Franchise Opportunities in Baltimore, MD

A few matchups to watch in Sunday's game (1 p.m.-Cincinnati's Local 12) at Paycor Stadium pitting the AFC North champion Bengals against the Ravens in the regular-season finale.

BENGALS QB JOE BURROW VS. THE INTANGIBLES

It's been a trying week to say the least in Bengaldom.

There's the emotional rollercoaster of watching Bills safety Damar Hamlin brought back to life in front of them Monday night on the Paycor Stadium turf and then hearing of his heartwarming recovery up the road at University of Cincinnati Medical Center.

Plus, they've played nine minutes in 15 days and are on a short, distracting week before they go back out there.

Then, there was the January Surprise the NFL threw into the locker room Friday when it decreed if the Bengals lose Sunday and the Ravens stay the No. 6 seed, the Bengals would have to go to Baltimore next week for a Wild Card Game if they lose a coin flip even though the Bengals have been declared the AFC North champion and, by rule, host. The league says it's a way to compensate for the Bills and Bengals playing 16 games because their game was cancelled.

"We don't capture everything and every rule in every policy manual and sometimes when you face situations, you have to try to make adjustments and this was one of the adjustments," is the way Rich McKay, chairman of the competition committee put it.

But besides bypassing the winning percentage rule two days before a game, the NFL opened up plenty of other questions. One of them is while covering for the possibility of the Bengals losing to Buffalo, it failed to capture what would have happened if the Bengals won. To balance the Ravens-Bengals coin flip, there would have to be a coin flip for the location of a potential Bills-Bengals payoff game and a flip for the No. 1 seed if the Bengals win Sunday and the Chiefs lose to the Raiders.

But to have the legend of Seamless Joe leading the way goes a long way in levelling the playing field. Center Ted Karras recalled this week the Monday night walk down to the Bills locker room after Hamlin went to the hospital.

"I've got to give Joey B credit for that," Karras said. "He organized that, he showed great leadership and wanted to show solidarity with the Bills."

Oh yeah, the guy's having an MVP season, too. He's top six in completion percentage, passing yards per game, touchdown passes and passer rating. And he wins. He's won 10 straight December and January games. He's the first Bengals quarterback to win back-to-back division titles. He and Dan Marino are the only quarterbacks in NFL history with at least 10 wins and 30 touchdown passes in two of their first three seasons.

Like cornerback Mike Hilton said Friday when asked who he'd like to take the coin flip: "Some good luck? Can't go wrong with Joe. That guy at quarterback, he's the guy that got us here. Let them do Nine."

Plus, there'll be positivity all around Paycor. The NFL is allowing teams on Sunday to outline Hamlin's No. 3 in each 30-yard line number on the field in either Buffalo Bills Red or Buffalo Bills Blue and during warmups all players throughout the league have the option to wear black Nike T-shirts displaying "Love for Damar 3."

As Karras said about playing six days after averting tragedy, "It's a little less tough now that we've got a good prognosis here."

BENGALS RB JOE MIXON VS. RAVENS LB ROQUAN SMITH AND THE RED ZONE

Remember when Mixon said what seems to be like five years ago that the Bills have good linebackers, but they're not the Ravens? Well, here they are with the Pro Bowler Smith leading the charge in his first game against the Bengals since the trade deadline shocker moved him from the Bears to the franchise that is an assembly line for great linebackers.

So no surprise that Smith is the first player since Ravens Pro Football Hall of Fame linebacker Ray Lewis to have at least 100 tackles, two sacks and an interception in each of his first four seasons. Now in his fifth season, only Smith, Patrick Willis, Lavonte David and Brian Urlacher have 400 solo tackles, 30 tackles for loss, 15 sacks and five interceptions in their first five years.

Mixon, Burrow and Co., have already tangled with Smith at Soldier Field and it didn't go well last year in the second game of the year when Smith had the game of his life. His 53-yard pick-six early in the fourth quarter turned around a game the Bears led, 10-3, and he added a sack and nine tackles.

Mixon is quietly having a big year. He leads the Bengals with 1,187 scrimmage yards and eight scrimmage touchdowns. He has at least 1,100 scrimmage yards and at least eight scrimmage touchdowns in four of the last five seasons, something only Browns running back Nick Chubb has done in each of the last five seasons.

And he's two catches away from breaking Giovani Bernard's team record of 55 for most catches by a running back in a season.

Mixon is one of the guys they turned to when they went more bread-and-butter in the red zone after the last-snap Oct. 9 loss in Baltimore could be traced to an unsuccessful shovel pass in the third quarter that capped four straight misses from the Ravens 2. After that play, the Bengals scored touchdowns on 17 straight red-zone possessions and while they have cooled a bit (Burrow had his first red-zone pick of the year in the last game they played), they are fifth in the league in TD red-zone percentage after they were 23rd last year.

"We had tried to find ways because in the second half of last year and in the playoffs, we didn't perform very well down in the red zone," said offensive coordinator Brian Callahan this week. "There are some teams that do a really good job of it and just try to find a couple things throughout the course of a season that can make it less stressful on everybody to go get a touchdown. And obviously, we thought this shovel pass was one of those things and it clearly was not.

"And the shift from then was, you know what? We're just going to do what we do down there and that's going to be going one on one, make great throws, make good catches, and run stuff that we have a lot of confidence in as opposed to trying to do something different. So, we definitely shifted our philosophy particularly in a little red zone. And I think it's paid off for us since that game, and that was that was really a turning point for us. I think offensively in general is that game and how we came out of it."

It's a classic Ravens defense. Stingy everywhere, not to mention ranked second in preventing touchdowns in the red zone, to third in preventing points to third in preventing the run.

BENGALS NT DJ READER VS RAVENS RB J.K. DOBBINS

No matter who has been at quarterback for the Ravens under head coach John Harbaugh, they've relied on the run. With Lamar Jackson out the last four games, they've really relied on it to go 2-2 and get in the playoffs. With backup Tyler Huntley hurting with a shoulder injury, look for a wave of even more runs.

Dobbins leads the NFL with 397 rushing yards since Week 14, the first game Jackson missed, and he has at least 90 yards in three of those four games. Keep an eye on the Ravens left side and massive fullback Patrick Ricard. According to Next Gen Stats, 280 of those yards have been to the left.

But the Bengals have Reader back in the middle, where he wasn't when Baltimore rushed for 155 yards in October. In the six games since Reader has returned from a knee injury, the Bengals haven't lost and they've allowed more than 102 yards on the ground just once as he solidified their No. 5 run defense. No matter if it is Huntley or No. 3 quarterback Anthony Brown, nothing changes for the Bengals.

"(Huntley) runs the system. He doesn't do things as well as Lamar, but he does them well," said slot cornerback Mike Hilton. "(Anthony Brown) played some against Pittsburgh the last couple of weeks. We have a little film. Same type of athletic guy. Makes throws from the pocket. He's been in the system. He knows the system well.

"They like to stay on schedule. Especially against offenses like ours. They want to be able to control the ball and keep our guys on the sidelines. As a defense we have to put them in tougher situations forcing them to throw the football."

But it's been really hard on the Ravens without Jackson. The Ravens have scored 17 or fewer points in five consecutive games and are last in scoring in that stretch. The difference in the points they score with Jackson and Huntley is the greatest between two quarterbacks since Chad Pennington averaged 25.8 in 12 starts and Vinny Testaverde had 13.3 in four for the 2002 Jets.

Reader captured the emotions so eloquently of playing defense after watching Hamlin go down after making a tackle.

"He was out there playing at full speed. It's just what happens sometimes and it's just such a freak accident," Reader said. "You can't take your foot off the gas as a defender or an offensive player out there. If you're playing lightly, you're going to take your risk of getting hurt. It's the only way to play this game. You've got to play 100 miles an hour and that's how you go about it."

BENGALS S DAX HILL VS RAVENS RB JUSTICE HILL

The Brothers Hill meet for the first time in the NFL because Justice was hurt in the first game. Both are key players on special teams and that's always a huge part of this matchup with Harbaugh's kicking game DNA and Bengals specials teams coordinator Darrin Simmons' 20-year success in Cincinnati. The Ravens are where they always are, ranked second in the kicking game by Football Outsiders, After a slow start the perennially top ten Bengals have scratched back to high teens.

Justice has knocked off five solid kick returns in the last two weeks, including a 56-yarder against the Steelers. Dax has four tackles on teams. Their streak of never tackling each other beyond a practice at Tulsa's Booker T. Washington High School may be over.

The Baltimore Ravens (10-6) face the Cincinnati Bengals (11-4) Sunday. Kickoff from Paycor Stadium in Cincinnati is set for 1 p.m. ET (CBS). Below, we analyze Tipico Sportsbook’s lines around the Ravens vs. Bengals odds, and make our expert NFL picks and predictions.

After their Week 17 game with the Buffalo Bills was ruled a no-contest, the Bengals were declared AFC North champions. While that usually comes with a home playoff game, the Bengals will need to win Sunday’s game to lock it in.

If the Ravens win Sunday, they will sweep the season series vs. the Bengals but would finish a half game back in the standings. The league decided, with the owners’ approval, that if this was the case and the Bengals and Ravens were to meet in the Wild Card round, a coin flip would decide home field for that game. If they’re not pitted against each other, the Bengals host a playoff game in the 1st weekend. And if they were to meet later in the postseason, Cincy would host as the No. 3 seed.

Cincinnati has won 7 in a row and covered the spread in all 7, being favored in 6 of them. The Bengals are a league-best 12-3 against the spread (ATS) this season.

Baltimore, which will be short QB Lamar Jackson, is 6-9-1 ATS and coming off a 16-13 home loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers as a 1-point favorite in Week 17. The Ravens are 2-5 ATS over their last 7 games.

The Ravens beat the Bengals 19-17 in Baltimore in Week 5 on Justin Tucker’s 43-yard field goal as time expired. The Bengals had taken a 17-16 lead after a 13-play, 75-yard drive with 1:58 remaining, capped by QB Joe Burrow’s 1-yard run.

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Ravens at Bengals odds

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Ravens at Bengals key injuries

Ravens

Bengals

Ravens at Bengals picks and predictions

Bengals 31, Ravens 10

PASS.

The Bengals are 5-1 at home and have won 7 straight. With Jackson out, the Ravens should stand little chance, so backing Baltimore at +365 doesn’t make much sense.

Betting Cincinnati (-450) will cost 4.5 times the potential return, which is also not wise.

BET BENGALS -9 (-110).

After the decision handed down by the NFL on how the Bengals’ canceled game will impact their playoff odds, the team seemed upset. Expect that anger to turn into production on the field and the score should back that.

As mentioned, Cincinnati has been a covering machine, while Baltimore has not. The Bengals have covered 4 of their last 5 home games. Plus, the Ravens are 2-3 ATS following a loss.

Considering where the motivation will lie and the talent taking the field — the Ravens down their MVP quarterback — BACK THE BENGALS -9.5 (-110).

LEAN OVER 39.5 (-110).

The Bengals offense was absolutely clicking against a top-notch Bills defense. Cincinnati scored a touchdown on its 1st drive Monday vs. Buffalo and looked to immediately answer again, driving into Bills territory prior to the game being canceled.

The Bengals have scored 20 or more points in their last 7 games and have topped 25 in 4 of those. On the other side of the ball, they may also be short their top cornerback in Apple.

With Baltimore being held to 13 points or less in 3 of its last 4 games, expect this to be a blowout, and with a total this low, I’d play OVER 39.5 (-110).

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Isn’t it more fun when the drama is in other locker room than the Pittsburgh Steelers? We all know our own household has had more than its fair share of messes over the years, but the past couple days have been a good reminder that there are things that go on in every locker room—and sometimes they get out.

That’s what the Cleveland Browns have on their hands as they close out the 2022 season. Fortunately for them they have nothing to play for, but it certainly seems as though their relationship with a player they agreed to pay $10 million this season has come to an end.

Veteran defensive lineman Jadeveon Clowney recently said that he was 95 percent certain he wouldn’t play for the Browns after this season, and that they favored building up Myles Garrett’s stats not only at the expense of himself, but of winning. Needless to say, there was some pushback against that, albeit cautiously.

Head coach Kevin Stefanski did a commendable job avoiding answering a barrage of questions about Clowney, but defensive line coach Chris Kiffin was a little more forthcoming, albeit begrudgingly. He was asked about a game against the Baltimore Ravens in which Clowney would only play on third downs, with rumors that he refused to play on first and second down.

“He did not say he was only going to play. He basically…I would try to get him to go out on third downs and he would”, he said, via the team’s website. When asked if the defender was disciplined internally over the matter, he said only, “I will punt that to Coach”. But he did cautiously expand on the topic.

“Working through that Baltimore game, yeah, he came off the field, said he was hurting”, he said. “First third down came after that moment, I said, ‘Can you go in on third?’, and he said, ‘Yeah’. And then next series he said he couldn’t go in on first”.

Then he was asked if he now believes that the reason Clowney gave for not playing on early downs—that he was too injured—was essentially bonus. “Sure”, he offered in a delayed response, before adding, “I don’t know the exact reason”.

But listening to it, you can read between the lines. It’s clear that the team now feels Clowney’s frustration runs deeper than they previously knew. He did acknowledge that he had voiced frustrations around the time of the first Ravens game, which was the subject at hand, but that it had not been brought up since then.

A soon-to-be 30-year-old veteran, Clowney has just 28 tackles and two sacks this season in 12 games for the Browns. He had a bit of a comeback nine-sack season in Cleveland the year prior after the Browns tried to get him to sign for years.

Now he’s going into year 10 with poor production and a poor attitude that he put out of his own accord. It’s not clear if the team will even put him on the field for the finale. Stefanski said that they have made a decision about that (having sent him home from practice) but that he would not disclose what that decision is.

For the 18th consecutive season, the ZiPS projection system is unleashing a full set of prognostications. For more information on the ZiPS projections, please consult this year’s introduction and MLB’s glossary entry. The team order is selected by lot, and the next team up is the Baltimore Orioles.

The building of Baltimore’s offense is coming along quite nicely; graduating two arguable no. 1 prospects to the majors in a single season has a curious way of doing that! The O’s should at least be locking up Adley Rutschman as soon as possible and ideally Gunnar Henderson as well. There’s no need to stay on both too long; everyone knows about Rutschman’s awesomeness, and I’ve written near-panegyrics about Henderson already. Similar to Mike Devereaux three (!) decades ago, Cedric Mullins is a borderline star.

The O’s aren’t amazing anywhere else in the lineup, but they are at least adequate, with a couple of exceptions. ZiPS does think the team could use an outfield upgrade, but one can at least understand why the Orioles are waiting to see which of their young outfield prospects takes a big step up, if any. I’m crossing my fingers, because Nomar Mazara was signed to a minor league contract and is lurking in the wings, like a replacement-level Sauron after the fall of Númenor.

Just in case you have only seen the graphic and not the tables below, ZiPS does project Ryan Mountcastle to be an above-average first baseman. What it isn’t crazy about is the backup situation with Mountcastle expected to spend some time at DH. Lewin Díaz is far from a ZiPS fave, but it sees him as quite a bit superior to Ryan O’Hearn, whose acquisition never made much sense to me given his poor track record.

I’m not going to grump about the O’s being quiet here, nor am I a particular fan of the Adam Frazier signing, since I’m going to complain elsewhere in a minute.

It is to my profound disappointment that the Orioles were not seriously involved, as far as I can tell, in the market for pitchers such as Justin Verlander or Carlos Rodón. Top-end starting pitching is what Baltimore is missing most, and unlike past seasons in the rebuild, during which I never (as far as I remember) complained about the team’s lack of free-agent spending, a serious addition here could make a meaningful difference in Baltimore’s postseason fate. The O’s could have signed both pitchers and still been a below-average payroll team. It’s hard to have much faith in the rotation, and that’s with ZiPS giving a legitimately excellent projection to Dean Kremer. John Means may come back quicker than our depth chart playing time believes, but that’s not enough; he’s most charitably a solid no. 2 pitcher coming off a major injury.

ZiPS likes the chances of Grayson Rodriguez and DL Hall becoming top-end starters, but why wait? If they do, it certainly makes the expensive ace easier to swallow, and no team has ever had too much good pitching as an actual problem. Sure, the O’s can still trade some of their deep prospect pool to acquire a pitcher, but it’s easier to make money than make prospects, and they have been running basement payrolls for years (and will continue to in 2023).

The relievers, I’m more confident in. ZiPS isn’t keen on the back of the bullpen, which is why the overall lower-than-expected WAR projection, but the Orioles have done a good job identifying live arms that can become dependable relievers. ZiPS also has a torrid love affair with Phoenix Sanders, whose employment status I’m not even sure of; I probably should just contact the team and find out for sure! If pitchers like Andrew Politi or Joey Krehbiel fail to impress, I’m sure the front office will look elsewhere quickly.

In sum, I’m generally quite pleased with the Orioles as a franchise right now. It’s only the lack of solutions in the rotation that is causing me to want to add the negative version of the Grape Job! sticker to their book report. Is there a scratch-and-sniff “Bad Job Broccoli!” sticker somewhere that smells like that vile weed?

Players are listed with their most recent teams wherever possible. This includes players who are unsigned or have retired, players who will miss 2023 due to injury, and players who were released in 2022. So yes, if you see Joe Schmoe, who quit baseball back in August to form a Norwegian Death Dixieland Bubblegum Ska-Funk band, he’s still listed here intentionally. ZiPS is assuming a league with an ERA of 4.22, above 2022’s level of offense but lower than other years. Pitchers who appear to have a fairly definite change in the majors from start-to-relief or vice-versa from these projections will receive reconfigured updates in the spring.

Hitters are ranked by zWAR, which is to say, WAR values as calculated by me, Dan Szymborski, whose surname is spelled with a z. WAR values might differ slightly from those that appear in the full release of ZiPS. Finally, I will advise anyone against — and might karate chop anyone guilty of — merely adding up WAR totals on a depth chart to produce projected team WAR.

As always, incorrect projections are either caused by flaws in the physical reality of the universe or by skillful sabotage of our friend and former editor. You can, however, still get mad at me on Twitter.

Good morning, Birdland!

One of the more exciting days for the analytically-inclined amongst us arrived on Friday as FanGraphs published friend-of-the-site Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS projections for the 2023 Orioles.

Of course, projections are not guaranteed to come true, but they certainly are fun to read through. They also provide for a numbers-based look at the state of the current major league team, although the writer even admits where there are some outputs that don’t entirely jive with common thought.

An example of this is the Orioles bullpen, which is projected for a total of 3.5 zWAR. That accounts for some pretty serious negative regressions for the likes of Cionel Pérez and Dillon Tate among others. The system does like Félix Bautista, but it doesn’t exactly buy his ability to recreate the 2022 season.

On the opposite end of the spectrum is Dean Kremer, who is projected to improve upon his breakout ‘22 campaign. This projection system gives him 3.6 zWAR, the highest of any Orioles starter, including Grayson Rodriguez (1.7 zWAR).

Another fun element of this annual post is a list of player comps for each of the guys on the roster, taking into consideration age and position. Adley Rutschman gets a Carlos Santana comp, Anthony Santander is compared to Jay Gibbons, and Grayson Rodriguez gets Josh Beckett. You remember early-career Beckett? Hoo, that would be a lot of fun!

My big takeaway from these projections is the same as my feelings on the Orioles offseason as a whole: They are missing a top-of-the-rotation arm. Perhaps that is still to come via trade, although my hopes dwindle with each passing day.

Something that feels even less likely is the addition of any outside position player of consequence. This team could use another bat, but at this point the smart money is on that bat coming from within the organization. One of the middle infield prospects could even break with the team for Opening Day, and Colton Cowser seems like a sure thing to make it to Baltimore sometime mid-year.

Links

2023 ZiPS Projections: Baltimore Orioles | FanGraphsSomething that should not be ignored is that ZiPs loves the Orioles situations at catcher, third base, shortstop, and center field. Honestly, one top line pitcher, and an upgrade at one of the corner outfield spots feels like enough to push this team into the playoffs.

How Orioles could split time at first base | Orioles.comThere has been a lot of movement at first base this offseason, but the ultimate outcome seems rather unremarkable. Ryan Mountcastle is gonna be the guy most days. That probably means a few Sunday starts at the position for Adley Rutschman or James McCann, or maybe they give Santander a chance here or there. If Mountcastle gets hurt, there could be some problems, but that is the case for most teams when an everyday player goes down.

The Orioles have followed a careful plan, but history shows they’ll need to start taking risks | The Baltimore BannerYes! Those risks don’t have to come via free agency, but it’s apparent to everyone how talented this roster is and where the holes exist.

Looking at the makeup for the late innings in the O’s bullpen | Steve MelewskiThere is going to be some turnover in the bullpen. That just seems to happen for every team every year. Relievers are volatile creatures. The good news is that the Orioles have built out a rather deep cavalcade of arms that should allow them to suppress any major disasters. The caveat is Bautista. He is the one that feels irreplaceable, so they will need to do whatever they can to ensure his success.

Orioles birthdays

Is it your birthday? Happy birthday!

This day in O’s history

January 7th is a sparse day in Orioles history, according to Baseball Reference. Instead, here are some other interesting things that have happened on this day in history beyond Birdland.

1894 - Thomas Edison develops a kinetoscopic film of a man sneezing, and that same day his employee, William Kennedy Dickson, gets a patent for motion picture film.

1927 - The first transatlantic commercial telephone service is created, sending calls from New York City to London.

1931 - The first trans-Tasman flight (from Australian to New Zealand) is flown by Guy Menzie. It takes 11 hours and 45 minutes.

1954 - The first public demonstration of machine translation takes place at the offices of IBM in New York. In an experiment developed between IBM and Georgetown University, the machine automatically translated Russian sentences into English.

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