BALTIMORE — Confronted with allegations of inappropriate behavior by kicker Justin Tucker, the Ravens have responded with a single statement released last month on the day the story broke:

“We are aware of the Baltimore Banner’s story regarding Justin Tucker. We take any allegations of this nature seriously and will continue to monitor the situation.”

That cautious stance is the right one for now, said public relations professionals who specialize in helping companies through crises.

“Silence is golden at this point,” said Bill Atkinson, president and CEO of Baltimore-based Atkinson Strategic Communications. “Being silent is basically a strategy because this thing is fluid. You want to come out with a statement and set the record … and then you just kind of want to back off, and it’s going to ebb and flow.”

Eventually, Atkinson and others said, the Ravens will have to say more.

Six massage therapists from five high-end spas accused Tucker of “exposing his genitals, brushing two of them with his exposed penis and leaving what they believed to be ejaculate on the massage table after three of his treatments” between 2012 and 2016, The Baltimore Banner reported last month. Three more therapists came forward after the initial report, accusing Tucker of similar inappropriate behavior in interviews with The Baltimore Sun and The Banner.

General manager Eric DeCosta and coach John Harbaugh could hear more pointed questions about Tucker as early as the end of this month at the NFL scouting combine in Indianapolis. In the weeks after that, they will have to decide, in conjunction with owner Steve Bisciotti and team president Sashi Brown, whether Tucker, coming off his worst NFL season, will be the team’s kicker in 2025.

If the answer is yes, they will have to prepare for Tucker’s first interactions with reporters this summer and for potential backlash from fans disinclined to give the seven-time Pro Bowl kicker the benefit of the doubt. Possible NFL discipline is also a consideration after Commissioner Roger Goodell said the league will look into the “serious” allegations against Tucker.

Tucker has already issued a lengthy denial, calling the accusations against him from nine Baltimore-area massage therapists “unequivocally false.”

The Ravens’ stance is a separate matter. They could release the 35-year-old Tucker and save $4.2 million, along with avoiding months of uncomfortable questions, if they execute the move after June 1. Or they could stick with Harbaugh and DeCosta’s assertions — before the allegations came to light — that Tucker would be their kicker next season.

Crisis managers said that once Ravens officials know the facts of the case as well as possible, they’ll ask whether Tucker’s brand fits with their brand going forward. Regardless of the answer, their stakeholders — fans in this case — will expect an explanation of how they came to it.

Whether the Ravens keep Tucker or not, advocates for sexual assault victims said they’d like to hear more from the team.

“It is important for the team to condemn sexual harassment while they wait for this case to be investigated,” said Lisae Jordan, executive director for the Maryland Coalition Against Sexual Assault. “As a football team, they are in a strong position to bring attention to the issue of sexual harassment and assault and to make it clear that there is no excuse to touch someone without consent.”

Kathleen Cahill is a Ravens fan and Towson-based attorney who works on sexual harassment and misconduct cases. “I would like to hear more than, ‘There’s a legal process, and we have to respect the legal process,' ” she said. “I would like to see them be transparent and consider the dignity of the women. … If the reporting is accurate that these women didn’t know each other and they have these accounts that are strikingly similar, then the Ravens need to do something. Doing nothing is absolutely unacceptable.”

The Ravens are no strangers to dealing with public relations crises around their star players.

Just as they were on the cusp of contending for the first time in 2000, their signature star, linebacker Ray Lewis, was arrested and charged with murder in connection with a stabbing outside an Atlanta nightclub.

Four years later, Jamal Lewis, fresh off leading the NFL in rushing, was indicted on federal drug conspiracy charges.

In 2014, franchise leaders were forced to reconsider their entire approach to evaluating players and relating to female fans and employees after a video emerged of running back Ray Rice striking his future wife in an Atlantic City casino elevator.

None of these cases are directly comparable to the allegations against Tucker, who, according to Maryland case search, is not facing criminal or civil charges as of Thursday. That does not mean there are no lessons to be gleaned from the Ravens’ responses over the years.

In general, they have stood by their star players during these public relations storms, a tone set by their handling of the Ray Lewis case 25 years ago.

Almost four months before the charges against Lewis were dropped in exchange for his testimony against his companions and a plea bargain to a misdemeanor of obstruction of justice, the Ravens held a news conference at which the All-Pro linebacker declared his innocence and coach Brian Billick laid out the rules for how he — and he alone — would address the situation going forward.

“Keep in mind that while there needs to be timely and informative internal communication, there must be cautious and limited external communication,” Billick wrote on NFL.com in 2013, explaining how the Ravens handled the charges against their greatest player. “Throughout the ordeal, we made certain to reiterate three main points of our message. First, we were sympathetic to the families involved in the incident and respectful of the loss of life. Second, we continued to reaffirm our faith in Ray. And finally — the most difficult of the three — we reaffirmed our faith in the judicial process.”

Billick maintained his discipline. As the Ravens prepared for the Super Bowl the next January, he told reporters: “As much as some of you want to, we are not going to retry this. It’s inappropriate, and you’re not qualified.”

Billick spoke just as forcefully on Jamal Lewis’ behalf after the star running back was indicted in 2004, saying: “We have a great deal of faith in Jamal and a great deal of faith in the process. I have no doubt he will find his way out of this difficulty.”

Jamal Lewis ultimately pleaded guilty to using a cellphone to facilitate a drug transaction — a deal that included four months in federal prison — after he said he received assurances from the Ravens that the plea would not impact his future status with the team.

In Rice’s case, it was the video, posted by TMZ almost seven months after the violent act it captured, that changed everything. The Ravens had stuck by him to that point, with high-ranking team officials testifying to his good character. The star running back was training with his teammates for the start of the 2014 season when the world saw that footage of him throwing a left-handed punch to his fiancée’s jaw.

The Ravens released Rice hours later, but that did not save them or the NFL from a reckoning with an angry, disappointed public. How much did they know? When did they know it? How could they have thought it was OK to forgive such an ugly act after a mere two-game suspension?

It was in response to these painful questions that Bisciotti and his top lieutenants promised a tougher stance on domestic violence and a comprehensive effort to deepen ties to the community organizations fighting it.

Asked at a tense news conference if the Ravens would have zero tolerance for domestic violence going forward, Bisciotti responded: “I give you my word that some things are going to change. I give you my word. I think that’s pretty safe [to say].”

It’s that statement observers have pointed back to in wondering whether the allegations against Tucker — with no criminal or civil actions attached and a possible NFL investigation pending — would trigger a “zero tolerance” response from the Ravens.

It’s a statement Harbaugh referred back to in 2022, after the Cleveland Browns traded for quarterback Deshaun Watson and gave him the largest guaranteed contract in NFL history while he was facing allegations of sexual misconduct from more than 20 massage therapists. Harbaugh said: “Basically, we’re kind of zero tolerance. You have to know the truth, you have to try to understand the circumstances, but we’ve stayed away from that particular situation — when we draft players, when we sign them as free agents.”

In reality, zero tolerance was always a more complicated idea than some made it sound. In his very next response at that 2014 news conference, Bisciotti said: “Can we avoid situations like Ray Rice’s? Absolutely not. Will we handle it differently? One hundred percent I guarantee you we will. But will it be the minute it happens? Do we cut him? Because we are so close to bordering on a slippery slope the other way with this whole scarlet letter thing.”

In describing his management philosophy, the Ravens owner has long said he tries not to make hasty decisions or allow heightened emotions to dictate his actions.

The Ravens are taking a wait-and-see approach with Tucker, just as they did last year when Baltimore County Police investigated a report of a “violent domestic incident” possibly connected to wide receiver Zay Flowers. Police suspended that investigation without charging Flowers, who faced no discipline from the NFL and played for the Ravens without interruption.

The complexities of zero tolerance aside, the Ravens earned credibility in the wake of the Rice crisis by establishing partnerships, backed by hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations, with anti-violence groups.

Five years after the incident, Sandi Timmins, executive director for House of Ruth Maryland, which works against intimate partner violence with an array of support and training programs, called it an “awakening” that spurred meaningful conversations about how to unlearn violent behavior.

Rice also gradually rebuilt his place in the community, never playing in the NFL again but using his experience as a cautionary tale to promote anti-violence work. He recently took a job as a football coach at Milford Mill High School.

Will the Ravens stand by Tucker and weather the storm around him? Atkinson said it’s entirely possible.

“But at some point, you are going to have to come out and address it in a public forum, because the season’s going to start,” he said. “Part of this depends on what they’re going to do with [Tucker]. If he is their kicker and they fully believe in him, they will support him at every turn. That’s how I would play it. I hate to say it, but people forget these things.”

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