Rookie first-round wide receiver Breshad Perriman needs to return to the practice field soon or he won't be playing on it at all.
Head Coach John Harbaugh said "the clock is ticking" on Perriman to make a return, and he doesn't have any news on how his injured knee is doing, though he does expect some information "really soon."
The Ravens need to determine whether they'll continue to wait for Perriman or just scrap it and put him on injured reserve, ending his rookie season.
Baltimore may need the spot on the 53-man roster if it's going to promote tight end Dennis Pitta this week or defensive end Brent Urban sometime in the next three weeks.
"To me, like you said, the clock is ticking," Harbaugh said Monday.
"If he can't get out there and practice soon … I'd love to get four games out of him, just so you could see him and he could develop for four games. But that means now we need four weeks of getting him ready to play four games. I haven't been told he's going to practice this week."
Harbaugh said General Manager Ozzie Newsome and Perriman's doctors need to have a conversation and "make a determination on that real soon."
Perriman sprained his PCL on the first day of training camp. He returned to practice eight weeks later, on Sept. 24, but did not run full speed.
Before the Ravens' Week 3 game against the Bengals, Perriman pulled up in pain while trying to reach a pass during pre-game warmups. After that, the Ravens sent him to Dr. James Andrews for another look at the knee and Andrews performed a minor scope procedure to confirm there was no new damage.
As Harbaugh said about a month ago, "it's probably one of the all-time slowest healing sprained PCLs ever."
Perriman's absence has hampered the Ravens offense since the start of the season, but Baltimore has found recent success with deep* *threat Chris Givens, who it traded for last month.
Strangely enough, Sunday's opponent, the Jacksonville Jaguars, have also been without their top draft pick this season. Defensive end Dante Fowler, the third pick overall, tore his ACL on the first day of minicamp.
