The Baltimore Ravens are probably sick of answering questions about quarterback Lamar Jackson and how that situation is going to play out. But that doesn’t mean reporters are going to stop asking, especially when it comes to how it will impact their decisions in the upcoming NFL Draft.
However, things got briefly testy during Wednesday’s press conference with Ravens general manager Eric DeCosta and head coach John Harbaugh when a local reporter asked about the team’s draft plans and mentioned the apparently unmentionable name of Lamar Jackson.
Tense moment in the Ravens' pre-draft press conference when a question mentioned Lamar Jackson, as it appears the media was sternly reminded not to mention the quarterback by the team pic.twitter.com/BznJOfs98k
— Kevin Oestreicher (@koestreicher34) April 5, 2023
“With respect to this being about the draft and everything,” started WJZ’s Alex Glaze. “With the Lamar stuff that’s going on-”
At that point, a Ravens PR person tried to cut Glaze off. Glaze continued and tried to veer back to the question at hand, saying “When you are looking at quarterbacks-” when this time the PR person called him out by name. The PR person then says “This is about the draft” and asks him to “Let’s just move off the…” before readjusting to say “If you have a question about the quarterbacks, ask a question about the quarterbacks in the draft” and “We’re not gonna answer any more questions about that.”
Undeterred, Glaze finished asking his perfectly understandable and reasonable question, “Are you looking at quarterbacks differently because of the situation that’s going on?”
At that point, DeCosta answered that the team is looking at quarterbacks, which ended up being a pretty interesting answer.
It’s understandable that the Ravens don’t want to have to keep answering questions about Jackson while they work through the fallout of his contract issue. However, it’s impossible to erase his existence altogether. Jackson is the team’s star player and starting quarterback. His absence creates a ripple effect that impacts the way they draft, the way they sign free agents, the way they re-sign other players, and so on.
Glaze tweeted about the incident after it happened, saying “I asked [Eric DeCosta] if the ravens are looking at quarterbacks differently given the lamar jackson situation. legitimate question. not sure what the issue was.” He later deleted that tweet.
Ultimately, there was nothing wrong with Glaze’s question, and had the PR person just waited for another second or two, they would have realized they were overstepping because they’ve apparently decided to turn Lamar Jackson into Voldemort.
