In The Athletic\u2019s Week 1 roundtable, we asked our writers several pressing questions around the league heading into Week 1 including a storyline surrounding tonight\u2019s matchup \u2014 Did either the Ravens or the Bills do enough this offseason to help their quarterback get over the hump and make the Super Bowl this year?<\/p>\n
Jeff Howe: I like the way the Bills remade their defense in a short time. There\u2019s certainly risk in putting too much on Josh Allen\u2019s plate to drive the whole offense, but he at least has a growing defense to help him. The Bills are still Super Bowl contenders, but someone other than Allen has to make a play when it matters in the postseason. They\u2019re not dissimilar to the Ravens. We know they\u2019ll be there in January, and Lamar Jackson has been better in the playoffs than earlier in his career, which makes me believe they\u2019re also a couple of plays away from contending for a Super Bowl. Zach Orr should continue improving as a defensive coordinator, too, so I\u2019m intrigued by that group\u2019s potential this season.<\/p>\n
Zak Keefer: Sometimes when you\u2019re as close as the Bills and Ravens have been over the years, it\u2019s not about one piece. These teams aren\u2019t a player away. They\u2019re a play away. Behind Philadelphia, Baltimore has the deepest roster in the league, and another 13- or 14-win season is in store. Sean McDermott deserved Coach of the Year votes for the work he did remaking his defense in 2024, and they were a play or two away from winning in Arrowhead in the AFC Championship Game. For these teams, the regular season is moot. Nothing matters until January, when both will have another chance to get past the Kansas City Chiefs and make it to the Super Bowl.<\/p>\n
Mike Sando: I think these teams are just staying in the window to take another swing, rather than doing enough to definitively get over the top. It\u2019s been a maturation process over the last couple of years, and I like where these teams stand in that regard. A case can be made, however, for Baltimore pushing a little more.<\/p>\n
GO FURTHER<\/p>\n
NFL Week 1 roundtable: Micah Parsons\u2019 Packers debut, Aaron Rodgers\u2019 Steelers vs. Justin Fields\u2019 Jets<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In The Athletic\u2019s Week 1 roundtable, we asked our writers several pressing questions around the league heading into…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":126338,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-126337","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126337","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=126337"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126337\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/126338"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=126337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=126337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=126337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}