Thad’s Three Things: Bills at Ravens

Three things clouding my thoughts as BillsMafia waits all day for Sunday night…

Avengers Assemble

Von Miller said this week he remembers watching Baltimore play the season opener against Kansas City. The Ravens took the first possession and rammed it right down the field for an opening touchdown. The last five plays were 33 yards on all Derrick Henry or Lamar Jackson runs.

Miller’s first thought: “This is going to be a problem.”

The Bills have always done a good job against Henry and Jackson. In eight starts against a Sean McDermott defense, the two have combined for only one 80 yard rushing game. Jackson is yet to reach even 170 yards passing (albeit with 2 of 3 Lamar starts in some sort of brutal weather).

No doubt, the two of them together is an entirely different task. Baltimore is unsurprisingly number two in rushing and number two in offense through three weeks.

The Bills run D is usually spearheaded by DaQuan Jones, but his start to the season hasn’t been up to his normally elite level. It’s not bad, but the Bills might need more Sunday night.

I’m also interested to see how the Bills rotate their defensive line. Jones, Ed Oliver and Greg Rousseau all played 74% of snaps or more. It’s rare any defensive lineman gets into the 70’s under McDermott, let alone three.

The blowouts in the last two games skew the snap count balance. Assuming this game isn’t a three touchdown win, I want to see if the heavy dose of using those top three guys is a blip or something the Bills feel is necessary. If the plan is leaning more on starters, the last thing Buffalo wants to do Sunday night is trying to stop the Ravens from running out the clock on the ground while trailing in the fourth quarter.

Not So Ravenous

The Ravens were top ten, if not top five in most defensive categories last season. Not so this year.

Baltimore is dead last in passing yards allowed through three games of 2024. Part of that is very likely because they are also number one against the run, allowing a ridiculous 50 rush yards per game so far.

I think another reason is a mediocre pass rush. The same team that led the NFL in sacks last year and was 4th in sacks per pass attempt is down to 16th in the latter category this year. Lack of pressure on Dak Prescott was one of the chief culprits when Baltimore allowed Dallas 19 points in six minutes, turning a laugher of a win into a nailbiter last week.

Buffalo’s offensive line has been excellent to start the season. Pro Football Focus ranks them the number three unit in the league and their pass protection metrics are elite across the board. When Josh Allen has time to survey and pick apart a defense, that’s when everyone really eats in this offense.

This matchup could be a big advantage for Buffalo and it’s why I think the Bills might score a bunch of points Sunday night.

Mind Games

Perhaps the best part of the Bills 3-0 start has been the work done by coaches. Buffalo has been the far better prepared team and the far better execution team the last two weeks. They have only seven penalties in their last two games combined.

This week will be a “pick on someone your own size” game. John Harbaugh and the Ravens coaches have been one of the top three or four staffs in the league for quite a while. This is a franchise that has been to the playoffs five of the last six seasons. They expect to win and succeed and have a standard the Bills’ last three opponents is very much yet to develop.

Baltimore’s defensive staff was gutted after last season. Coordinator Mike McDonald is now the head coach for 3-0 Seattle. Assistants Anthony Weaver and Dennard Wilson have both moved on to their own coordinator positions.

As much as McDermott deserves credit for how well the Bills have played with younger, new and emergency starters, so do his young coordinators. It will be fun to watch Joe Brady and Bobby Babich match wits with Harbaugh’s team, even if the Baltimore defensive braintrust is about as new as the Bills group.

Betting Things

Off to a 3-0 start after Trevor Lawrence stayed well below his passing yards line of 226.5. Much appreciation to the Bills for hammering Jacksonville enough that Lawrence got sent to the bench early. I’m ahead 2.8 units to being 2024.

This week is an easy pick. The Ravens have done a good job against the run and a bad job against the pass. Could it be an opponent thing? Three weeks is hardly a good sample size. My answer to that is the Chiefs. They ran for 72 yards against the Ravens and followed with 277 rushing yards the last two weeks (without Isaiah Pacheco for most of that).

As mentioned above, I also think the Bills might feel like their better play is letting Allen drop back and spread pain the Brady way. The Ravens haven’t allowed less than 276 yards passing to any quarterback so far, and that 276 was from Mr. Journeyman himself, Gardner Minshew.

I’m actually a bit worried this game gets out of hand and the Bills don’t have to throw, but I do believe Baltimore will move the ball plenty fine enough themselves. This should be a 60-minute game of legit offense.

As such, give me Allen over his passing yards number. The number I liked best was over 233.5 on FanDuel at -113. Other books have the number lower, but the odds shorter. I’ll chase a few more yards for a few more pennies.

The Pick

The Ravens run game might scary on paper, but their passing game feels a bit pieced together. Mark Andrews has only six receptions all year. Isaiah Likely has only three catches since he made you spend all your fantasy free agent budget on him after week one. The Ravens have only one receiving performance in three games of at least 60 yards. To be fair, Baltimore is 11th in total passing yards and some of these struggles are part of a league-wide issue moving the ball through the air.

Add in a stupendous start for Rasul Douglas and especially Christian Benford, and I think it makes the defensive gameplan fairly simple for the Bills. Throw the kitchen sink at stopping the run and see what happen. The Bills can also mitigate Baltimore’s rush game by just scoring so many points the Ravens need throws to keep up.

The Ravens are a 2.5 point favorite, but that’s the usual margin for being home. It means Vegas sees these teams as dead even. It’s certainly a significant move in the Bills direction since week one, and appropriate considering how both teams have played their first three games. I don’t think it’s enough.

In this game, I think the Bills have more answers and more options. They’re also just playing better top to bottom. Not only do I think Buffalo wins, I think they do it rather comfortably. Give me the Bills 34-21 .

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