It’s been nearly six months since the Ravens fired John Harbaugh, yet some are still reckoning with their new reality.
Consider Todd Monken, the Browns’ new coach who landed the job only after he was dismissed as part of Harbaugh’s staff in Baltimore. Although he’s happy with where he is now, he also isn’t afraid to speak candidly on the end of his tenure with the now-rival Ravens, either.
“It tells you how fickle, just in general, life is,” Monken told The Baltimore Sun. “From the year before, if you’d have told me that we’d have been fired after the year we had offensively … “
“I’ll give it this, coaches, for the most part the players, never quit.”
In 2024 — Monken’s second season as Ravens offensive coordinator — Baltimore owned the most productive offense in the NFL, finishing first in yards per game (424.9) and third in scoring (30.5 points per contest). The newly formed tandem of Lamar Jackson and Derrick Henry steamrolled defenses, powering a 12-5 finish and a playoff run that ended in heartbreaking fashion in a Divisional Round loss to the Bills in Buffalo.
Coming off that season, most everyone expected the Ravens to replicate their success in 2025. But injuries struck, sidelining Jackson for an extended period and sending Baltimore into an unexpected spiral.
Backup quarterback Tyler “Snoop” Huntley did his best to keep the Ravens’ afloat, posting a 2-0 record as a starter, and the Ravens managed to fight their way back into a winner-take-all Week 18 showdown with the rival Steelers in Pittsburgh. With Monken directing the offense from the booth, Jackson led a heroic final drive that positioned the Ravens to kick a game-winning field goal that would have won them the AFC North crown and sent them back to the postseason.
Tyler Loop‘s miss changed everything. Baltimore lost, Harbaugh and Monken were fired, and more than five months later, Monken now finds himself wearing the rival’s colors in Cleveland.
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