Episode Transcript
The Browns are all in on Deshaun Watson, leveraging their future, their brand, the stability of their organization. All on a disgraced wildcard. Can Jacoby Brissett and an elite offensive line, keep the Browns competitive through the first 11 games of the season?
Brett: And the Ravens were 5-1 to start the season. In position for the number one seed in the AFC, before unraveling and losing six straight games to close the season. Is 2022 the Ravens revenge tour? We'll discuss all of this and more on tonight's betting market outlook for the AFC North.
Let's hit the opening bell
Welcome to this next edition of our betting [00:01:00] market outlooks. I'm Brett Matthew, along with Judah at @throwthedamball on Twitter.
So Let's start off with the 2022 win total futures for the AFC North. We can see the Ravens at the top with an expected win total of ten. Bengals, follow them at nine and a half juiced to the over. Browns at eight. Steelers lagging at seven and a half. Anything pop out to you here, Judah?
Judah: If I had any leans, it would be the Steelers under. I think there's really so much up in the air with the Ravens, the Bengals and even the Browns. Yes, Mike Tomlin has had a winning record. At some point that's gonna stop, right? They don't really have much talent on the roster. The vaulted defense of the 2018-2019 Steelers is really no longer. The guys are older. They've got either a rookie quarterback or, Mitch Trubisky.
I don't really see this as the year where the Steelers continue their winning streak. And I think the alt unders a bet in such a tough AFC.
Brett: My initial inclination was I wanted to bet Steelers over.
[00:02:00] Primarily around the assumption that the market was going to be very cool on the Steelers
Assuming that because there's three teams in this division, who are all sexy in their own ways, that you'd have the Steelers here and everyone would be writing them off. But as I kind of listened to podcasts and read other people's division previews and things like that, what is priced into these lines?
Because we don't wanna keep talking about all the same things that everybody knows. If everyone knows it, then it's reflected in these prices. So simply just talking about them and if that's part of our rationale for leaning one way or another, then we better think that the market is actually mispricing that very well known fact, either to the upside or the downside. And then we're taking the other side of that position. And in the Steelers case, it seems like everyone thinks that everyone else thinks that they're writing off the Steelers. So they're gonna take the other side of that trade, which is, "Hey, this Steelers [00:03:00] defense is still pretty good. Mitch Trubisky isn't as bad as everyone thinks that he is. This is still Mike Tomlin. Mike Tomlin hasn't has a losing season in 15 years."
Judah: That's almost, to me what this number says is: "OK, by all accounts, the numbers say the Steelers should be worse than even a seven and a half win team. But Mike Tomlin, hasn't had a losing season in 15 years. Maybe there's something we don't know. And almost the market's hanging that up saying, "Okay, what works generally for figuring out the other 31 teams, we gotta have a different formula for this one."
Brett: And basically again, because I'm so markets oriented. I see a lot of the market positioning it in that way. So one, it's not just like I'm gonna unilaterally and blindly fade it to take the other side, but it gives me pause. Cause again, as I came into my research and even after I was doing my research, I still felt "Hey, I think there's some value to the over here on the Steelers".
But basically because I'm aligned with the market and the market thinks that they're being clever by [00:04:00] buying the Steelers is for that reason in itself, I'm probably just gonna lay off.
But I'm down on the Browns. Under, I love the under I'll take the under. I I'll take the under seven alt +195. The way the market is framing, the Browns is... As long as they can be competitive up until that week 11 or whatever, then Watson is gonna come in and he's gonna necessarily make them absolutely better.
And I don't know that's gonna be the case. He would have to go through all, working out the kinks, getting in rhythm with the wide receivers, and also just playing an NFL game at NFL speed for the first time in what, like two years? Is he just gonna roll out of bed and essentially start playing like vintage Deshaun Watson, which we don't even know he's even that athlete anymore.
Judah: Right.
I take a totally different angle on the Browns. I was really hoping the market would be a little more bearish, which is that I actually [00:05:00] think that Jacoby Brissett is an upgrade over what they had in Baker Mayfield last year. You wanna take EPA, if you wanna take CPOE, if you wanna take a PFF passing grade, Jacoby Brissett's career averages were all better than what Baker Mayfield was in 2021. You're more or less looking at a 9 10 win team, which I guess maybe I should be taking my over here. But I think this division's really tough and the AFC is really tough.
Brett: The other thing is like what I feel like no one's really taking into consideration either is what if this team is vibing and they're like 8-3 or 9-2 or something like that.
And I'm not saying Jacoby Brissett is like, just crushing it, but the team's got a rhythm. Do you bring in Deshaun Watson at that time?
And then there's the Bengals again at nine and a half juice to the over. Ravens 10 juice to the over. I wanna fade the Ravens, but again, there's like almost all of the evidence suggests that's not a good decision, especially because , I think the expectations are high for [00:06:00] them in the kind of broader betting market.
I don't know anyone who's bearish on the Ravens, do you? No.
So I don't know. I wanted to bet the over on the Steelers, I'm gonna cancel it out .
You disagree with it also. I think it's just aligning up with the market for me too much. My best kind of way to angle on this division. I, think would be the Browns under.
Judah: So to add even just a little bit there, like there's some real left tail here, which is, they start out, 0-3, 0-4, there's already a ton of pressure on the organization. That's an example where everything can just completely fall off. Yeah. Like absolute organizational dysfunction, real possibility.
Brett: This is definitely one of the best divisions when it comes to offensive line play. So we look at some of these market rankings here, Browns ranked second again, according to market perception. Ravens almost the top 10, , and certainly is gonna be better than it was last year, given just the devastating injuries that they absorbed. Bengals [00:07:00] dramatically improved.
That's a narrative that is very well documented and probably more than priced into the market already. And then there's the Steelers who have always had a great offensive line, certainly during the height of the Big Ben years.
And then the last couple years it's been really bad. It was certainly one of the worst last year. And isn't expected to be one of the worst this years. Cause there really was no upgrades, even besides, James Daniels, one of the things we'll get into, but that was really the only kinda improvement.
Judah: The Steelers are interesting on the offensive line because last year they basically didn't let their offensive line have any impacts on any play cuz they were getting ball rid of a ball so quickly.
I wonder if that's a function of Ben Rothlisberger's arm? Is it a function of Matt Canada's offense? Is it a combination of the two kind of, what do we see with Trubisky or Pickett?
But that's definitely a question to be monitoring over the course of the season.
Brett: So let's get into the Steelers. Very bizarre year. Ended [00:08:00] up going 9-7-1. Came into the season with an win expectation of nine.
Went 8-9 ATS, which is actually quite surprising in itself as well. Ended up winning a $100 unit, better $235 on the season.
From a pythag perspective. Seven wins. Our pythag 2.0, had 'em a little bit higher than that, but still the Steelers ended up outperforming that at 7.9 mean power rank was around 16.
So roughly average. And their volatility was pretty high at around four spots per week. Which I think goes to demonstrate the market wanting to fade the Steelers, but then putting in some sort of performance that always looked ugly, but the final score was a win or a cover.
And so the market couldn't sell off on the Steelers. Because they were still either cashing tickets or otherwise actually winning games. And as we know, actually [00:09:00] even ended up making the playoffs.
Judah: This team just kept on winning and you couldn't really understand why what was going right for them. Big Ben looked totally washed and it didn't really matter. To even think about where the Steelers were in 2020, which was a team that was 11-1. It was a big PFF thing.
So the Steelers are fraudulent. They totally collapsed.
Brett: I know PFF certainly was riding that narrative hard.
And then just really started pounding the table and dancing on the grave of the Steelers. And that's why I remember coming into 2021, people would look at that nine and say, "Man, that's, really high. Gotta fade that." Like the Steelers are the worst team in this division, or one of the worst teams in this division. That they're gonna challenge the Bengals for the bottom. Was I think a real, a pretty common narrative last year.
And they outperformed. Yeah. And now expectations are even lower than [00:10:00] that. Meaningfully lower than that at seven and a half.
Looking at their schedule from last year again, we saw very, volatile, cause there was this like push pull of everyone saying, oh, the Steelers do not look good. The Steelers are not good, but then they keep winning or covering. Started off middle of the pack with the power rank of around 14 and then jumped and got to that ninth spot. And then again, you go from nine to 22 in a three week span.
The market was just ready to sell off on the Steelers, very fragile.
And we can look at the time weighted average margin 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 5, 5 wins. So that's definitely one of the biggest deltas that we've seen from kind "earned wins" is what we could call this.
Maybe. And realized wins being nine. And I think one of the things that we'll talk about maybe more in future streams and certainly over the course of the season is something [00:11:00] you've been taking a lead on called " Drive Quality", looking at adjusted scores based on kind of the quality of drives.
And that was around five wins as well. So just quantifies what I feel like a lot of the eye tests want to say about a team when a team is outperforming, what they actually look like, how they're performing on the field, what this Drive Quality is expected to really do is to really drill down through that misleading final score to really show what was earned from this team.
Judah: Yeah. The sense I get is that betters think the Steelers defenses, like they were in 2018-2019 of this just like nasty unit that took Mason Rudolph and Duck Hodges to the playoffs.
Forcing turnovers left and right. And I think the adjusted drive quality paints a pretty good picture. This team is actually like a bottom 10 defense. Their secondary was dreadful. They were like 26 and perfectly covered plays. [00:12:00] Joe Haden was really washed up.
They were really reliant on TJ Watt. I think the market might be pricing, "Okay, at least the defense is good. We got like a defense and a good head coach. And we know the offense was terrible." I think everyone knows the offense was bad. That's right.
What's almost interesting to me is where the total scoring margin over expected comes from. I would've expected it to be all offense. It's actually a mix.
Brett: That's a good call out. That total scoring margin over expected, looks at how did they actually outperform expectations? And then how do you attribute that outperformance? And we can see total scoring margin over expected minus 34 points, which kind of makes sense. But, it's relatively split down the middle. Implying that the defense underperformed kind of consistent with the offense and to your point around the defense being really reliant on TJ Watt.
The defense allowed 5.2 yards per play. But that's with Watt on the field. With Watt off the field, then it's 6.2 yards per play. So a huge difference with him simply not being [00:13:00] on the field. And I think that's a good point too, around what is being priced in the market and what is not. I agree, everyone knows the offense is bad. Everyone expects the offense to be bad. And if the offense is anything better than bad, that's just a cherry on top, but the defense is good.
And the defense is the top five unit. That's what the market is pricing in. So if that, if you think the offense, if you think the defense is much worse than that, and you're saying possibly a bottom 10. Yeah. Then that's huge.
Judah: I think the offense, if anything will improve, you can't really get much worse than Ben Rothlisberger was last year. And I think the market is pricing in this defense as if they're still really good. The picture that's left in people's head is the Steelers defense carrying Duck Hodges to the playoffs.
Brett: And even carrying Ben Rothlisberger to the playoffs.
Judah: That's exactly. Yeah.
Brett: So off season changes. Yeah, they didn't really make that many changes.
So obviously the lost of Big Ben, bringing in Mitch Trubisky and also rolled the dice and drafted George Pickens from Georgia.
If Mitch Trubisky could [00:14:00] realize the potential for what the bears originally had from him, drafting him as the number two overall pick.
And I'm not saying that he would ever reach that type of potential. But he always showed flashes in Chicago from time to time. He's way more mobile than Big Ben. In fact, near the tail end of his career in Chicago, the offense actually started to open up a allow him to actually run more.
In fact, even had more designed runs for Trubisky, allowed him to be a better quarterback. And so I wonder if Matt Canda and his offense could maybe source some of that unrealized talent from Mitch Trubisky.
So if we look at 2022, again, win expectation at that seven and a half, very depressed to win the division expect to come in. Last of course, plus a thousand +350 to make the playoffs. One thing I have here is George Pickens win offensive rookie of the year [00:15:00] plus a thousand.
Certainly, probably more likely to cash than the Steelers between the super bowl.
So pythag 2.0, has the Steelers under. You and pythag 2.0, you're locked in that's right. Seeing eye to eye.
Judah: I, don't even have the I don't even see the pythag 2.0. Before my leans totally blind here.
Brett: Strength of schedule fourth hardest. Net rest, negative four days, mean spread plus two and a half.
It's pretty low for a seven and a half win expectation. Patriots Browns, jets, I think are all winnable. So you could be three and one right there.
Judah: I gonna be ecstatic to sell at that point.
Brett: well, that's the thing is I don't really sell because I think even if they go into three and one.
The I think the Mark's gonna be like the same thing as last year. It's gonna be like, just waiting for the crack to show, to just sell off hard [00:16:00] on them. And if they're three in one, it's gonna be the, oh, this is the worst three in one team like ever . Yeah.
Then coming off the, by then you got saints, Bengals Colts. That's not a breath of fresh air coming outta the, by then Falcons, Ravens Panthers. Maybe you could get squeeze out two wins there and then close with Raiders, Ravens, Browns.
Yeah you're keeping me off, the over and yeah, this looks like a very tough schedule. So I'm with you. I guess.
Browns: the villains of the NFL went into 2022 with an win expectation of 10. Went 8-9, 7-10 ATS. Lost a hundred dollar unit better over a thousand bucks.
So definitely one of the worst performances that we've seen thus far. doing these We see, they hung around from a power ranking perspective, all the way up until about week 13, 14, [00:17:00] and then sold off into the end of the year.
Judah: They year, were everyone's darling towards the beginning of the season.
The week one game against the chiefs stayed in bettors' minds, really hanging with the chiefs, giving them a hard time.
It's okay, the Browns are here to stay. People were really high on Kevin Stefanski won coach of the year in 2020. Baker Mayfield: everyone seems to forgotten that he had his breakout in 2020. He was getting ready to, dominate in 2021 and was really good through the first couple of weeks.
You look at the EPA numbers there. Weeks one and two. It was excellent. And week three and it all went downhill. I, think some of the same reasons why people were bullish on the Browns in 2021, you should apply the same reasoning in 2022. It's a terrific head coach a terrific offensive design.
I think that Amari Cooper is a massive upgrade at wide receiver that they haven't had. And the defense is, was very young and is only gonna get better. And especially as [00:18:00] secondary players age, they tend to get better. They're still a lot of them on their rookie deals.
And these were high picks and the edge group is one of the best in the league. Yes, the quarterback is the, big question, mark. I think baker Mayfield was thought to be a, top 10 quarterback in 2021. And he didn't actually perform that way, but all the other reasons to buy the Browns, I think still exist from two to 53 in the head coach.
With the exception of the tails risk of the organizational dysfunction. Assuming that doesn't happen, there are good reasons to buy.
Brett: And also we know their offensive line was really destroyed throughout the course of the season. Yeah. And we look at the total scoring margin over expected, negative 51 and a half in all of it attributable to their offense.
And so a lot of upside to potentially be gained here.
A very hot start. Played very competitively verse the Chiefs were winning that game by 12 ended up losing it. But yeah, that was a sufficient spark to [00:19:00] kinda capture all the bullish, Browns bettors imagination for what could be.
Browns ended up blowing it after having a two touchdown lead. Had an ugly game vs Denver. Got ended up getting swept by the Steelers over the course of the season.
2022. Plus 380 to win the division, plus 175 to win the playoffs plus 5,000 to win the super bowl.
I feel if you wanted to take a, flyer around the super bowl, like saying that in fact, the exact opposite of what I say happens and it all comes together.
Judah: That's my favorite bit. I'm at I, really am hitting like on opposite, like full on tails, like 1% outcomes. I don't hate the fewest wins and I don't hate a super bowl.
Brett: What makes it easy here is again you're, a franchise influx, but you ostensibly have the eighth easiest schedule. You have a positive net, two days of rest. [00:20:00] Again, we don't really have a lot of kind of future forecasted spreads out in the market right now. But that front half of the season is certainly easier than the back half of the season.
Yeah.
Again, there's always the huge asterisk of, trying to forecast the season here in late August
but in any case that, second half does look very tough. But if you go in at five and three into the buy, then you just need to squeak out three wins to push on that eight. It's not terrible.
Moving on to the AFC champions, Cincinnati Bengals .Came into 2021. I was actually surprised when I was looking at this. So they came into 2021 with an expected win total of seven. That was actually pretty high.
I ended up going 10 and seven. So well over the seven. 10 and seven also ATS. Won a $100 unit better on the money line spread over 500 [00:21:00] bucks.. Pythag a had 'em at 10 and a half. Our pythag 2.0 actually had 'em at eight and a half. So actually much lower. Mean power rank about 18. The seven day power rank volatility was six spots.
That's mostly attributable to obviously the market starting the season off, very low on the Bengals and then taking them eight weeks, nine weeks for them to finally kinda get up 20 spots.
Judah: But there was a real kind of, I think market adjustment after the Ravens game and immediately lost to the Jets, Mike White's Jets.
And it's, everything we thought we had like a, seven week case that was building of... okay, maybe the Bengals are actually good. They lose to Mike White in the Jets like downward trending. Then again, get crushed by the Browns. It was like, okay, this team isn't actually that good. Yep. And then it took a while to be like, okay slowly here come the Bengals.
Brett: When when we're looking at these types of charts. There's a lot to learn here. [00:22:00] Around not getting caught in the moment in any specific week. Like it's so easy to look at this and just see the future, see how it all played out and you feel very comfortable with it.
Judah: Yeah. Like spelling out the Y axis here is important. Like you can see, it looks like a pretty big jump. It's going from 11 to 18 in the span of two weeks. And that's a massive jump and that's from a team we say, okay this is like an above average to really, to, to good team to no, they're actually below average.
Yeah.
Brett: Did it twice.
Judah: Yeah, no they, did it twice. And, granted, some things changed over the course of the season, but I think you make a really excellent point, which is the Bengals are a prime example of the importance of kind of quantifying change over the course of the season.
Which is are certain types of changes built in where you should maintain this long term perspective. And I think these podcasts are extremely helpful for understanding your own priors and your own perspective, and then evaluating mid-season and saying, okay, is this good reason [00:23:00] to jump off? Should I still be buying? Is it time to jump off the new information, come in where it's okay, my prior was wrong and that's the most difficult part of being a better, but also the most profitable.
Brett: And I think we've seen this also time and time again, as we're previewing these teams and looking back on 2021 as even some of the best teams are having these dud of games and those.
On a standalone basis have proved actually to been more noise than signal. And it was certainly not any reason for you to reorient your potentially your priors on them or otherwise reshape how you wanna forecast them moving forward.
So we know off season changes. Again, something very well priced in. Everybody knows it. They meaningfully upgraded their offensive line, which was one of their key weaknesses last year. And as we saw at the beginning, when we were looking at the market kind of consensus office of line rankings, they moved up dramatically are now a top [00:24:00] 15 unit.
And so despite that, I feel like it's, very torn on the way the market is positioning on the Bengals. Yeah. There's a lot of people that wanna sell the Bengals and we can of see their their future win total for a team that just went to the super bowl at 9.5 It's pretty low. Yeah. But I feel like there's like a contingency. That's oh, they upgraded like the major weakness. They can only get better. Yeah. But then there's a lot of people that say they were never as good as they were last year. And they were just one of those teams that got hot at the right time.
And they're actually much worse.
Judah: I think this is a great example of the different push and pulls from the market. No one thought they'd go to the super bowl. Okay, this team overachieved, they're gonna come back down to earth.
And this is something I don't think the market's pricing in at all. Cause it very rarely prices it in. Is that what if Joe Burrow gets better? Yeah.
Like he's the number one overall pick. He got much better from year one-to-year two. Players, especially young quarterbacks get [00:25:00] better from year two-to-year three.
That just happens. In the same way that no one priced in the possibility that Hey, maybe Joe Burrow would actually become a top 10 quarterback and maybe we shouldn't be power ranking the Bengals at 29th to start the season. He can be saying the same thing from year two to year three. What if he takes the next step? And we've got elite receivers: Tee Higgins and Jamarr Chase and Tyler Boyd might be the league's best receiving unit. The defense is fine. They fixed their offensive line. Yes they overachieved. But what if this offense is the best in the league? That wouldn't be unthinkable?
Brett: I think the fantasy market is definitely telling us that the Bengals could potentially be the most explosive offense in the NFL. And that's one thing that you and I have talked a lot about as well is trying to source signal for betting from fantasy.
I think the fantasy market is sharper than the betting market. The guys in fantasy, I feel are just more intelligent. Have way more sophisticated ways of analyzing information. Are way [00:26:00] more comfortable with data than the broader sports betting market. And I think again, leveraging that source of information to cross pollinate different views.
Yeah.
Judah: I think the market's almost building in an expectation that as a general rule, explosive offenses are less stable year over year. We should be looking at something more like success rate if we're using an analytical statistic. Because that's more stable year over.
But we have an outlier here. Jamar Chase, Joe Burrow are going to be better deep every year. Statistically, it's not going to regress to the mean because it's a specific skill.
Joe Burrow is a very good deep thrower and he's very accurate, which means that he allows for good yards after the catch. And Jamarr Chase, so long as he stays healthy, is going to be elite after the catch they're always going to be more explosive than other teams. That's not something that's going to regress.
And I think the market's pricing that in. They're like, we should build in some regression that this team's going to be less explosive. I don't think that's true. They're going to continue to be as explosive.
Brett: One thing that's necessary to call out . I don't [00:27:00] hear being cited as much for why you would be bearish on the Bengals.
But is Zac Taylor.
Judah: I was about to bring that up. That's the biggest question work to me.
Brett: Going into last year, especially, and even throughout the course of last season, it's like, how are they doing this? Cuz Zach Taylor is such a bad coach. And is he getting better? I don't know, but I it was a consistent view that he was one of the worst, if not the worst coach in the NFL. Very young, one of the youngest coaches in the NFL as well. So you can allow for the possibility for growth and philosophy and approach, but it, didn't necessarily demonstrate itself throughout the season. It was like they were winning in spite of Zach Taylor, not because of Zach Taylor.
Judah: I think is that is a massive question, mark, and that's why I'm not being like I'm all in on the Bengals Super Bowl I think that Joe Burrow can be a top five quarterback with a very good offensive line and elite receivers. That's like [00:28:00] recipe number one for me to jump all over a super bowl team, like possibility of elite quarterback, elite passing game. But it just Zac Taylor is a total a wild card. I have no faith at all. And that's tempering me back from just like being all in on the Bengals.
Brett: Yeah. That's definitely the Achilles heel here for the Bengals. Because you look at the Bengals potentially have the sixth hardest strength of schedule in 2022.
And when you're thinking about the impact of coaching decisions. It's when there's a close game and there's a meaningful call that needs to be made, it's going to dictate potentially the outcome. And maybe those things didn't pop up as much last year. I The thing is, I wonder if this is a consequence of the Zach Taylor effect .
Yeah. So we're looking at max deficits. One, two, I'm gonna call this three, four, [00:29:00] five, six, seven, eight games of double digit deficits. Yeah. Last year. So is that again, you're not play calling the game properly and then it's the miraculousness of Jamar Chase and Joe Burrow.
Judah: Nothing stands out more than the super bowl on the last drive, on the third, down from the shotgun, running Semaji Perine outta the shotgun.
Brett: That's when it showed itself.
Judah: Exactly, In a close game when the team needed it most.
Brett: One of the things I also wanted to call out here is too is, and we'd see how it took really long time, I guess maybe for traditional modelers or ELO modelers to really catch up to the Bengals.
It looks like actually the betting market was much faster. So we see, like they were a top five, top 10 pick starting in week five and really from then on all the way through the end of the season. [00:30:00] So the market was pretty quick to adjust, to seeing value in the Bengals. Something that I thought was pretty interesting.
Just to close kinda again, looking at their schedule it does look pretty tough.
Judah: But the spreads are, notable there, right? They're not huge underdogs.
Which I think speaks to the, value of how the market is seeing the Bengals.
Brett: This also has to be a record for Bengals, at least within our lifetimes.
Yeah. Of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 primetime games. So national audiences are going be getting a large dose of Bengals in 2022.
All right. The Ravens, perhaps the most controversial team in the NFL always an argument around the efficacy of the Ravens and Lamar Jackson and their approach and their strategy.
2021 came in with that 10 expected wins. Similar to this year, went under that of course were [00:31:00] devastated by injuries. There was a chart that your buddy Arjun put together that really demonstrated how outsized of an impact injuries had on the Ravens.
Ended up going 8-9,, 7-10 against spread. Lost a hundred dollars unit better on the money line spread over 500 bucks. Pythag had 'em around eight wins our pythag 2.0, again to my dismay, have them at 9.2.
So suggesting that they're actually better than they actually were in the realized win total perspective. Because again, this is a team that I feel like no matter how injured they were, the market was relatively high on the Ravens .
And for that reason, always gonna give them the benefit of the doubt, even if they don't necessarily perform well. But they were 5-1 going into week seven. Got blasted by the Bengals Then came back [00:32:00] played the Vikings, didn't cover the seven, but ended up winning the game. Then looked really bad on Thursday Night Football vs. the Dolphins.
And that's when I feel like the cracks really started to show. And again, some of the injuries started to really catch up to them. And ended up not making the playoffs, not covering their win total again, despite a pretty promising start.
Judah: This is my bold call for the Ravens in 2022. I don't think the offense is going to look anything like it did in 2021, because of the running back injuries. I think that the Ravens adopted a different style of play Lamar Jackson both threw the ball out quicker and had a much higher passing depth which is counterintuitive.
Cause you'd think generally the longer the play develops, the further you'd throw the ball. But I think it actually speaks to the game plan, which was very quick throws and deep shots because they did not really believe in their run game to get the smaller, garbage plays that they were doing that they were know enjoying [00:33:00] previously, which is almost to say that like they have their running backs healthy.
The offense is not going to look like it did in 2021. I think it's gonna look more like the 2019 version more running. Certainly a different passing style. I think the trade of Marquis Brown signals that, which is that they're, they don't really care about who they're really throwing to back to those two tight end sets.
And defensively, that's where most of the injuries were coming from. They lost the entirety of their secondary. It was Jamie Smith Marcus Peters, Marlon Humphrey missed a bunch of time. Everyone was out. The defense is gonna look nothing like it did in 2021.
Brett: I seen very little chance that the Ravens look anything like 2019. 2019 in my view was one of those years that caught the league by surprise. And the league could just simply never catch up to it. Just could never adjust from a week to week basis of dealing with already whatever that team is dealing with. And then having six days to [00:34:00] prepare whatever for this offense just could never, just never happened. Yeah. And, but the, the Ravens, have not really ever shown glimmers of that team.
Judah: To add some data using our new drive score metrics. They were by far the best team in the database by far adjusted win differential of almost 12.3 points. The next is 11.7. And it's, the Broncos in 2013 and Pitton Manning's prime year. That's not happening again.
I think that's exactly to your point. That's not happening. And I think that if betters are trying to chase the 2019 Ravens, that's going to fail. That model cannot be replicated and it couldn't have even been replicated in 2020 or 2021. Even if everything worked out perfectly, that's just a one percentile outcome that happened in 2019.
Brett: I think what's [00:35:00] also again, we can lament that they were very injured and ended up losing a bunch of these games. And maybe they're actually, they're a better team than that, but they were pretty, again they, were banged up right off the bat. So we know that, but this Colts game was not a justified to win.
And then they needed what? A 65 all time, like greatest kick, longest kick ever from Tucker.
Judah: After, a fourth and 20 pass interference.
Brett: Yeah. And also when even on that 65 yard kick, there was like a blatant false start.
Judah: No business winning that Sunday game.
Brett: Oh, and that's another. Yeah, I totally forgot about this one. In fact, look at that mean margin too. Almost a touchdown and ended up winning it. Yeah. So that's three games right there. So that's it's not a wash, but that mitigates some of this asterisk here of, yeah. They lost those last six [00:36:00] they were super banged up.
They ended up winning three games in the front half of the season... they probably shouldn't have.
Judah: Yeah. Also week nine, looking at the mean margin they beat the Vikings. Geez.
Brett: I don't really remember this one, but that's hideous too. Yeah. Almost a touchdown again. Mean margin.
Win probability. Yeah. 43%. End up being the Vikings
Judah: I don't think they were that good, but I'll stand by there's nothing to learn from it. The offense is gonna look nothing like it. The defense is gonna look nothing like this team.
Brett: The one thing though. They did not upgrade wide receiver in any way, shape, or form. They're relying totally on Rashod Bateman to materialize into what they want him to be.
Judah: Yeah. I think the, only signal to lean there if you could find a bet, which allows you to, bet on which team is gonna run the most 12 personnel. I take the Ravens here, which is that the, Ravens are gonna run a ton of two tight formations. They're gonna use their backs.
They're gonna use their tight ends. It's not, doesn't really matter who their wide receivers are. [00:37:00] And that's, their bet. Whether it's gonna work is a totally separate question.
Brett: So we're looking at 2022 for the Ravens, again, win total expectations at 10. To win the division plus 140. To make the playoffs minus 165. I would never touch that. Plus 2000 to win the super bowl. I think that potentially has some value. I think it was higher in the off season and has been bid down already. Our pythag 2.0 model. No bet here. Strength of schedule 11th easiest. Net rest minus three days. And means spread less than a field goal.
Minus two, you start off probably as, as best as some, as you could ask for jets, dolphins, Patriots and then have a tough back to back games, but both at home bills and Bengals, and then you have [00:38:00] Giants, Browns, Bucs, and Saints into the bye.
Judah: Depending what happens in that Patriots game, we're like, oh, this team's two and three with two bad wins. Like two, two wins over like non quality teams. This team's done. I can see that narrative playing. Yeah. I can also see them going four and one and just steam rolling over everyone.
Brett: Yeah. And if that's the case, then they're definitely going over because you look at the back half of the season and it's much more favorable. So you have Panthers, Jags, Broncos. Steelers twice, Falcons, Browns and, then close at the Bengals.
Judah: I have a thesis on what the markets getting at right now that I think's come through in our conversation, which is that the central question around the 2022 Ravens is how much of 2019 can they capture?
Are they gonna be 70%? Are they gonna be 80%? Are they gonna be 90%? The markets like a little uncertain, they're pressing in kind of [00:39:00] a, mean outcome, which is where we get 10 from.
Brett: Yes. I think anything close to 2019 is off the table. 50% best case. The team is always gonna be in a position to show flashes, which I think is always gonna create just enough amount of noise and just to keep the argument a flame.
There's always gonna be enough for that. I think you, they could do that. In week one vs the Jets.
Judah: Also they have a tendency to blowout opponents. Like when they win big. They don't take their foot off the gas pedal.
Brett: Which ends up kind of distorting narratives.
Judah: I see this as a team that I'm betting futures on because there's gonna be a lot of week to week volatility, a lot of just games where they show up. They don't show up. And I want a thesis that's gonna playout over 17 games.
Brett: I wanna have as little opinion on the Ravens on a week to week basis.
But it's like always like my long term view on them is typically right. Yeah. But like in between I can never time it properly. So given that's the case, I should just stay away.
Judah: That's why I love futures. [00:40:00]
Brett: That's why you have to keep me off the temptation of trying to bet them on a week to week basis.
Remember what you said in the pre-season.
So that wraps up our preview of the AFC North. We'll see you next week. When we preview the NFC North.
And then we're gonna have to get into Week 1 previews soon. Oh, man. Preseasons already, behind us. So that's coming soon.
Thanks everyone.
And that's the closing bell.
