Joe Flacco's Book Learnin' Coming Along Slower Than Expected

I mentioned earlier that this looks like Troy Smith's team, even it if hasn't been made official yet. Still, despite the end of an era (a pretty depressing era, but an era nonetheless), a slew of coaching changes, and a bunch of new faces, it looks like the same-old, same-old for Baltimore's offense.

At least according to Mike Lombardi, former Raiders personnel dude-turned internet scribe.

The Ravens hired Cam Cameron to run their offense; he knew it would require a major rebuilding effort. Based on this summer, the job might be even harder than many thought. When the Ravens drafted Delaware quarterback Joe Flacco in the first round it was with an eye on the future.

No one expected him to come in and start right away, but then again, no one thought he would be so far behind. Flacco's progress has not been as quick as some hoped and this is hurting the progress of the offense.

Hardly surprising, I guess. I mean, the Ravens haven't played a regular season game since Brian Billick was fired and you're not going to solve the offense's myriad problems during one offseason. Cam Cameron is an obvious upgrade over Billick/Neuheisel/Cavanagh*, and Joe Flacco is coming from Delaware, a D-IAA school.

He's going to need time to get up to speed, and that he's "so far behind" right now isn't that big a deal. Of course, that's easy for me to say; I didn't trade up in the first round to draft him, and I don't have a track record of taking future NFL busts.

It could be worse, though: Billick could still be the coach and Boller the starter.

* to be fair, Neuheisel was OC in name only