OWINGS MILLS, Md. — The nightmare preseason scenario played out over the weekend for the Ravens: an important starter suffered a major injury. That’s just what happened to J.K. Dobbins on Saturday night. On Monday Head Coach John Harbaugh confirmed Dobbins is done for the year.
"J.K. does have a season-ending knee injury," he said.
It happened during the first offensive series against Washington. The second-year running back will miss the entire 2021 season with a torn ACL.
"That’s a disappointment, especially for us, for J.K. Our hearts go out to him," said Harbaugh. "It’s very challenging because he worked so hard. He was so prepared and he was so ready to go this year and so excited to go and such a big part of our plans."
Gus Edwards now steps up to be the Ravens' featured running back. Behind the proven Edwards is unproven Ty’Son Williams. Williams has impressed during the preseason, finishing with 24 carries for 131 yards and a touchdown. He spent last year on the Ravens’ practice squad after going undrafted.
"Ty’Son, you do the math. He’s there. He’ll be out there playing and he’s ready to go," said Harbaugh.
With the Dobbins injury comes the second-guessing about how much the Ravens should really play starters in the preseason.
"It’s a fair conversation. We played Lamar (Jackson). We played Mark (Andrews). We played the starting offensive line. We played the whole offense for nine plays I think it was," said Harbaugh. "Those guys played for no more than 23 plays the whole preseason. That’s what J.K. had. Some teams play their guys a lot. I watched certain teams, you know who they are. They played their starters every single game extensively. A lot of teams in our division have done that, great teams in the AFC. The teams that we are competing against in the AFC have pretty much all done that. But, there are other teams that don't play their guys at all. They don't play their starters even one snap. We are probably as close to that, I know we are farther down that road than we've ever been. We played our guys so little this offseason. It's just been how we've done it. But, anytime a guy gets hurt you ask yourself those questions."
The Ravens held a closed walk-through on Monday. They are scheduled to have another closed walk-through on Tuesday as cuts loom. The NFL mandates rosters be trimmed from 80 to 53 players by Tuesday at 4:00 p.m. The Ravens' next scheduled practice is on Wednesday.
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