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          NFL Nation

          Flacco's QBR is lowest rating in five years

          • Jamison Hensley, ESPN Staff WriterOct 22, 2012, 09:45 AM ET
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              Jamison Hensley is a reporter covering the Baltimore Ravens for ESPN. Jamison joined ESPN in 2011, covering the AFC North before focusing exclusively on the Ravens beginning in 2013. Jamison won the National Sports Media Association Maryland Sportswriter of the Year award in 2018, and he authored a book titled: Flying High: Stories of the Baltimore Ravens. He was the Ravens beat writer for the Baltimore Sun from 2000-2011.
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          With so many injuries to the defense, the Ravens needed Joe Flacco and the offense to step up in order to win at Houston. Instead, Flacco recorded the worst performance by a quarterback in five seasons, based on ESPN's quarterback rating system.

          Flacco's Total QBR, a metric that accounts for everything a quarterbacks does, was 0.3 on the 0-100 scale, the lowest rating for any quarterback with at least 30 action plays since 2008. He had never posted a Total QBR under 5.0 in his career and hadn’t recorded a game of 10.0 or worse since Week 2 of 2010 (at Cincinnati).

          Flacco was 21-of-43 (48.8 percent) for 147 yards with one touchdown and two interceptions (one was deflected and returned 52 yards for a touchdown). He was also sacked four times, one of which resulted in a safety.

          “We all could have done things better, starting with myself,” Flacco said after the game. “I don’t really have an answer for you. I think that’s just the way it works out. These guys are a good team. We didn’t play up to the level we expected.”

          The Texans' defense played a factor in Flacco's struggles. This was the fifth time this season that Houston held an opponent to a Total Team QBR under 15.0, according to ESPN Stats & Information. Entering Week 7, no other team had more than one such game in 2012.

          To put Flacco's low QBR in perspective, there had been only two quarterbacks who had recorded QBRs lower than 1.0 over the past five seasons. The Jets' Mark Sanchez did it once in 2009 (0.7 QBR) and again in 2011 (0.8), and Kyle Orton posted a QBR of 0.9 in 2010.