The Baltimore Ravens 2025 secondary was dealt a devastating blow on the injury front before it could even take the field for a meaningful game.
Following the report that fifth-year veteran safety Ar’Darius Washington suffered a torn Achilles while conditioning that will likely cause him to miss the entire upcoming season, the team might quickly turn to the veteran free agent market to fill the void.
In order to properly address the key role the former undrafted gem was projected to play this year, they will need an experienced player with a physical playing style who excels at playing downhill in the box and can even play dime linebacker if needed. Here are five veteran safeties the Ravens could target to offset the loss of Washington to their outlook in 2025.
Jordan Whitehead
The eighth-year veteran comes with a wealth of experience, having started 101 of the 105 games he has appeared in and won a Super Bowl with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2020. Except for last season when he missed four games with a partially torn pectoral, Whitehead has been extremely durable throughout his career, having played at least 14 games in six of his first seven seasons in the league. He possesses the positional versatility that the Ravens covet at the position, having experience playing strong and free safety.
Despite playing in a career-low 12 games in 2024, Whitehead still managed to record the third-most total tackles of his career with 79, including two for a loss, to go along with a quarterback hit and three pass breakups. The average annual salaries of his last two contracts were $5.25 million or less, both of which were signed in the initial waves of free agency. Now that the 2025 NFL Draft has passed and he has sat on the open market for much longer, he could be open to playing for a contender with a glaring need, even if he wouldn’t be playing a full-time role.
Quandre Diggs
The former three-time Pro Bowler is the most experienced option left on the market with 120 career starts in 145 appearances. He is coming off a Lisfranc injury that required surgery to correct and ended his lone season with the Tennessee Titans in 2024 after just eight games. While Diggs has been a full-time starter with three different teams since 2018, the 32-year-old has only been to the playoffs three times and never gotten past the divisional round. He could be hungry enough for a legitimate chance at winning a title that he would consider signing with the Ravens at the cost of his consecutive starts streak.
Even though he didn’t record an interception or pass breakup in the games he appeared in last year, Diggs possesses impressive ball skills with 24 interceptions and 56 pass breakups in his career. Not only does he have free and strong safety positional flexibility, but he is familiar with the scheme the Ravens run on defense, having spent last season with former Ravens secondary coach Dennard Wilson was his defensive coordinator. The transition, assuming he is or once he is fully recovered from his injury, would be smoother than someone who is learning it for the first time.
Chuck Clark
While some fans may be torn on the possibility of a potential reunion, it would likely be welcomed by the Ravens, as they have a need at the position and are familiar with the ninth-year veteran. They originally drafted him in the sixth round of the 2017 NFL Draft out of Virginia Tech and gave him his first contract extension as he spent the first six seasons of his career in Baltimore.
The Ravens traded Clark to the New York Jets during the 2023 offseason, and after not missing a game due to injury in his entire career up to that point, a torn ACL cost him the entire next season. He appeared in and started 12 games in 2024, missed four midway through on injured reserve for an ankle injury, and finished with 69 total tackles, including one for a loss, a sack, a quarterback hit, a forced fumble, a fumble recovery and two pass breakups.
