Despite an unsettled contract situation with the team, Baltimore Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco reported for voluntary workouts Monday, according to the team’s official twitter account.

#Ravens QB Joe Flacco is at the team's voluntary strength and conditioning program

—
Baltimore Ravens (@Ravens) April 16, 2012

Back in March at the NFL Annual Meeting in New Orleans, Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti told the Baltimore Sun that he envisions a new contract for Flacco before his contract expires after the 2012 season.  No deal has been settled on yet.

Ray Rice, who is also in the midst of negotiating a long-term contract, chose not to report for voluntary workouts Monday despite having the franchise tag applied to him.  Among the first players to report for the workouts was cornerback Lardarius Webb, who recently signed a six-year, $50 million deal with the team.

In a recent radio interview, Baltimore Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco stated that he thinks he is the best quarterback in the NFL, according to ESPN.com.

“I assume everybody thinks they’re a top-five quarterback,” Flacco said to WNST 1570 in Baltimore when asked where he ranks among NFL quarterbacks. “I mean, I think I’m the best. I don’t think I’m top five, I think I’m the best. I don’t think I’d be very successful at my job if I didn’t feel that way. I mean, c’mon? That’s not really too tough of a question.”

Flacco is currently in the final year on his rookie contract since being drafted in the first round in 2008.  His agent Joe Linta has expressed that he and Flacco believe the quarterback should be treated like the league’s best and he wants a deal done soon.  However, Flacco did say, “It’s not about the money. It’s about what you feel you deserve.  At the end of the day, they’ll take care of it and I’ll be waiting.”

Flacco’s overall numbers have been considered underwhelming by many.  However, he did lead the Ravens to the playoffs with 12-4 record last season, with his squad ultimately losing to the New England Patriots in the AFC Championship Game.  In 2011, Flacco compiled an 80.9 qb rating, throwing for 3,610 yards and 20 touchdowns.

The Baltimore Ravens have hired former Indianapolis Colts head coach Jim Caldwell as the new quarterback coach, according to the Ravens’ official twitter account.

#Ravens have officially hired Jim Caldwell as their Quarterbacks Coach

—
Baltimore Ravens (@Ravens) January 30, 2012

Caldwell will work with quarterback Joe Flacco alongside offensive coordinator Cam Cameron.   Before being hired by the Ravens, Caldwell was interviewed by the Pittsburgh Steelers for the offensive coordinator job.

Caldwell, 57, has been a quarterbacks coach for 15 seasons, including seven (2002-08) with Manning and the Colts.   Coaching the team for three years after taking over for Tony Dungy in 2009, Caldwell’s tenure with the Colts ended in 26-22 record including one AFC title and two division titles.

Ravens Quarterback Joe Flacco responded to Ed Reed’s comments to SiriusXM NFL Radio on Flacco’s “rattled” play in the win against the Houston Texans last Sunday, according to USA Today.

“I said, ‘Yo, bro, what are you doing to me? I mean I already take enough, and now you gotta come out and say this.’ You never know what context it was said in — you know, live — and you never know what he was really thinking in his mind about what he meant by it.” Flacco told NFL Network’s NFL Total Access on Wednesday .

“ [Reed] kinda laughed about it and wanted to give me a hug and all that,” Flacco said, asserting that there was no rift in the locker room. “Like I said, you never know what he was actually thinking and stuff like that when he answered the question. It didn’t sound good, it’s not a big deal.”

In the Ravens’ opening playoff game last weekend, Flacco completed 14 of 27 passes for 176 yards and was sacked five times in a 20-13 win over the Texans.

This Sunday, the Ravens will travel to Foxboro to face Tom Brady and the No. 1 seeded New England Patriots in the AFC Championship game.  Brady is 4-1 against Baltimore; however, his 71.4 quarterback rating in those contests is his lowest against any team.

Baltimore Ravens safety Ed Reed said that he believed that quarterback Joe Flacco was “rattled” in the team’s divisional matchup with the Houston Texans, according to ESPN.com.

“I think Joe was kind of rattled a little bit by (Houston’s) defense,” Reed said, according to the report. “(The Texans) had a lot of guys in the box on him. And, I mean, they were getting to him. I think a couple times he needed to get rid of the ball. I don’t know how much of the play-calling … but it just didn’t look like he had a hold on the offense. … It was just kind of like (Baltimore’s coaches) was telling him to do, throw the ball or get it here, you know, get it to certain guys. And he can’t play like that.”

Flacco was sacked several times, and Reed also said that some of the blame falls on the offensive line.

“[T]he offensive line gotta block better,” Reed said, according to the report. “You know, they gotta communicate better, gotta pick up blocks (and) Joe’s gotta get the ball out of his hand.”

The Ravens will play the New England Patriots Sunday with a trip to the Super Bowl on the line.

When you stack him up against the great quarterbacks still standing in these NFL playoffs — Aaron Rodgers, Drew Brees, Tom Brady and the like — the Baltimore Ravens’ Joe Flacco doesn’t exactly stack up favorably. But Flacco is tired of listening to the criticism.

“I don’t care,” Flacco told the Baltimore Sun after today’s practice. “We’ve won a lot of games around here. This is the second year in a row we’ve won 12 games. I could care less. At the end of the day, do you see the criticism sometimes and say, ‘What the hell are they talking about?’ Yeah. But who cares?”

Reminded today that mostly big-name quarterbacks — the three named above, plus Ben Roethlisberger and two brothers named Manning — have won all of the last eight Super Bowls, Flacco told reporters that he resented the praise that’s heaped upon the league’s championship-winning QBs.

“If you look at the teams that won, yeah, you can look at the quarterbacks, but that’s just because you guys, ESPN, everybody wants to pump them up as being the best quarterback that year,” he said. “But I’m sure if we win, I’ll have nothing to do with why we won, according to you guys.”

Flacco has started every single game for the Ravens in his four-year NFL career. He’s thrown for 13,816 yards and 80 touchdowns in 64 career games.

The Ravens take on the Houston Texans in the wild-card round of the playoffs at 1 p.m. Sunday.

Baltimore Ravens star quarterback Joe Flacco says he is baffled by how much more coverage the media gives Tim Tebow over the Baltimore Ravens, according to NFL.com.

“I mean, look at Tim Tebow,” Flacco told Baltimore Sports 1570 AM. “I like Tim, but you have a tendency to want to — I don’t want to see Tim do bad — but look what happens after he wins a football game. If you watched SportsCenter today, it was Tim Tebow then something else, Tim Tebow then something else, and Tim Tebow then something else. When we beat the Steelers, were we on TV? No. I couldn’t even find a Baltimore Ravens highlight. I think that’s kinda the way it is around Baltimore. We don’t always get our respect but you gotta deal with it and go out there every week and just win football games.”

Flacco and Tebow come from polar opposite backgrounds. The 26-year-old Ravens quarterback was drafted out of the University of Delaware, an NCAA Football Championship Subdivision, and has kept a relatively low profile as the starter for Baltimore for the past four seasons. Tebow, on the other hand, played for one of the top football programs in the country, Florida, and won two National Championships and the Heisman Trophy award during his college football tenure.

The Broncos, 8-5, are currently on a six game winning streak with Tebow as their starter. The Ravens, 10-3, have won their previous four games in a row.