Steve Bisciotti: Lamar Jackson, veteran players didn’t play large part in John Harbaugh decision
Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti and General Manager Eric DeCosta held their first press conference on Tuesday since the firing of head coach John Harbaugh and the questions about that move involved one about quarterback Lamar Jackson.
Bisciotti was asked if he spoke to Jackson before letting Harbaugh go and Bisciotti said that he spoke to “a bunch of the veterans” last Monday about the possibility of a change. He then went into further detail about his conversation with Jackson.
“You’ve gotten know Lamar about as well as I have,” Bisciotti said. “Lamar is really, really a non-confrontational person. When I spoke with him Monday night, he said to me, ‘Everybody’s saying I have a problem with [offensive coordinator Todd] Monken. I don’t really a have a problem with Monken. I don’t know where that comes from.’ And he said, ‘I hear that I’ve got a problem with Harbs, and I don’t have a problem with Harbs. I don’t know where that comes from. We gotta make changes, probably, but that’s probably more for you and [DeCosta].’”
Bisciotti said that he let Jackson and the players know that “your opinion matters,” but said earlier in the press conference that he’d been discussing the move with DeCosta for several weeks. He pointed to the number of big leads the Ravens have blown in recent seasons and said the team has underperformed relative to its seeding in the playoffs.
“I don’t think the players had a large part of my decision,” Bisciotti said. “My partners here, that’s an 80-20 thing. I don’t think I’d be a very good leader if I didn’t ask the top players in my organization that have been here the longest. No, Lamar didn’t have an outsized part of my decision. My decision, I think by Monday, was pretty much set. I think by the time I got off the phone with Lamar, I had told him that I think my position was pretty set.”
Bisciotti thinks the team has the most attractive coaching opening in the league at the moment and the presence of a two-time MVP quarterback is likely one of the selling points he has in mind as the team looks for their next head coach.
