With just one game left in Week 2 of the 2023 NFL regular season, you can almost consider your Baltimore Ravens a postseason team come January. Yes, you read that right.
The Ravens defeated Houston in Week 1, dealt with the lowly Bengals on Sunday, and are sitting at the top of the AFC North boasting a smooth 2-0 record. That means that they are 63.8 percent of the way toward making the playoffs, according to Mike Jurecki.
THE IMPORTANCE OF 2-0: Since the NFL expanded its postseason in 1990, opening 2-0 has given teams a significant advantage toward qualifying for the playoffs. In that span, 63.8% of teams that have started 2-0 have advanced to the postseason. In contrast, only 41.8% of teams that…
— Mike Jurecki (@mikejurecki) September 12, 2023
Jurecki did the research, and he found out that since the NFL expanded the playoffs in 1990, teams that have started the season with a 1-0 record went on to clinch a postseason berth 63.8 percent of the time.
On the other hand, the Bengals (0.-2) are sitting at the bottom of the AFC North (and the NFL standings as a whole, just in case you missed that one little fact) and if they want to make the postseason they'd need to do an encore of the 2022 year... and join a group of just 9.6% of teams that did since the 1970 merger it after falling 0-2.
The Ravens have started the 2023 season up 2-0, something they had not done since 2020 when they defeated Cleveland in the season opener and followed that with another victory in Week 2 at Houston.
Baltimore finished 2020 with an 11-5 record and made it to the playoffs, where they defeated the Tennessee Titans 20-13 in the Wild Card round before falling 3-17 to the Buffalo Bills one round later, crashing out of the postseason early.
The Bengals fell 0-2 for the second season in a row, although they were one of the historic teams to make the playoffs facing long odds last year. Cincy also started 2020 losing their first two games, although they finished that season with a putrid 4-11 record in Joe Burrow's rookie season.