In one of the biggest games of the season to date, the Miami Dolphins will travel to Baltimore this Sunday to take on the Ravens. Lamar Jackson recently became the MVP favorite after his team took out the NFC's top seed in the San Francisco 49ers, and now he will face a similarly tough test in a Dolphins defense that has been playing markedly better since Jalen Ramsey's return from injury.
But Dolphins defensive coordinator Vic Fangio knows that his defense will face just as tough a test in going up against Jackson, despite the fact that they have already gone against mobile quarterbacks like Russell Wilson, Josh Allen, Daniel Jones, Jalen Hurts, Patrick Mahomes and Dak Prescott this season.
"Yeah, fair share mobile quarterbacks? Yes. Then there's Lamar Jackson. He's unlike anybody else," Fangio said, per the Dolphins' official website. "The only other player that's been like him in the last 50 years is Michael Vick. He's a tremendous player. Kudos to Ozzie [Newsome] and Eric [DeCosta] for picking him. Thirty-one other teams that passed him by are kicking themselves. He's really improved over the years. Dynamic with the ball. Good passer. He makes their offense go."
Jackson is widely considered the best rushing threat at the quarterback position in the history of the NFL. He has rushed for at least 695 yards in every season of his career, and even though his 52.4 rushing yards per game this year are a career-low for a full season, he still leads all quarterbacks in rushing by more than 200 yards over the next-closest player.
This has also been one of the best passing seasons of Jackson's career, as the Ravens have modernized their aerial attack under new offensive coordinator Todd Monken and after adding players like Zay Flowers, Odell Beckham Jr., and Nelson Agholor to their receiving corps. Jackson's 436 pass attempts are already the most of his career to date, his 66.3% completion rate is a career high, and his 7.7 yards per attempt average is nearly equal to the 7.8 he averaged during his MVP season.
"The pure definition of a great quarterback is there's no one way to play him," Fangio said of Jackson. "Because if there was, everybody would do it. So you just have to mix up what you're doing. Along the way, they have a hell of a run game. Both from the players ability -- O-line, tight ends, runners -- and the scheme of it with Lamar at the helm makes it a difficult task. There's a lot to prepare for, a lot to defend in this offense."
The Ravens just tore up one of the league's best defenses, but the Dolphins also just slowed down one of the NFL's best offenses by holding the Dallas Cowboys to just 20 points in their last-second Week 16 victory. This will be a fascinating battle between a truly unique player and one of the best defensive minds in all of football, and in a game that will have a dramatic impact on the playoff picture. it should be must-watch.
