Lamar Jackson.

Absolutely nothing.

You didn't prove anything to me.

What were we surprised by?

Hey, get caught!

A cramp, he said, came back out through that 44 yard touchdown pass.

The marquees Brown Hollywood Brown deserves a lot of credit, but let's face reality.

Lamar Jackson was sensational because we saw him do things that no one else could do from the quarterback position when it comes to running the football, and he definitely deserves props for that.

He went four for four in the final drive.

We understand what you know.

Second, last driver, if I remember correctly, the guy was sensational last night.

Please don't get me wrong.

But what I saw from Lamar Jackson is what I expect to see.

A guy that is electrifying running the football and you that leaves you standing there or by saying to yourself, Excuse me, if this brother ever gets toe a point where he could be 60% 70% off himself, throwing the football as well as he is at running the football, then this brother would be in the M V P conversation.

Each and every single year for the foreseeable future because he's that electrifying running the football.

But in the end, when I see this guy, I do say to myself, Excuse me, there was a big chunk of this game where him throwing the football wasn't necessarily there.

He wasn't that adroit at it.

So in the end, when I look at it, I say Lamar Jackson is that Dude is electrifying, spectacular.

We all know he's a game changer, etcetera, etcetera.

But are you gonna let him run for 124 yards in the postseason?

You might not be able to prevent that, But in the event that you forced him to throw the football, is he gonna be able to do that effectively for you?

That's still left.

The question mark for me.

What happened to you?

What happened to you along the way?

Stephen A.

Smith.

I remember when you were a tabloid writer.

Top tabloid just refers to the size of the print in the in the paper.

Everyone who grows up, who's actually read the talking about sports mhm New York Daily News Boy Philadelphia Inquirer's broadsheet Yet, right?

Oh, excuse me, Phil Philadelphia.

I'm referring to The Daily News.

The point is, I remember Stephen A.

Smith.

One of the great things about reading Stephen A.

Smith was he saw the big picture.

Everyone else's quibbling about the little stuff, and they see little and they're missing the big picture.

Stephen A saw the big picture and encapsulated it and spun it forward Stephen A.

Smith coming out here talking about all the little details that actually don't matter today.

What matters today, Stephen A.

Of course, Lamar Jackson proves something.

Last night that was a game with nine rushing touchdowns in an era of passing, passing, passing nine rushing touchdowns.

When Lamar comes back into the game hot, you know, Mrs the fourth quarter gets the bowl on fourth down, the first time he touches the ball, the it's fourth down and completes a 44 yard your past escapes pressure, rolls out, uses his legs, keeps his eyes down the field and throws a 44 yard strike for a touchdown to give the Ravens the lead on.

And you want to talk about the fact that he did it.

That's a Willis Reed moment.

I know Stephen A.

That this is not the playoffs, but it's a big game.

It's a Monday night football game against the Cleveland Browns, who are ascending in the division Right now.

They're in the playoffs, not the Ravens, at least heading into the game.

And then, after throwing the 44 yard strike, Baker Mayfield leads him right back down the field.

Now, how does the team respond to that?

Damn.

The other guy just did it.

You even saw Baker nodding on the sidelines like, Okay, I got to do it.

I'm gonna get this done.

And the maturity and development of Baker.

He was really on display, and after doing that, was the team demoralized?

There's like a minute to go.

Lamar Jackson's got to get us into field goal range.

Got a great field goal kicker, but still four completions to get them into field goal range.

So you mean to tell me Lamar Jackson, who can't pass when it matters, right?

Who can't beat the big team under the spotlight?

I've said that who uses his legs, but can he get it done with?

His arm comes in on fourth down, fourth and five throws a 44 yard strike for a touchdown to give you a lead.

And then, instead of being demoralized, the team obviously is energized by him.

Four completions.

You're in field goal range and you win the game.

And today stay.

Stephen A.

Smith wants to come out and quibble about the fact that they ran the ball a lot.

What happened?

Well, I'm not quite well.

Well, first of all, you're not hearing my point, but there's nothing new there.

I know it's hard for you to comprehend where I'm coming from, because I don't say whoops when I'm wrong and move forward like I never was wrong.

I acknowledge it, but here's the reality of the situation.

When you look at Lamar Jackson, when you look at Lamar Jackson, I will remind you Max Kellerman, that coming into the playoffs last year, I took the same position that I'm taking now.

It was you that was raving about what he had been doing against everybody in the regular season, and I kept telling you, Excuse me when you play the quarterback position, if you're gonna make things happen, you've got to be able to throw the football.

So everything that I'm going to analyze and dissect about you is gonna be based off of that premise, particularly when it's coupled with expectations that precede the season.

So coming into this season we're looking at the Baltimore Ravens were predicting They're gonna win the A F C North.

Obviously, they're falling off a little bit.

The Pittsburgh Steelers surprised everybody.

They go out to 11 straight wins to start this season.

We see the Baltimore Ravens have some trouble.

We know some of it was due to covert 19 and beyond.

We get all of that.

But we also saw Lamar Jackson, who suffered riel symptoms from Cove in 19.

We understand because I think he slept like 10 straight days.

According to the reports of what happened, He was really, really feeling the effects of it.

And if we're gonna look at Cam Newton and say some residual effects from that might have affected his play, we can definitely surmise that the same could be possible with Lamar Jackson.

But in the end, we have to postseason losses and as many appearances to fall back on.

We have his electrifying running ability, but its inability to throw the football effectively toe fall back on so when I look at him last night and taking this heroics at the late game aside because we have to acknowledge that that did happen.

I'm looking at the vast majority of this game was predicated on his ability to run the football and Baltimore's ability to run the football because they ran for over 230 yards last night against this Cleveland Brown squad.

So when I look at it from that perspective, what I'm doing is imagining a defense that could lock in on you in a fashion that forces you to be a thrower.

And I'm asking myself, Could Lamar Jackson that we see in the regular season deliver that?

I'm saying I still haven't seen that yet.

Thanks for watching ESPN on YouTube for live streaming sports and premium content.