Ravens Insider Defends Former LB

Now that Patrick Queen has left the Baltimore Ravens for the Pittsburgh Steelers, will he hold up without his running mate?

Dec 24, 2022; Baltimore, Maryland, USA; Baltimore Ravens linebacker Patrick Queen (6) celebrates with linebacker Roquan Smith (18) along the sidelines during the game against the Atlanta Falcons at M&T Bank Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Tommy Gilligan-USA TODAY Sports / Tommy Gilligan-USA TODAY Sports

The Baltimore Ravens lost quite a few key players this offseason, but perhaps none more so than former first-round linebacker Patrick Queen.

Losing Queen, who just had the best season of his young career with 133 total tackles, would already be rough, but that isn't the full story. Queen didn't leave for just any team, but for the arch rival Pittsburgh Steelers, and he's wasted no time in making himself a villain in Baltimore.

The second-team All-Pro is expected to hold down the middle of the Steelers' defense, but there's a common question surrounding his future in Pittsburgh. Will Queen be able to maintain the same level of play without Roquan Smith, the Batman to his Robin so to speak, by his side?

In a rare case of a Ravens beat writer defending Queen, Jeff Zrebiec of The Athletic believes Queen will be just fine without Smith to lean on.

"People tend to forget that Queen was one of the youngest players in the league when the Ravens drafted him, and he didn’t play much college football," Zrebiec writes. "There were going to be growing pains, and they were probably exacerbated because middle linebacker is a glamour position in Baltimore. But I think this notion that Queen needed Smith to arrive so he could improve is unfair.

"After a slow start in 2022, Queen started to play much better before the Smith trade was made. He was improving. Did the presence of Smith help Queen get to another level? Sure. That’s how it works. Playing alongside great players tends to raise your level, too. I think Queen will be just fine in those roles. He’s a smarter, more experienced and explosive player than he was two years ago."

Advanced stats back up the notion that Queen improved significantly with Smith by his side. The LSU product posted dreadful PFF grades of 29.7 in 2020 and 43.5 in 2021. He then posted a much-improved grade of 70 in 2022, the same year Smith arrived, and a career-high 73.1 last season.

However, this could easily be a case of correlation rather than causation. While it is undeniably true that Smith improved Queen's play, who's to say that the latter can't take the lessons he learned from the former and use it to thrive elsewhere?

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