Cincinnati Bengals: Players to watch vs. Ravens in Week 17
By Kenn Korb
1. Andy Dalton
No player watch list versus the Ravens would be complete without including the Red Rifle. Despite actually having relative success in the win column against Baltimore since he was drafted (6-6), the Ravens stand tall as a nightmare matchup for the Cincinnati signal-caller. He may have won half his games against them, but the victories have often come in spite of him while the losses are heavily influenced by his errors.
He’s thrown 17 interceptions against this team (compared to 12 touchdowns). Those turnovers have tended to come in bunches, too. All 17 came in just seven games, with four of those games involving three or more interceptions on their own.
The opening game this year was the worst of those meetings for Dalton. Zero touchdowns were matched with four interceptions in a game Cincinnati had a legitimate shot at staying in for awhile due to their own defense making things tough on Joe Flacco. It didn’t matter how good their own defense played though, because their quarterback was as much of a wrecking ball to their chances as we’ve ever seen one be in a single game.
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Relative to this season, this Baltimore game was a blip. Dalton hasn’t been the player we saw in 2015 (when he was a dark horse MVP candidate before getting injured), but he has mostly fallen in line with the player he was last season: that’s someone who is pretty good and (mostly) avoids turnovers. Without that Baltimore game, Dalton’s 2017 TD:INT ratio (22:8) would be even better than it was last season (18:8).
Which trend will bear out as more important here: Dalton across all of 2017, or Dalton versus the Ravens throughout his career? The answer will play a huge role in whether his team can stay close in this contest, or if it will be a continuation of how this disappointing season began for Cincinnati.