’ve had a lot of success developing offensive linemen in the past. I could give you a bunch of players that we took in the draft or even got off the streets, and those guys became good players for us.”

DeCosta acknowledged there could be some “hiccups” but said a year from now, the offensive line could be in a great place.

The Ravens needed to retool a bit on the fly at a time when there’s still pressure from fans for the team to reach a Super Bowl with Lamar Jackson at quarterback.

Baltimore was dominant in the regular season in 2023, posting the league’s best record, but the Ravens lost at home to Kansas City in the AFC championship game.

DeCosta indicated if he were ranking the best Ravens teams, he’d put the famous 2000 championship team — with its incredible defense — in the mix, but he also mentioned teams from 2006, 2011, 2019 and 2023 that didn’t make the Super Bowl.

As for the 2012 team that did win it all: “We got hot late,” he said.

“My goal is to build a team that has talent at every position, that is flexible enough to withstand injuries, that we have depth to get us through a long season and to make the playoffs and to be sort of ascending at that point,” DeCosta said. “It’s really hard to project what’s going to happen, and it’s mentally challenging, too, for me.”

It may be difficult for the 2024 Ravens to prove anything until the playoffs, but DeCosta doesn’t really accept the notion that the Super Bowl is the sole arbiter of a good season.

“I think we’ve maybe had the best record twice in the last five years, and we didn’t make it to the end. That’s tough, but I am proud of our team, what we’ve accomplished,” DeCosta said.

“We haven’t accomplished our ultimate goal, but I don’t really subscribe to the idea that your season is a failure if you don’t win the Super Bowl. I know a lot of people do. If I did that, I’d probably be in a mental institution. So, I don’t feel that way. I measure success of a season in a lot of different things — Super Bowl being one of those things, but certainly not the only criteria that I would use to judge a season.”