Vote for the Baltimore Ravens’ Rookie of the Year for the 2024 season.
The 2024-2025 NFL season is complete, but before the chapter is closed, we want a final look at the joys that came from the Baltimore Ravens’ season.
So, let’s celebrate the successes by handing out our second-annual Baltimore Beatdown Awards. Today, we continue with Rookie of the Year.
Beatdown contributors will offer up our nominees, but the winner is ultimately decided by you, the reader, with a poll at each article’s end.
Baltimore Beatdown’s Rookie of the Year
Kyle Phoenix: OT Roger Rosengarten
For all the impressive potential and splash plays made by first-round cornerback Nate Wiggins, I’m locked in with Rosengarten. He played 1,066 snaps this season, tied for No. 24 among all tackles in the NFL this season with fellow rookie tackle Joe Alt. His growth, improvement and overall consistency led to the Ravens becoming one of the best offenses in not only recent NFL history, but since its inception.
In his first season, Rosengarten allowed four sacks, one quarterback hit. Not one of those came from divisional games where he faced a litany of the NFL’s best pass rushers. For him to make such an impact with clear potential on the horizon, Rosengarten is a home-run hit from GM Eric DeCosta, and he’s my surefire rookie of the year.
Nikhil Mehta: CB Nate Wiggins
Is a first-rounder a boring pick for Rookie of the Year? Maybe, but Nate Wiggins put together an excellent 2024, especially for a 21-year-old learning a complex defense. The primary draft-day concern surrounding Wiggins was size, but he added almost 10 pounds over the summer in Baltimore and put together a strong training camp. An injury to Arthur Maulet forced Marlon Humphrey to play in the slot, giving Wiggins a chance to start on the outside right away. He dealt with the same early-season woes as the rest of the defense, but picked up his game by Week 7 and finished the year as one of the best cornerbacks in the NFL. According to Pro Football Focus, Wiggins’ 50% catch rate allowed and 64.6 passer rating when targeted ranked among the top four starting CBs in the regular season. He also didn’t give up a single touchdown in that period and finished second among all DBs in coverage EPA (-28.4).
The Ravens’ excitement in drafting Wiggins was about his long-term ceiling as a young, talented cornerback with unteachable length and speed. But his floor as a rookie was impressive this year, with a snap share just under 70% and coverage skills that encouraged opposing quarterbacks to target other parts of the field. Wiggins can only get better from here, making it clear that Baltimore has found their next young lockdown CB.
Joshua Reed: RT Roger Rosengarten
After opening the regular season taking fewer snaps in a two-man rotation, the second-rounder got a chance to become a full-time starter once versatile veteran Patrick Mekari moved over to left guard and seized that spot. Rosengarten improved each week and established himself as one of the best young linemen in the game by the end of the season whose best performances came against the best competition. He was the highest-graded Ravens offensive lineman by Pro Football Focus when they went up against the Philadelphia Eagles’ fearsome defensive front in Week 13 of the regular season.
The highest-graded Ravens in Week 13 vs the Eagles:
Roger Rosengarten – 79.6
Marlon Humphrey – 74.9
Mark Andrews – 72.1
Ronnie Stanley – 71.1
Travis Jones – 70.8 pic.twitter.com/N19YJPK7yF— PFF BAL Ravens (@PFF_Ravens) December 2, 2024
His most impressive performances of the season came against former Defensive Player of the Year and future first-ballot Hall of Famer, Pittsburgh Steelers outside linebacker T.J. Watt. In three matchups between the regular and postseason, Rosengarten didn’t give up any sacks and hardly any pressures when they were lined up against each other including completely blanking Watt from the box score sheet entirely in the Ravens’ resounding Wildcard Round victory. With two-time Pro Bowl veteran left tackle Ronnie Stanley slated to become an unrestricted free agent this offseason, phase two of the team’s rebuild of the offensive line that began with moving on from three starters last year could include Rosengarten becoming the next blindside protector for franchise quarterback Lamar Jackson in his second season.
Zach Canter: OT Roger Rosengarten
After being drafted in the second round, Rosengarten was immediately expected to be the starting right tackle on opening night. Despite the clear intentions and a good preseason, Rosengarten opened the season as the backup and his first career snap was getting beat by Chris Jones for a strip sack. He could only go up from there.
Rosengarten took the full time right tackle job in Week 4 and never looked back. While it wasn’t always pretty, Rosengarten steadily improved and by the end of the season, was the definition of a bookend tackle. The highlights came at the end of the season with a viral clip of Myles Garrett talking with Rosengarten then the very next week in the playoffs where Rosengarten kept TJ Watt, a Raven-killer his entire career, completely off the stat the sheet. While the near future is in flux with left tackle Ronnie Stanley becoming a free agent and Rosengarten could potentially flip spots, at least one tackle spot is secured for the next couple of seasons, no matter which side he plays on.