The Ravens are back in motion on the kicking front after another Tyler Loop miss put the position under the microscope again.
Loop missed from 49 yards on Sunday, and that kick ended up carrying real weight in a 13-10 loss at Cleveland. He had a chance to push Baltimore ahead by two scores, and the miss became one of the biggest swings in the game.
According to a league source, the Ravens are signing veteran kicker Jake Moody back to the practice squad. Baltimore had originally brought Moody in late in the summer, during a stretch when Loop was struggling in preseason games. Once Loop got hot, Moody’s stay was brief and the practice-squad spot shifted elsewhere.
Head coach Jesse Minter kept his comments about Loop’s role guarded at Monday’s press conference, but he did not hide his frustration with the kicker’s inconsistency.
“I think like any position - you're always looking at ways of how to impact the roster, how to impact improvement,” Minter said Monday of the kicker position. “So, that one would be no different."
Loop’s position had already been scrutinized before this season even started. He missed a 48-yard kick in Pittsburgh in Week 18, a miss that knocked the Ravens out of the postseason and handed the Steelers the AFC North title. Even after that, Minter stayed behind him through a rocky preseason at M&T Bank Stadium, while general manager Eric DeCosta had framed the situation more like a competition.
Loop did give Baltimore a burst earlier this season. In Week 3, he hit a game-winning 56-yard kick in Brazil, and he has also made a 60-yard field goal.
Distance, though, has not been the only issue. His problems this year have come from 40-49 yards, where he is 2/5.
Overall, he is 10/13 on field goals, which puts him outside the top 20 in the NFL. He has made all 16 extra points.
Moody brings a different kind of resume. He has played for three NFL teams and spent last season with Ravens offensive coordinator Declan Doyle in Chicago.
He finished that season strong and was a former second-round pick of the 49ers. He also has ties to Minter from their time together at the University of Michigan.
“Confronting issues and confronting problems is really what this whole thing's about,” Minter said, while also updating Lamar Jackson's injury status on Monday. “So, there have been a few times where it's not the end-of-a-game kick that everybody sees as a game winner, but there are kicks that take a lead from a two-score game to a three-score game a few games ago, or take that game from a one-score game to a two-score game, which, the way that game is going, is really, really critical.
“So, those are critical misses. There is a confidence level for how he prepares and how he practices and how he operates and how he strikes the ball, but at the same time, that position itself is completely results-driven.”
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