The Pittsburgh Steelers may be the kings of the North, but the Ravens return to the playoffs is more reliant on beating the Cincinnati Bengals in 2018.
The Ravens-Steelers rivalry has been considered one of the NFL’s best for quite some time now. Since 2013, the Ravens are 5-5 versus the Pittsburgh Steelers. The team is currently on a three-game losing streak versus the Steelers. But don’t let that fool you, the Steelers aren’t the Ravens biggest enemies in the AFC North right now.
It’s the Cincinnati Bengals.
How can that be? The Ravens and Steelers hate each other, after all. The two teams play classic smash mouth football and entertain audiences for 60 minutes with each and every match-up. While I am inclined to agree with you, it’s hard to call it the Ravens top nemesis when it’s so evenly matched.
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Comparatively to the Ravens record versus Pittsburgh since 2013, Baltimore is just 3-7 in games versus the Cincinnati Bengals. Surprising? Maybe to an average fan, but every Ravens fan knows that for some reason the team just doesn’t show up to play the Bengals. This is perhaps one of the most frustrating aspects of being a Ravens fan. For some reason, the Ravens just can’t seem to get over the hump when the Bengals roll up on the schedule.
Through and through, the Ravens are the better team. The Ravens have superior coaching, blocking, and defense entirely compared to Cincinnati. While the Bengals do host A.J. Green, one of the league’s top wide receivers, the Ravens offense is just as talented, if only because the Bengals young stars like Joe Mixon and John Ross are unproven.
The proverbial monkey on their back:
The Bengals are simply too persistent of a thorn in the side of the Ravens. Their struggles against Cincinnati became as evident as ever on New Years Eve when the Bengals eliminated Baltimore from the playoffs to the tune of a 31-27 victory. This loss stung worse than almost any other loss in recent memory for Ravens fans (only slightly behind the Christmas day game in 2016).
The key to getting back into the post-season is to recapture Baltimore’s mojo. The first step in that process is finding a concrete plan to beat Cincinnati when it matters. The formula for this is simple: suffocating defense and avoiding turnovers.
The Ravens missed the post-season in 2017 because neither of those components were met. The Bengals ran amok on the Ravens defense to the tune of 146-yards as a team. Darqueze Dennard picked off Joe Flacco and returned it for a touchdown, leaving the Ravens in even more of a deficit. This is inexcusable for a team who had high hopes for a playoff run, and for a fan-base that has grown impatient with the current brass and their failures to get over the hump and back to playoff football.
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By now, one would think that the team is starving for the post-season, as well they should be. Is this a Super Bowl caliber team? Probably not, but stranger things have happened. None of that matters, however, if the Ravens can’t put it all together and find a way to take down the Bengals. Figuring out how to beat Cincinnati should be the missing piece of the formula for the Ravens to return to the playoffs in 2018.