After the Ravens' 13-10 loss in Cleveland Sunday, Derrick Henry told his team in the locker room that the loss fell on his shoulders.
Henry's fourth-quarter fumble opened the door for a Browns touchdown that tied the game, part of Cleveland's 10-point comeback.
"I told the team I put this on me," Henry said. "I just have to be better. I can't put the team in that situation."
Henry fumbled in each of the Ravens' first three games last season, losing them in tough late losses to the Buffalo Bills and Detroit Lions. He had one fumble the rest of the season.
This time, second-year Browns linebacker Carson Schwesinger, last year's AP Defensive Rookie of the Year who was questionable to play entering the game, ripped the ball away from Henry as they went to the ground.
"Just going back and trying to fight for yards. [With] my momentum [and] his momentum, he ended up pulling it out," Henry said.
"I have to take care of the ball. No excuses for that. I have to be better. [I] put the team in harm's way. I sound like a broken record with this, but I have to go back and work on it."
While nobody is more accountable or harder on themselves than Henry, the Ravens' loss certainly wasn't solely, or even mostly, because of him.
After back-to-back scoring drives to open the game that built a 10-point lead, the Ravens' offense, as a whole, floundered much of the rest of the way.
The Ravens had 111 yards on their first two drives. They had 124 yards on the next nine, which included seven punts. The two exceptions ended with a 49-yard field goal miss by Tyler Loop and Henry's fumble.
Baltimore was operating with backup quarterback Tyler Huntley for a second straight game with Lamar Jackson (ankle) sidelined again. Huntley and Ravens Head Coach Jesse Minter gave credit to the Browns' "really aggressive front."
The Ravens tried to lean on Henry and their ground game, but he had a season-low 58 yards on 17 carries (3.4 per run).
"We weren't able to really sustain anything in the run game," Minter said. "They're jetting up field, and they're cutting off some of our angles in the zone schemes. They did a really good job, and we have to find a way to have more answers for that type of defense."
Huntley was 19-of-31 for 165 yards and a touchdown and had two completions of 12 yards or more – one on an extended play and another on a tricky wrinkle with rookie tight end Josh Cuevas lined up at guard. But Huntley was fortunate he didn't have at least one pass intercepted, as a few hit Browns defensive backs in or near their hands before falling incomplete.
"The Browns did a good job of adjusting," Huntley said. "We just didn't make a couple plays that would have pivoted the game and allowed us to go ahead, but we just have to make those plays when we get them."
Minter said the Browns were also aggressive in the secondary with man-to-man coverage that allowed them to drop a safety down in the box to deal with Henry. Cleveland entered the game with the highest man coverage rate in the league.
Even when the Ravens did find some offensive momentum in the second half, they committed too many self-inflicted errors.
Huntley extended a play and found Zay Flowers for a 31-yard gain near the end of the third quarter that put Baltimore in scoring range. But Huntley was sacked on the next play for a 9-yard loss, then fumbled on the following play to bring up a third-and-22.
After an 11-yard completion to Cuevas, who scored the Ravens' only touchdown, Loop missed the 49-yard field goal that would've given Baltimore a 10-point lead. In a defensive slugfest, mistakes like that proved to be the difference.
"We look at that really as ourselves, allowing the game to end up that tight where, for a lot of it, we played well enough to be able to separate and potentially have more than a one-score lead at certain times in the second half," Minter said. "We'll look at ourselves."
