Baltimore, MD – May 31, 2025
The question hangs uneasily in the air in Owings Mills. For years, Mark Andrews has been the steady heartbeat of Baltimore’s passing game — a red zone titan, a locker room anchor, and a safety net for Lamar Jackson when chaos breaks loose. But as the 2025 season approaches, a cloud of doubt surrounds the 29-year-old tight end, fueled by both hard numbers and harder memories.
Andrews is coming off a season that saw him post a career-high 11 touchdowns, and yet, it’s the two moments he didn’t deliver that continue to echo. A dropped two-point conversion and a crucial fumble in the Ravens’ devastating playoff loss to the Buffalo Bills have become rallying points for skepticism. While Andrews remains composed publicly, he doesn’t pretend the weight of that night has disappeared. “This is my life. I put a lot of work into this… it wasn’t the way that I had planned it, but that’s all part of the story,” he said recently. “I’ve been using it.”
Behind him, the shadow of Isaiah Likely grows longer. The younger tight end has earned praise from coaches, fans, and now even Head Coach John Harbaugh, who declared, “I want to see him be an All-Pro. He’s capable of it.” Likely’s dynamic style and positional versatility give him the edge in a league constantly evolving toward speed and flexibility. His rapport with Lamar Jackson is building — slowly but surely — and his upside is undeniable.
All the while, the business side of football looms. Andrews is entering the final year of his contract. The emergence of Likely, coupled with salary cap concerns and a front office under pressure to lock down other young stars, could make the veteran’s situation more precarious than it seems. When asked about his contract, Andrews replied simply: “It’s not for me to deal with that… I think I’ve been able to do it at the highest level for a long time, and I’m not slowing down.”
But slowing down may not be the issue. Regression might come not from physical decline, but from a shift in the offense itself — more mouths to feed, more plays for the emerging Zay Flowers, and the arrival of DeAndre Hopkins. Pro Football Focus has already warned that Andrews is a likely candidate for statistical regression in 2025.
None of this is to say Andrews is finished. But in a season where expectations are Super Bowl or bust, the margin for error is razor-thin — and the tight end who once felt like a guaranteed solution now finds himself at the heart of a question no one in Baltimore wants to answer out loud.
One drop doesn’t define a career. But it can start a countdown.
