The 5 O'Clock Club: Instant reactions to the game - Preseason Game 1 edition

The 5 o’clock club aims to provide a forum for reader-driven discussion at a time of day when there isn’t much NFL news being published. Feel free to introduce topics that interest you in the comments below.

First play of the pre-season: Terrelle Pryor drops the pass. Good, we got that out of the way. He should catch all the rest this season.

Defensively, the team looks more lucky than good. The Ravens fail, the Skins don’t stop them.

Second drive: Rob Kelley plows through the Ravens on 1st down. Tough run. On 3rd down, the Ravens blitz the run and blow the play up before it ever starts.

Back on defense, gang tackling on 1st down -- I like that. 2nd down, LB Zach Brown runs it down at the sideline. That’s why we signed him. Good. Mallet misses his second 3rd down pass of the game.

Drive 3: Second drive in a row that the Skins start around the 5 yard line. McCoy handoff to Perine. Stuffed. McCoy throws to an open grassy area on 2nd. Hits the target. Colt panics on 3rd down, dumps the pass, but no real blitz. This is ugly offense.

Punt goes out of bounds on ‘Skins side of the field... ugh. Penalty moves it to the Ravens side. The almost-block on the punt made me feel nauseous.

More good tackling by the Skins. 3rd & 12. I knew that if Mallet kept under-thowing, the Ravens would benefit from interference call. It happened. Great play by Mallet... he’s setting up the DBs (joke). 1st down run stuffed again. 3rd & 3. Skins stuff the run to force the FG attempt. Defensive tackling looks a LOT better than last year (so far). Trent Murphy helped off the field. He’s got 6 weeks to recover...

Tucker bounces the ball off the upright, but illegal formation penalty on Skins gives the Ravens another first-down-by-penalty. No tackling this time -- West runs for 18. Ouch! 1st & goal - good tackling, and I heard Phil Taylor’s name called. West earns the 6 points with the dive.

Drive 4: First down play breaks down. McCoy looks like a bad playground QB. 2nd down sack. Overall we look worse than a playground offense. McCoy avoids pressure on 3rd down and hits Ryan Grant who makes a tough catch across the middle - first down. Tough catch by Brian Quick - the team gets to 4th & inches. Looked like Quick hurt his knee a bit.

2ND Quarter

Perine gets only the number of inches required & no more. Maybe we’re saving something for the regular season.

McCoy misses a wide-open receiver. I don’t believe McCoy can win many ball games. Perine fumbles behind the line: someone needs to show him Matt Jones’ game film from last year. On third down, Perine drops the check down pass. Ugly, ugly, ugly. I’m getting the Ravens’ announcers, and the play-by-play guy calls him Pee-reen.

One of the highlights of the Redskins game so far is Tress Way’s punt, fair catch around the 15. Penalty moves the Ravens half the distance. I wanna cry at how bad the Skins look. Listening to Ravens play by play just makes it all the worse.

Defense again. Ravens have a decent play + 5 yard penalty. Not good.

Tight End Boyle makes an easy catch for 1st down. Apparently, we still can’t cover tight ends. A few plays later, Mallet beats a free hitter. The teams seem to be down to third teamers now, in the middle of the second quarter.

Redskins 3-man rush, 50 yard pass, Holsey makes a better play on the ball than the receiver. Good. Mallet throws another bad ball (or receiver goes on the wrong route) to get Baltimore off the field.

Blackmon muffs the punt, manages to recover it and run it out of the endzone. Redskins will start on offense inside the ten -- for the third time today.

Drive 5: Matt Jones runs (I guess we’re playing fifth-string now). Ugly play, but Jones holds on to the ball. McCoy noodle-arms a pass on 2nd down, but manages the completion. Matt Jones runs again — very non-beastmode. Driven backwards by an arm tackle.

Matt Hazel fumbles the ball away to the Ravens in the Red Zone. The RAVENS red zone. Old Keystone Kops movies start playing in my mind.

Ravens start on the 18 yard line.

Oops. Call reversed by New York upon review. Still Redskins ball. I watch the replay and can only conclude that the guys in New York feel sorry for the Redskins. How anyone can call this non-possession by Hazel is beyond me.

Redskins “drive” continues.

McCoy under pressure tosses a horrible pass on 3rd down. Punt. Seeing a lot of Tress Way tonight. I think he’s punted as many times in first half tonight as he did in the first quarter of the 2016 season.

Ravens back on offense, convert 3rd & 10 with no apparent effort required. Feels like 2016 never ended.

Ryan Anderson makes a nice tackle on the next 3rd down. Refs give the Ravens the line-to-gain on 4th & 1. In Bangkok, it looked like a good stop by the Washington D. We’ll call it payback for that crazy reversal on the fumble.

2:00 warning

2nd down, the tackling looks good again (for one pay anyway).

Huge rush on the next 2nd down; Deshazor Everett drops an interception. 3rd & 10 - good tackle by Nico Marley. Ravens field goal.

Redskins get the ball with 00:29 left. Good play; McCoy throws a nice pass. First of the game for him I think. Follows it up with a terribly underthrown interception. I’d say that the Redskins offense look like a high school team, but I don’t want to insult any high school teams.

00:01 - 59-yard-FG for the Ravens; Tucker punches it through. Score: 13-0.

Face-palm in Bangkok.

Halftime

One note: the Ravens announcers (including Brian Billick) aren’t calling Redskins players at all. They don’t say which Redskins got the tackle... nothing for the most part. It makes it challenging to get a good feel for individual players in a pre-season game where I’m struggling with jersey numbers. It’s getting harder now that all the starters are watching the game from the sidelines.

Redskins kick off to start the second half. New QB for Ravens.

Redskins sack on 3rd down by one of the newest Redskins, McClure.

Drive 6: Perine runs for 10 on 1st down, but hard to get excited about a good run in the 3rd quarter of a pre-season game. Clearly, during halftime, someone told the Ravens play-by-play guy how to pronounce “Perine”. Sudfeld looks way sharper than McCoy did... he actually looks like an NFL QB.

Hopkins on for a 49-yard FG. Looks like the kick would’ve been good from 60. Now THAT’S something I can get excited about in the 3rd quarter of a pre-season game. I’ve been waiting to see if “Hoppy” got his mojo back over the summer. First chance was a good chance.

Great KO coverage by the Skins 3rd stringers.

Nico Marley flashing a bit in his chances, gets a sack.

Lanier gets a sack up the middle. No gain on 3rd & 16. Ravens punt. Kendall Fuller on the return. I guess his knee is feeling better.

7th drive: Sudfeld & Jones both look good on a screen pass on 1st & 20. Jones stuffed on 2nd & 2. Sudfeld sails a ball high on 3rd down. Punt. Desperate effort by cover team to keep the ball out of the end zone. Can’t quite do it, but I like the hustle.

Mizzel running at will through the Skins D, but they stop Bobby Rainey. Broken play by Ravens on 3rd down. Quick thinking by Mizzel gives the Ravens a chance, but the Skins take advantage. Punt.

8th drive: Free runner on Sudfeld from inside. Nate avoids it, stays alive, throws the ball away. 3 & out. Ravens bring the ball back to the Redskins 32 yard line. Nice return by the Keenan Reynolds - 48 yards.

1-play, 33-yard TD pass by Ravens 4th string QB.

9th drive: Skins start on the 25 after touchback. Sudfeld starts with a long pass to Robert Davis - good blocking, good throw, good catch.

4TH Quarter

Jones stays in the game at RB; they’re either giving him a chance, or trying to set up a trade. Bad decision by Sudfeld, but avoids the interception. Garner with a good catch in traffic. Harbaugh decides to slow down a pre-season game by throwing the challenge flag. Does it really matter enough to bother? eh... call reversed. I guess it mattered -- brings up 4th down.

Punt cover guys watch the ball bounce into the end zone. Looked like Tevin Homer to me. He’s too far down the depth chart to not be trying to keep the ball in play.

Zach Vigil down injured. Don’t wanna see that. (That reminds me, Ravens broadcaster didn’t give any update on Trent Murphy -- I hope he was okay).

Mizzel with another 10-yard run — this Virginia kid looks good, at least versus future grocery stockers. Tevin Homer not helping his cause tonight, getting called for pass interference inside the 10-yard line. Lots of “teaching moments” for Homer. If he learns too much more, he’ll be getting a bus ticket back home.

Defense holds on 3rd down. Tucker adds 3 to the Ravens score on a chip shot FG. 23-3.

10th drive: Mack Brown in at RB now. Good run on 1st down. Brown with good pass block on 2nd down, though pass tipped at line by Ravens. Brown runs for 1st down, looking good on 3 plays. On 5th play of the drive, Brown beaten by pass rush, Sudfeld sacked by Brown’s guy. Ooops. Sack negated by penalty.

Brian Quick mistimes a jump on long pass. He gets called for Offensive PI on the same play. Quick is a little loose with the ball on a screen on the following play. I’m not impressed with him in this game. ON 3rd down, OL lets an inside rusher sack the QB without blocking him. Clear confusion. Not surprising in 4th quarter of preseason game 1.

Fish Smithson spotted on field. He didn’t do anything, I just wanted to type his name. 3rd string lineman pumped up at making a tackle. I like the enthusiasm. Deshaun Phillips with a nice tackle.

2:00 warning

Ravens complete a long bomb. No QB pressure. Tevin Homer on coverage -- looked awkward. Homer has gone to the top of my ‘cut’ list. Ravens now in “Victory” formation.

This was not “just” a pre-season loss, and no big deal. The Redskins looked outmatched on offense, defense & special teams. They need a huge turnaround, or I’m gonna drop my “games won” prediction from 9 to 6.

Ugly game for the Redskins. Ravens fans should be happy all week.

What did we learn from the game against the Ravens last night?

My final thoughts:

• If Pryor hadn’t dropped the pass on the first play of the game, the entire thing may have played out differently. If pigs had wings...
• Sudfeld looked better than McCoy in this game. I wouldn’t be unhappy to see a revision to the depth chart.
• The Redskins showed signs of better tackling than last year’s version.
• Perine looked human. Mack Brown ran well late in the game.
• I’d like to see Cousins get more production against the Packers. A lot more.
• Tevin Homer needs to have a big week in practice and play well against the Packers.
• Watching post-game press conference, Gruden looked as unhappy as he should. He said Murphy and Cravens needed MRIs after the game. I hate injuries.

What did we learn from the Redskins vs Ravens game last night?