The Baltimore Ravens host the Jacksonville Jaguars tonight in a game that has shifted dramatically over the past five days.
Last Sunday, the Ravens visited the Buffalo Bills in a perfect spot to take advantage of the return of Lamar Jackson and down a quality Buffalo team to climb back into the thick of their AFC North Division race. Then, on the first offensive play Jackson ran on Sunday, he broke his thumb and will probably miss the rest of the season.
Okay, on Sunday the Ravens now had an uphill battle with backup Tyler Huntley running the home team’s offense. But the Bills have a less than dominating defense so Baltimore still has a chance in this critical game for their playoff hopes. Then Huntley suffers an injury that required surgery this week and the Ravens are left with undrafted rookie Joe Fagnano to lead the Ravens offense.
Chances gone, lopsided loss for Jesse Minter’s squad a near certainty and realized in a 36-10 defeat.
Fagnano will get his first NFL start tonight when the Jaguars come calling. The Jaguars have a better defense than Buffalo and are expected to dominate the action just as the Bills did last week when Fagnano made his first NFL appearance.
So, a game that was slated to favor the Ravens on the spread by 4½ points before the season began, has now been relegated to a battle between the have and have nots. Tonight’s primetime game would have had a great matchup between two elite quarterbacks; Jackson and the Jaguars Trevor Lawrence. Now this contest is a mismatch on the spread that has the visitors favored by 10 points.