Baltimore is not yet eliminated, but the team is hanging by a thread. Rams are next.
Sunday, December 26, 2021, Cincinnati, OH: ‘Twas the day after Christmas, and all through the team, with a skeleton crew, it felt more like Halloween.”
That’s how scary the Ravens’ prospects looked Sunday at Paul Brown Stadium as they tried to avoid getting swept by the Cincinnati Bengals for the first time since 2015. That was also the year the Bengals last had a winning season and AFC North Division title. Not only that, Baltimore was trying to prevent a fourth straight regular-season loss for only the second time since John Harbaugh became the coach.
The only other instance happened five years ago, in October of 2016, when the Ravens lost home games to Oakland and Washington and road contests at the New York Giants and Jets.
But with an injury- and a COVID-riddled roster–complete with a host of practice-squadders being asked to suit up–the Ravens’ season sunk further into oblivion with a 41-21 loss to the Bengals in front of 63,922 delighted Queen City fans. With the win, Cincinnati became the first Raven opponent in team history to post multiple 40-point games against Baltimore within the same season.
While it is not likely the Ravens (8-7) will win the AFC North title, they can still fight their way through a thicket of teams in the wild-card chase. But they need teams like Pittsburgh, the Los Angeles Chargers, and others to lose. Surprisingly, the Chargers cooperated by falling to the woebegone Houston Texans.
The Ravens have been the living embodiment of the old saying””When it rains, it pours.” To wit:
–One of their practices over the course of the week featured only 13 healthy defensive players.
–Eleven practice-squad players were called up to the active roster, partially because the team had ten on the COVID list.
–Seven starters remain on injured reserve, including nearly the entire starting secondary.
–A third-string quarterback, Josh Johnson, got the start in place of COVID victim Tyler Huntley, giving the Ravens three different starting quarterbacks in three weeks for the first time in team history.
For his part, Johnson, who starred for the Ravens during the 2016 preseason, played relatively well, completing 28 of 40 passes for 304 yards, two touchdowns, one interception, one sack, and a 98.3 passer rating. But it was the Bengals’ second-year signal-caller Joe Burrow who stole the show, passing for a club single-game record 525 yards, continuing to stay in the game and throw despite having the game well in hand in the fourth quarter.
Burrow was seen by Bengals’ fans as a Pro Bowl snub, while Lamar Jackson, who did not make the trip to Cincinnati, earned an all-star berth. Burrows’ 525 yards also turned out to be the fourth-highest total by any quarterback in league history.
“They call their plays,” Harbaugh said. “We’ll get a bunch of guys healthy for next week and we’ll see what we can do.”
At the very least, the Ravens get to put away their suitcases, for the time being, what with their last two games at home, starting with next week’s visit by the NFC West Division-leading Los Angeles Rams (Sunday, January 2, 4:25 p.m.).
In the first meeting with the Bengals before Baltimore’s bye, it was rookie Ja’Marr Chase who did most of the damage. But this time it was another young receiver, ex-Clemson national champion Tee Higgins, who stepped to the fore with 194 yards on a dozen receptions. Chase had a rather quiet seven catches for 125 more.
Working against a Ravens secondary that featured names like Kevon Seymour and Daryl Worley, the Bengals (9-6) were able to play the Ravens’ possession-style game to gain and maintain control of the game flow. To make things worse, cornerback Anthony Averett had to exit the game with a rib injury. As a result, the Bengals got points on each of their first seven drives before Evan McPherson missed a 50-yard field goal.
The undermanned outclassed Ravens couldn’t’ keep pace, managing only to post Rashod Bateman’s first NFL touchdown catch, tight end Mark Andrews’s’ 18-yard touchdown reception, and Devonta Freeman’s two-yard run. Meanwhile, Burrows hot start turned into a 299-yard first half through the air, the most yards any Raven opponent had thrown over the first two quarters of any game in the team’s 26-year franchise history. The previous record (273 yards) was set by Kansas City’s Patrick Mahomes.
Mark Andrews: This whole year has been one thing after another. But there’s one thing that remains true: we continue to fight. It’s time to start winning games. That’s where my head is at.
In the end, it was a holiday tale that seemed hardly worth re-telling–and one that won’t become an annual tradition, either.
