ExtremeRavens Posted yesterday at 01:30 PM Posted yesterday at 01:30 PM The Ravens kept their playoff hopes alive with a resounding victory in Cincinnati. The competition stiffens in another must-win game Sunday night against the 11-win New England Patriots. Who will have the advantage? Ravens passing game vs. Patriots pass defense Lamar Jackson has never lost a game that he’s started in the final four weeks of the regular season. He’s a perfect 16-0. This home stretch will be as important a December schedule as he’s had, with the Ravens’ margin for error nearly nonexistent. Lucky for Baltimore, Jackson’s stretch of odd and uncharacteristic outings might be behind him. He endured a five-game rough patch without completing more than 60% of his passes. Various lower body injuries restricted his ability to make plays with his legs, too. This past weekend, Jackson was an efficient 8 of 12 with two vintage scoring drives. His best football of the season might be ahead of him. The Patriots have a good defense, but they aren’t world beaters. Plus, four defensive starters missed practice all week. Since Week 8, they have 11 sacks, which is the second fewest in the league over that span. And they don’t force takeaways at a high clip. When the Ravens aren’t beating themselves, those are the two categories that have hurt them the most in losses. EDGE: Ravens Patriots passing game vs. Ravens pass defense Two prominent gambling sites, DraftKings and FanDuel, give Drake Maye the second-best odds to be named the NFL Most Valuable Player. The 23-year-old was the frontrunner until last week, when the Patriots’ 10-game winning streak ended against Buffalo. Maye has the best completion rate in the NFL (70.9%), and he’s top five in passing yards (3,567), passing touchdowns (23) and yards per completion (8.7). “I’m going to be honest, I’m really impressed with Drake Maye,” Ravens defensive coordinator Zach Orr said. “I’m like, man, this guy’s in his second year, and he has full control of the whole offense. He’s running the show. Nobody’s telling him what to do. All the responsibility is on him, which is impressive. You really don’t see that with second-year guys, especially somebody in their first year in a new system.” On the flip side, Maye has been sacked 43 times. Defenses brought him down three times in each of the past two weeks. Some of that can be chalked up to losing his blindside blocker, rookie left tackle Will Campbell, to injury. Still, Maye is considered one of the best deep ball threats in football. He’s first in DVOA on deep passes of 16 or more air yards. Baltimore’s best hope is to disrupt the MVP candidate like they did against Joe Burrow in Cincinnati. EDGE: Patriots Ravens running game vs. Patriots run defense There is no clearer an advantage for the Ravens in this game than their rushing attack against New England’s run defense. Derrick Henry is coming off his most efficient outing of the year: 9.1 yards per attempt, churning out 100 yards on just 11 attempts. No surprise, he’s at his best when the temperature drops and the pressure heats up. Keaton Mitchell has been an admirable complementary carrier. He’s eclipsed 8 yards per carry on eight or fewer attempts in each of his past three outings. Tasked with stopping Baltimore’s version of Sonic and Knuckles is a New England run defense which has plummeted in recent weeks. Nine games into this season, the Patriots ranked third in EPA/rush (-0.14) and yards per carry (3.6). The Patriots are 29th (+0.07) and 26th (4.8), respectively, over the past five games. EDGE: Ravens Patriots running game vs. Ravens run defense As Ravens safety Kyle Hamilton put it, New England is going to keep running “until you stop it.” Maye can extend plays with his legs. TreVeyon Henderson and Rhamondre Stevenson account for a top half of the league ground game. All three have combined for 14 rushing scores. Henderson and Stevenson “can gash you for big runs and also run downhill and get out of the backfield, so it presents a lot of problems,” Hamilton said. But Baltimore doesn’t allow many explosive rushes. In fact, the Ravens rank first in the NFL over the past month. They’re also second in rush success rate and EPA per rush — a far cry from where they started the year. EDGE: Ravens Ravens special teams vs. Patriots special teams New England’s special teams unit hasn’t had many problems this season. But the Patriots struggled mightily against the Bills, allowing returns of 38, 45 and 58 yards. Two of them led to touchdown drives. Baltimore brings big-play threats in the third phase and has consistently stopped opposing teams from flipping the field. There are few opponents on the Ravens’ schedule with a tougher special teams unit. EDGE: Ravens Ravens intangibles vs. Patriots intangibles To John Harbaugh, it was a sour question. Is the Ravens’ 3-5 home record a point of frustration? “No, I don’t even know what you’re talking about,” the longtime coach snapped. “A point of frustration? No. The guys are locked in for the next game. That’s it, period.” Baltimore hasn’t had its quarterback in a pair of the five home losses, but an inability to defend home turf is a troubling stat. It’s an indictment on this topsy-turvy season, an inability to string wins together. The Patriots, alternatively, haven’t lost a road game this season. They’re a perfect 6-0. “When you go into those hostile environments, we’re all we got,” star receiver Stefon Diggs told reporters this week. “For real, for real. Whether it’s the coaches, whether it’s the players, it’s hyper-sensitive.” That’s how the Patriots carry themselves, like underdogs and castoffs. EDGE: Patriots Prediction Last Sunday’s win looked like the Ravens might have turned a corner in a few ways: their defense played with some swagger and the offense moved the ball efficiently. It was a confident, well-rounded win with help from all three phases. But that was against the Bengals (4-10). These are the Patriots (11-3) we’re talking about. And the last time the Ravens beat a time with a winning record was the Bears … in October. They haven’t been very good at home either. I think they show up and give New England a fight but their hopes of a late-season playoff push diminish drastically late Sunday night. Patriots 27, Ravens 24. Have a news tip? Contact Sam Cohn at scohn@baltsun.com, 410-332-6200 and x.com/samdcohn.x.com. View the full article Quote
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.