The actual sequence won’t be released until May. But since we already know which teams the Ravens will play and where the games will take place, the “when” is the final mystery regarding the upcoming season.
The National Football League’s current scheduling formula, established in 2002 and amended in 2021 to account for a 17th game, has neatly laid out for each team what most of their opposition look like in future years. So, that’s why, when each season ends, I enjoy trying to predict what the following year’s Ravens schedule will look like.
It’s a fun, innocuous exercise that doesn’t really carry a lot of long-range importance, but I enjoy doing it each year, and recently, I’ve had a few predicted phenomena actually take place.
In 2018, I was only one week off in predicting when the Ravens would have their bye week and when they would play their home games against Cleveland, Pittsburgh, and New Orleans, as well as the road game at Cleveland. I was just two weeks off on the dates of the games against Oakland, Tampa Bay, and Buffalo.
This column did better in 2019 than ever before, getting the exact week right on three games (Cleveland, Week Four; at Cleveland, Week 16; Pittsburgh, Week 17) and missing by just one week on four other entities: the bye, the Cincinnati home game, the Pittsburgh trip, and the San Francisco home game. In 2020, I erred by one week on a few matchups and two weeks on others and nailed the exact week of the Cleveland road game, which turned out to be a high-scoring thriller.
This year, the Ravens will play 16 of 17 games inside the Eastern time zone (New Orleans being the exception), with a mere five games against 2021 playoff teams and three of them on the road. But another one of the road games is taking place in New England, one of only two remaining places where the Ravens have never won a regular-season game, the other being Minnesota.
Using the 2021 records of the 2022 opponents, Baltimore’s schedule is ranked as tied for the league’s tenth-easiest. Those figures will change as the 2022 records are applied. There are a few things to consider:
—The following guesses apply to Sunday afternoons only (indicated by the dates next to the week numbers in the sequence below). I don’t make speculative guesses regarding which games will be played Sunday, Monday, or Thursday nights, although some matchups would seem to belong in prime time. The maximum number of prime-time games for any team is five, a number the Ravens played in 2020 and 2021 and could reach again this year, given the national appeal of quarterback and 2019 league Most Valuable Player Lamar Jackson.
—Also, keep in mind the issue of the season’s first four weeks. As with the rest of the schedule, guesses will be applied to Sundays only, based on the Orioles’ already-determined schedule.
—Starting with Week Five, picks were made as if the Orioles would not be playing home postseason games in October. It’s a rather safe assumption. It must be said – which would be a logistical nightmare considering the proximity of the two stadiums.
So, what could the 2022 Ravens’ schedule sequence look like with all that in mind?
Here’s our annual guess:
Week One (Sept. 11) at Cleveland: The Orioles will be at home to play Boston that weekend, so it should be a Week One game on the road for the Ravens unless it’s a Monday-night affair when the bat-and-glove team has the day off. Since the Ravens and Browns always seem to play each other in September and given the national media’s appetite for Cleveland victories over Baltimore, this could be a prime candidate for a Sunday- or Monday-night game. Plus, a Watson-vs.-Jackson showdown would be spicy, would it not?
Week Two (Sept. 18) Buffalo: The Bills were the Ravens’ opponents for the home openers in 2016 and 2018, while the Ravens played in Buffalo in September 2018, so the teams are well-accustomed to meet before the leaves change color. Plus, a game between Lamar Jackson and Josh Allen this early in the season, when both are presumably healthy, would indicate where each team stands in what should be a crowded AFC race.
Week Three (Sept. 25) at Tampa Bay: I’m waving the white flag here because every time the Ravens are scheduled to go to Florida, I root for a December date for the sake of the fans that like to travel down there and avoid the cold, and it never works out that way. So, I figure the Ravens will get to play the Bucs very early in the season and get Tom Brady out of their sights and minds until a possible February meeting (please?).
Week Four (Oct. 2) Carolina: I just looked back at the beginning of my schedule guess sequence and thought, “Wow, it’s tough there at the start.” So, it’s time for a breather, a regional game for a smaller Fox audience that won’t be big enough to merit a top announcing crew. This should be a low-profile game, not like the 2014 meeting when Steve Smith, Sr., then in his first year in Baltimore, said, “Ice up, son,” and led the Ravens to a blowout win over the visiting Panthers.
Week Five (Oct. 9) at Cincinnati: Reality smacks the Ravens in the face again, and it does so with a thud in the form of a road trip to play the defending division and conference champions. The Ravens’ D needed to improve after last year’s injury-filled debacle; this game will show if it truly did. This offseason, the Bengals have fortified their offensive line quickly, giving quarterback Joe Burrow the kind of protection he needs to carve up defenses even worse than he did last year.
Week Six (Oct. 16) Atlanta: October is a notable month for baseball, as the postseason is in full swing. When you play games like this, the low-interest interconference games between teams that don’t see each other much usually end in blowouts. Basketball and hockey seasons are ready to get started, but it’s the “dog days in the football world.”
Week Seven (Oct. 23) Denver: On most occasions, whenever quarterback Russell Wilson brought the Seattle Seahawks into Charm City, he walked out with a win. Now, he comes to town with a young, exciting offense and one of the league’s best defenses in yet another true litmus-test game for the Ravens, who are noticeably absent from the discussion of the AFC’s best teams.
Week Eight (Oct. 30) at New Orleans: I have to admit, I’m being a bit selfish with this pick, for New Orleans is one of my favorite cities, and this game is being played on Halloween weekend. If the Ravens are going to get the maximum of five prime-time games again, why not put this one on Monday night, which happens to be Halloween? How epic would THAT be?
Week Nine (Nov. 6) BYE: I usually place my bye guess here each year, only because it’s the season’s midpoint, although, with a 17-game campaign, not the mathematical midpoint. In fact, the Baltimore bye has fallen right around this spot quite a bit in recent years, the near-perfect spot for a team to assess its health and state of play when the season resumes.
Week Ten (Nov. 13) at New York Jets: Back in 2016, the schedule rotation threw the Ravens a curveball, putting the New York Giants and Jets on the Ravens’ schedule. As it turned out, Baltimore played at MetLife Stadium in consecutive weeks, a rarity, to be sure. Well, maybe not so rare, as the Ravens have to go on the road to play both again this year, so I think they’ll go back-to-back again, only to play the Jets first this time. The Ravens have one of the league’s best post-bye records, so I’m guessing it this way.
Week 11 (Nov. 20) at New York Giants: I already explained the crazy coincidence from 2016, so there’s also this: Baltimore-area fans hate Duke University with a passion for obvious reasons, and Giants quarterback Daniel Jones is a Duke alumnus, so there’s that. If he gets knocked out of this game, his backup is Tyrod Taylor, who did nothing in his days as a Ravens backup… or anywhere else.
Week 12 (Nov. 27) Pittsburgh: A bye and three in a row on the road? Well, it’s time to come home, and more importantly, it’s time to play Pittsburgh. The annual Ravens-Steelers series has started this late many times before, so it’s not out of the question. TV networks clamor to show at least one of these games every year. It is not as much of a hot property this year, especially if the Steelers will go with Mitch Trubisky at quarterback.
Week 13 (Dec. 4) at Jacksonville: Even though Thanksgiving is in the rear-view window by this point, we can be thankful this game won’t be in London, for one thing. For another, we can be glad the Jags are being coached by a competent Super Bowl winner like Doug Pedersen instead of a clueless narcissist like Urban Meyer. Also, we can be thankful that the team isn’t quite on the Ravens’ level… not yet, anyway.
Week 14 (Dec. 11) Miami: The Dolphins have been active in the free-agent market to leapfrog the Bills and take over the AFC East, but it’s a pass-happy league driven by solid quarterback play. Tua Tagovailoa isn’t in Josh Allen’s league, which will keep holding Miami back until they change that position. Still, this game, whenever it’s played, should be fun to watch.
Week 15 (Dec. 18) at New England: The Ravens have had only one true “snow game” in 26 years, the well-remembered 2013 home game against Minnesota. Coincidentally, the Vikings and Patriots are the only two teams left the Ravens have never beaten in regular-season play on the road, and if my guess is right, this game could be played in the snow. I placed this game here to set up a backbreaking last three games, starting with…
Week 16 (Dec. 25) Cleveland: I’m not really sure the Browns will really be relevant in the AFC North race by this point, in that Deshaun Watson will either be serving or have served some form of suspension for making the league look bad; that’s basically what his case is all about despite not being criminally charged. But the league likes having divisional games stacked up towards the end of the season. The better to maximize playoff-spot drama.
Week 17 (Jan. 1) at Pittsburgh: New Year’s Day is when the annual Tournament of Roses Parade is held. But whenever these two teams meet, it’s nothing but thorns, especially coming from the cranky Steelers, a rebuilding bunch who will likely be looking to spoil whatever playoff plans the Ravens have at that point. Remember how the Steelers did exactly that at Heinz Field on Christmas night in ’16?
Week 18 (Jan. 8) Cincinnati: In a perfect world, this is how I see it: two healthy teams fighting for the division, taking to a windswept field in Baltimore for a game that decides the AFC North Division. The winner takes it, the loser gets in the playoffs as a wild-card team, and they see each other again, possibly next week. But, as we all know, it’s not a perfect world; yet, it would be a great way to end the season, wouldn’t it?
