The Ravens spent the offseason reshaping both lines, but their work at wide receiver may end up mattering just as much. Baltimore didn’t chase a familiar veteran to patch the room again. Instead, it added two rookies in the 2026 NFL Draft and leaned harder into the young talent already in house as the team installs a new offense under first-time play-caller Declan Doyle.
That plan has drawn some skepticism outside the building. Inside it, and among a few former Ravens, the reaction has been far more optimistic.
Steve Smith Sr. is one of the loudest believers. The former Ravens wideout and NFL legend sees a group built around two-time Pro Bowler Zay Flowers, who is coming off back-to-back 1,000-yard seasons and still looks like he’s climbing.
“He is the alpha, he is the No. 1 wide receiver but you got to have a little bit (of) creativity and not have all of that clutter and have everything be predictable and confusing in the hashes,” Smith Sr. said on his '89' podcast. “You gotta get him outside of the hashes.”
Flowers delivered a career-high 1,211 receiving yards last season, good for the seventh-most in the league and second-most in the AFC. Most of that damage came from the slot, where he ranked second in yards per route run, behind only 2025 Offensive Player of the Year Jaxon Smith-Njigba of the Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks. His 2.53 yards per route run, according to Pro Football Focus, was third-best in the league overall.
Smith Sr. believes the rest of Baltimore’s receiver group needs to live outside the numbers and give Lamar Jackson more ways to attack defenses. The Ravens are bringing back Rashod Bateman, entering his sixth year, after a bounce-back 2024 that produced career highs of 756 receiving yards and nine touchdowns. Devontez Walker, now in his third season, has barely been used through two years but has flashed when given chances, and the Ravens also added Ja'Kobi Lane and Elijah Sarratt in the third and fourth rounds.
“When you look at this wide receiver group, they have to play outside of the hashes because these are guys who excel (out there),” Smith Sr. said.
Bateman, listed at 6-1 and 193 pounds, found his best form last season as a vertical threat outside the numbers and in the red zone. Walker, at 6-1 and 198, has averaged 22.4 yards per catch, and four of his seven career receptions have gone for touchdowns. Lane, who stands 6-4 and 200, and Sarratt, at 6-2 and 213, were known in college for contested catches, back-shoulder fades and a nose for the end zone.
Smith Sr. thinks the Ravens intentionally built a more varied receiver room.
"The Baltimore Ravens said, 'Hey, we're going to figure it out and we're going to make sure that we cross all of our T's' and dot our I's and let's get a more proper level of different wide receivers,'" Smith said. "'Let's get the big guys.
Let's get the slow guys. Let's get the tall guys.
Let's get the little jitter bugs. Let's get every variation that we need to be able to attack multiple levels.'"
The run game will still be the engine. Since Jackson entered the league, Baltimore has never finished lower than third in rushing yards, and Derrick Henry is now part of that backfield. But Smith Sr. says the offense will only reach its ceiling if the passing game stretches defenses beyond the middle of the field.
“We know they’re going to run the football with Derrick Henry, it’s not a question,” Smith Sr. said. “But the way to benefit mostly from that is by expanding the play sheet and really showing defenses that you can throw the football outside the numbers. Because if you can’t, it’s going to get clustered and very crowded and then it’s not going to work and then you’re going to be looking at another subpar season.”
Lane, meanwhile, is already drawing buzz before taking a snap in pads as a pro. DeAndre Hopkins, who spent 2025 with the Ravens and finished with the third-most targets on the team at 39 and the third-most receiving yards at 330, also shared his excitement after reposting a video of Lane working through routes, breaks and cuts.
“He a playmaker! Ball in the air it’s his. Looking forward to see him w Lamar https://t.co/3jElBS7yHp,” Hopkins wrote.
Hopkins’ enthusiasm makes sense when you look at the similarities. Like Hopkins, Lane is a big-bodied target with 10-inch hands and a long frame built to win at the catch point, whether the ball is thrown high, contested or into traffic. That kind of profile is exactly what Baltimore has been missing in stretches.
Lane also has some Ravens connections already. He played high school football with Todd Heap’s son, and he was also neighbors and classmates with Dennis Pitta’s nephew. Pitta, on 'The Lounge' podcast, said he’s eager to see what Lane can bring to Baltimore.
"I'm excited about his potential because I don't remember a receiver that looks like Ja'Kobi that the Ravens have had in a long time," Pitta said. "(He's) just tall and long and the ability to go up and highpoint the ball and his catch radius.
"It's going to be exciting to watch because I think he's a very different receiver from Zay Flowers and some of the guys that they have, and I think they'll complement each other well and provide a different kind of weapon for Lamar out there, certainly in the red zone with his length."
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