Week 7: Baltimore at Buffalo

It’s not easy being the Bills. For one thing, they play in Buffalo, a city whose chief exports are rust, fistfights, and bitter, bitter tears. (Oh, and Goo Goo Dolls, which is even sadder) Then they’re victimized by The Athlon Jinx (trademark pending), in which we deemed them “sparky” with unseemly exuberance, thus causing goofball quarterback J.P. Losman to do a nightmarish two-game Brody Jenner imitation (from MTV’s The Hills? No, you don’t watch?) before suffering a gnarly injury in Week 3. This was preceded and followed by an avalanche of ruptured tendons and broken bones on the defensive side of the ball so unbelievably severe that 80-year old GM Marv Levy actually played on special teams in Week 4. And then, the coup de grace: a legitimately sparky showing – their first of the season – on Monday Night in Week 5 against the Cowboys that falls apart in the last minutes, leading to a heartbreaking loss that the team then has a whole bye week to think on. As we said: not easy.

Sadly for the Bills, it’s not getting any easier this week. While the Bills defense remains unreasonably stout – it seems safe to say no other team will force six turnovers and score two defensive touchdowns against the Cowboys this year, as the Bills did in Week 5 – their depleted depth means they wear down badly at the end of games. And their offense, despite Edwards steadiness and the weekly emergence of Marshawn Lynch as a big-time back, just isn’t that good.

It’s not bad, exactly, either, but it’s still one of the weaker units in the NFL. Edwards has thrown just one touchdown pass, but the team clearly believes in him, and he seems to be developing something of a rhythm with potentially game-breaking receivers Roscoe Parrish and Lee Evans. After what seemed like a lifetime of Losman’s shaka-brah haplessness, a little boring steadiness must seem downright thrilling to these guys. And Lynch, a bona fide bruiser who has scored three of the team’s four offensive TDs this year, is for real. All of which will be of great service to the Bills in Week 8, against the Jets (check local listings!). This week, against the Ravens, not so much.

The Ravens defense is a wonder. Injuries bounce right off the unit, and veteran LB Ray Lewis remains oddly ageless and entirely terrifying. The team’s defensive line is as good as any in the game – thus their 66.7 rushing yards allowed through six games – and their linebacking corps is equally effective. Yes, their secondary has been pretty terrible, but it shouldn’t hurt them this week against a Buffalo air assault that hasn’t been very assaultive. The Ravens have yet to beat a halfway-decent offense, and eventually they may be exposed somewhere in an upcoming stretch against Pittsburgh (twice), New England, Indianapolis, Cincy, Cleveland and San Diego. This game won’t do that, though, and we expect them to stuff Buffalo.

The key, then, as it is every week, is eking a double-digit number out of their offense. Steve McNair missed the team’s Week 6 win with an injured groin, and remains questionable for Week 7; Kyle Boller, the backup, has excelled in what amounts to a middle reliever’s role as McNair’s body begins to give out. But with nearly every pass-catcher on Baltimore suffering from an injury – star TE Todd Heap was inactive in Week 6 and top receivers Derrick Mason and Mark Clayton are both dinged up – it’s perhaps a good thing that the Ravens’ offense is so absurdly conservative. It’s not a fun-to-watch thing, certainly, but their ability to eat up clock and do just enough to win has helped them dispatch weak teams with relative ease.

We expect them to do just that here, and also foresee a biggish day from RB Willis McGahee in his return to Buffalo, and another one of those sparky-but-not-quite-enough efforts from the Bills. Next year, guys.

Ravens by 5