OWINGS MILLS, Md. -- The Baltimore Ravens envisioned Joe Flacco firing soaring, deep shots to Mike Wallace and Breshad Perriman, moving the offense briskly down the field and keeping defenses on their heels.
Through the first quarter of the season, the Ravens' passing attack has been anything but dynamic. It's been dink-and-dunk.
Flacco has thrown the second-most passes under five yards this season and ranks 30th in the NFL with an average of 6.3 yards per pass attempt. This style of conservative offense frustrates one of the strongest-armed quarterbacks in the NFL.
“We just make it so tough on ourselves,” Flacco said. “We throw the ball 50 times, and we only have 300 yards. You know, we have to move the ball down the field so methodically.”
Flacco led the NFL from 2010-15 in deep shots. He averaged three passes of at least 25 yards per game.
Over the past two games, Flacco has thrown a total of three passes that traveled at least 25 yards in the air, completing none. During that span, he topped the league with 59 throws of five yards or fewer. That's 64 percent of his attempts.
This is a surprising turn, considering the signing of Wallace, the return of Perriman and the drafting of Chris Moore.
“We have speed out there, and we have to start hitting them,” coach John Harbaugh said. “Joe is making a great point; you have to get big plays in this league. That is what we are searching for. We really think we have the players to do it.”
The Ravens' coaches and players point out that defenses are playing a lot more two-deep safeties against them to limit big plays. But defenses are probably doing the same when playing the likes of the Steelers and Falcons.
That hasn't stopped Ben Roethlisberger from completing 10 passes of at least 25 yards in the air. Matt Ryan has connected on seven of them.
Flacco, meanwhile, has four. The Ravens invested $44 million in guaranteed money this offseason for Flacco's big-play ability, and Baltimore isn't getting what the players call "chunk plays."
"I think that's just who we are right now," Flacco said when asked about the lack of deep throws. "We've just got to get jelled up more, so we're getting some more yards after catch and things like that on some of those short passes."
Part of the problem has been giving Flacco time to throw deep. He was under pressure for 17 pass attempts Sunday, which led the league.
This season, Flacco is getting rid of the ball in 2.40 seconds, which ranks as the 10th-fastest in the NFL, according to Pro Football Focus. This doesn't give him much of a chance to look downfield.
Harbaugh said big pass plays have been part of Marc Trestman's game plan.
“We called a bunch of them,” Harbaugh said. “There is no doubt about that. We threw a few of them. Some of them we weren’t able to get off, and some of them, we had to checkdown. We have to keep calling them.”
The Ravens' first touchdown this season was a 66-yard pass to Wallace. Baltimore has yet to score on another pass of over 20 yards.
This has factored into the Ravens scoring seven touchdowns in four games. Only four teams have reached the end zone fewer times: the Los Angeles Rams, Cincinnati Bengals, Minnesota Vikings and Houston Texans.
"We’re capable of being an excellent offense, and we’re going to get there," Harbaugh said. "Our guys are capable of doing it. I’m going to keep pushing them and prodding them and encouraging them. We’re going to keep working hard to get to the point where we translate plays and yards into points. That’s what we need to do."