Ravens declare Joe Flacco ready to go for Week 1

Joe Flacco has only recently returned to practice, but he’s been deemed ready for Week 1.

A back injury sidelined Baltimore Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco for all of training camp and all four preseason games, which cast his status for Week 1 into doubt and opened up some speculation about the team signing Colin Kaepernick. But the consistent vibe from the team pointed to Flacco being fine for Week 1, and he returned to practice over the weekend.

With only Ryan Mallett behind him on the depth chart after the roster was cut to 53, Flacco’s return health is obviously important. Even at less at full strength, he gives the Ravens their best chance to win Week 1 against the Cincinnati Bengals and any games beyond that.

If confirmation was really needed, Ravens’ head coach John Harbaugh gave a clear declaration of Flacco’s status for Sunday’s season opener on Wednesday morning.

Flacco has been dealing with a disc issue in his back, which seems unlikely to have just magically gone away with rest and presumably some sort of treatment. Exercising extra caution during camp and meaningless preseason games is fine in regard to a starting quarterback, but Flacco could deal with this back issue off and on all season and a missed game or two is easy to see coming.

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Flacco has missed just six starts in nine seasons as Baltimore’s quarterback, and they all came when he suffered a torn ACL and MCL in his left knee and missed the rest of the 2015 season. So he’s not necessarily a huge durability concern, even as a 32-year old stationary pocket passer behind what looks to be a thin offensive line this year. But make no mistake about it, Flacco’s back will be at the front of the conversation about the Ravens’ 2017 season until proven otherwise.