Ravens GM Eric DeCosta discusses how team tries to be responsible during free agency

The Baltimore Ravens are a team that uses free agency to their advantage year in and year out. While they might not be flashy spenders every offseason, they’re able to sign quality free agents at positions of need while also handing out a big contract or two here and there.

When asked about how important it is for the team to re-sign some of their veterans still on the free agent market such as defensive lineman Calais Campbell and Brandon Williams, DeCosta talked about some of the nuances that go into making free agent decisions. He discussed how there are still a lot of good players that the team is interested in, but they try to be as responsible as possible with the contracts that they give out.

“There’s always a chance. There are some players out there that we have had, some veteran players, some outstanding players for us in the past, and our job is to basically see where the holes are, how much money we have, the opportunity, and then make the best decision we can. And so, there are still a lot of really good players out there that played football this year in the National Football League, across the board, at multiple positions that we’re interested in. In saying that, if the cap were unlimited, so to speak, we’d be out there signing players left and right. We’re bound by the fact that there is a salary cap. We try to be as responsible as possible, and we’re not going to be a team that is irresponsible with our deals, the structure of our deals. I think [vice president of football administration] Nick Matteo and [senior vice president of football operations] Pat Moriarty, they do an awesome job negotiating and doing the type of deals that we feel will reflect well in the short term but also in the long term, and that’s a big part of that…”

DeCosta said there are a lot of FAs out there that the team likes. But his caveat was the cap has created challenges and they have to be disciplined.

— Jeff Zrebiec (@jeffzrebiec) April 5, 2022

Baltimore has always been an organization that’s balanced out spending with sitting back and letting the market play out. As things currently stand, they can’t afford to hand out many more big deals without restructuring or extending other players, but in some instances that would be kicking the can down the line. While it’s important to improve and get better over the course of free agency, bad deals and big contracts that don’t pan out can cost a team years of competitiveness on the field.