The Ravens need more from their tight ends. Could a ‘rough’ training camp get them right?

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Last summer, Ravens tight ends coach George Godsey was asked about the future of his position room. Mark Andrews, Isaiah Likely and Charlie Kolar were all entering the final year of their contracts. Fullback Patrick Ricard’s deal was set to expire, too. The clock was ticking, even in training camp.

“We’re worried about today, today,” Godsey said just over a year ago. “Tomorrow, we’ll worry about tomorrow.”

Tomorrow is finally here. And there are new worries.

The Ravens entered camp last year with maybe the NFL’s best tight end room. Then the group slogged through an up-and-down season, undercut by injuries and inconsistency. Then, almost everyone in the room left, finding richer paydays elsewhere.

On Tuesday, there was a new tight ends coach taking questions after practice in Owings Mills. The three players who followed him were all new to the franchise, too. And the only holdover at the position, Andrews, was midway through a frustrating camp. Big-play highlights for the group have been sparse.

“I don’t really think about what I’m hoping to see,” said tight ends coach Zack Grossi, who was hired to Jesse Minter’s staff in February, a month after Georgia Tech named Godsey its offensive coordinator. “We’re just trying to be process-driven. Worry about: What do we have to do that day to get better? What do we have to do for that practice? What’s next? The meetings, the recovery, whatever the next thing is, we give it all of our attention. Every play has a life and history of its own. We are not too worried about big-picture things right now. We just kind of have our nose down.”

The Ravens lost plenty this offseason. And they could replace only so much.

Isaiah Likely, despite a disappointing 2025 (career-low 307 receiving yards), signed a three-year, $40 million deal with the New York Giants. Ricard, a six-time Pro Bowl pick and running back Derrick Henry’s personal escort, got a two-year, $7.6 million contract to reunite with coach John Harbaugh and join the Giants as well. Charlie Kolar, who over his four years in Baltimore developed into one of the NFL’s best blocking tight ends, signed a three-year, $24 million deal with the Los Angeles Chargers.

Andrews, who had signed a three-year, $39.3 million extension in December, was the only Ravens tight end still under contract when free agency opened in March. Soon he was joined by Durham Smythe, a reliable blocker who had worked with offensive coordinator Declan Doyle in Chicago. Then came the rookies: fourth-round pick Matt Hibner and fifth-round pick Josh Cuevas, both speedy prospects, as well as undrafted signing Ty Pezza.

Doyle, a former tight ends coach for the Denver Broncos, helped oversee a Bears offense last year that got over 1,000 yards from its tight ends and turned first-round pick Colston Loveland into a star. Weaponizing the position in Baltimore will be one of his biggest challenges.

Ravens tight ends finished 18th in the NFL last season in receiving yards (862), 18th in yards per route run (1.4) and 25th in expected points added per target (0.14), according to Sports Info Solutions. Lamar Jackson, one of the NFL’s best quarterbacks on throws over the middle, averaged a career-low 52.5 yards per game on passes to tight ends. Andrews, long one of his favorite targets, finished with a career-low 422 receiving yards.

Two weeks into training camp, Ravens tight ends have racked up targets in Doyle’s play-action-heavy attack. But explosive plays, the foundation of Doyle’s offensive philosophy, have not followed. According to play-by-play charting of the Ravens’ first-team offense, only one tight end has caught a pass at least 15 yards downfield in a team drill since their first padded practice on Aug. 3. It happened to be Smythe, the Ravens’ least explosive player at the position, and came at the end of a hurry-up period that ended with time running out on Jackson.

As receivers, the tight ends have struggled with the basics. Andrews opened camp with a couple of drops and hasn’t kicked the habit yet. He couldn’t hold on to his first target Tuesday, a ball from Jackson that safety Kyle Hamilton seemed to jar loose from behind. Later, Cuevas was wide open as he ran a crosser, only to drop a pass from undrafted rookie quarterback Joe Fagnano. He ended practice by bobbling a catchable Fagnano pass that eluded him in the red zone. Hibner has been more consistent, but his hands haven’t been sure things, either.

Perhaps these are just necessary growing pains. Ravens tight ends have both phases of Doyle’s playbook to master: the passing concepts in his drop-back game and the blocking concepts in his running game. It’s hard to play fast in August, when one offensive install period blends into another. Cuevas said the transition from college schemes to NFL schemes “can get pretty overwhelming.”

“I think the way this offense is taught … you kind of want to stress the players as much as possible, as fast as possible,” Smythe said. “So at the beginning of teaching things, it can be a little rough because there’s so much information thrown at you at once. But I think over the longevity of the season — which you kind of saw with us last year in Chicago — we started a little slow, and then everything caught on at once. Obviously, we’re in a race to master it faster than that.”

That mastery could shape the near future of the Ravens’ offense. Under former coordinator Todd Monken, the team leaned on heavier personnel groupings — multiple tight ends on the field, two-back sets with Ricard — to establish its dominant rushing attack and play-action-passing game. In Andrews and Likely, the Ravens had receivers who could run by linebackers and safeties in coverage. In Kolar and Ricard, they had blockers who could take on hulking edge rushers in the run game.

Now the Ravens’ options are thinner. Andrews is still looking to re-establish himself as one of the best receivers at the position. Smythe is the room’s only proven in-line blocker. Hibner has star potential — general manager Eric DeCosta traded up in the draft to get him, coveting his field-stretching speed — but the 24-year-old acknowledged Tuesday that he’s still figuring out where in the offense he fits best.

A year ago, Hibner was blocking defensive ends considerably younger than him at Southern Methodist’s preseason practices. On Tuesday, he was up against Trey Hendrickson and Tavius Robinson. There was no time to worry about tomorrow.

“There’s definitely a level up” from college, Hibner said. “Every play is probably a little bit higher in intensity. There’s a lot more athleticism on the field as a whole. But football is football. So you just try to level up as the game levels up.”