Tyler Linderbaum Expected to Return to Practice Friday
The Ravens should get a big piece of their offense back at practice soon, as rookie Tyler Linderbaum is expected to return to the field Monday, Head Coach John Harbaugh said.
Linderbaum suffered his foot injury on Aug. 4. Contrary to reports, it was not a Lisfranc injury and the rookie is on the 1-2 week timeline for return that Harbaugh first announced. Friday would be two weeks and a day.
As with all players returning from injuries, Linderbaum will start with individual drills, Harbaugh said.
"I don't anticipate him playing in the game, but he'll start working his way back in – it looks like – on Friday. We'll see, but that's how it looks right now," Harbaugh said.
That would still leave the first-round pick more than three weeks to get back into form before the regular season. Linderbaum could also possibly see some action in the final preseason game on Aug. 27 to get his feet wet before stepping into the Week 1 starting lineup.
J.K. Dobbins Making Progress, 'We'll See' About Week 1
J.K. Dobbins is making progress shaking off the rust from last year's season-ending knee injury but it's still too early to say for sure whether he'll play Week 1 against the New York Jets.
Dobbins returned to the practice field on Aug. 8. He has been going through individual drills and did some team offensive work over the past week, but has not participated in 11-on-11 drills yet.
Asked Wednesday if there's any sense yet on whether Dobbins would be ready for the regular season, Harbaugh said he didn't know.
"He made some good progress this week," Harbaugh said. "We measure the times of how fast he runs, how fast he decelerates, how fast he accelerates, how fast he changed direction. We do that, and you can see the improvement is tangible. So, we'll see."
A month ago, Dobbins tweeted that he would "[darn] sure going to be ready for Week 1." The desire is clearly there, and Dobbins just needs to continue working through the comeback process.
Lamar Jackson Won't Play in Arizona
It's not surprising news, but Harbaugh confirmed that Lamar Jackson won't suit up for the Ravens' second preseason game against the Cardinals Sunday night in Arizona.
Jackson didn't play in the first or second preseason games last year either. He got one series in the preseason finale in Washington.
Jackson said earlier in the week that he didn't know whether he would play or wanted to play. He said the knee injury suffered by Jets starter Zach Wilson didn't impact his decision.
Harbaugh didn't go through a full list of who will play and who won't, but there could be more starters playing some snaps than in the preseason opener.
"Some of the other starters won't play. There may be a couple other starters that will play a little bit," he said. "It's kind of hard to go through every guy, but Mark Andrews isn't going to play, for instance."
Rashod Bateman Not Happy With His Madden Look
Rashod Bateman is the Ravens' top receiver, but "Madden 23" didn't give him the star treatment.
Bateman got a 77 overall rating. That's not even the top beef Bateman has with EA Sports. His issue is that it looks nothing like him.
"I'm not happy with the rating or the face scan," Bateman said. "But, I'm more concerned about the face scan. I feel like the NFL is rigged in a lot of areas, so I'm not concerned about the numbers right now."
They at least may have treated Bateman better than Ronnie Stanley.
