The Baltimore Ravens will be on the road again in Week 5 for their first game against an AFC North opponent when they take on the Cleveland Browns on Sunday afternoon.
Coming off a thrilling victory over the Atlanta Falcons in Week 5 in primetime, in which they had to pull off a late rally and force overtime to extend their winning streak, the Ravens are currently holding the best record in the division at 4-1, while the other three teams are tied for second at 3-2.
There are several intriguing storylines surrounding this divisional matchup between these two rival teams. Here are the top four.
Can Tyler Huntley do it again if called upon?
With two-time league MVP Lamar Jackson officially being ruled out after missing the entire week of practice for the second week in a row since suffering an ankle sprain midway through the Ravens' Week 3 victory over the Tennessee Titans, his Pro Bowl backup will be making a second straight start this upcoming Sunday. Huntley performed exceptionally well in last week's overtime thriller over the Atlanta Falcons after getting all of the reps with the first-team offense leading up to the game.
The seventh-year veteran went 24-of-32 for 201 passing yards and a pair of touchdowns and scored the game-winning touchdown on a quarterback sneak. He is now 3-0 in his last three starts in place of Jackson since rejoining the team last year, two of which came in primetime and all were against NFC opponents.
As the next man up again, this will mark his first start against a division rival since Week 18 of the 2023 season, when the Ravens had the division crown and the AFC's top seed, and decided to rest several key starters against the Pittsburgh Steelers. Unlike that game, this one has much higher stakes and they'll need Huntley to be on his 'A' game with first place on the line.
"[Huntley]'s a really good player, and he's got a great demeanor," head coach Jesse Minter. "He's got great poise. He has great respect amongst his teammates. He's just [an] infectious personality. Infectious can be different, [but] he's just cool, calm, collected, confident — that to me, that's infectious. When he's in there, that's kind of how the guys feel, and it's really no different with Lamar."
Will Ravens continue to be road warriors?
While the Ravens' home record has been abysmal, dating back to last season's franchise-worst six losses, they've been far more successful away from the confines of M&T Bank Stadium. In addition to being perfect 3-0 on the road through the first five weeks of this season, their 21-7 record playing outside of Baltimore since 2023 is the best in the league, as is their point differential, turnover differential and offense with an average of nearly 400 total yards.
Their running game has traveled especially well, averaging over 180 yards on the ground per road game since 2023, with an NFL-record streak of 36 consecutive road games of rushing for at least 100 yards. The Ravens are 4-4 in Cleveland during the Jackson era dating back to 2018, and this Sunday will mark Huntley's second career start against them during that span, with his first coming in Week 15 of the 2022 season.
Are penalty issues finally in the rearview?
Through the first four weeks, the Ravens were among the most penalized teams in the league, having been flagged 10-plus times for over 100 yards twice in that span, including season-highs with 13 flags for 131 yards in Week 4. They managed to finally buck that trend in primetime against the Falcons with a season-low five penalties for 40 yards against the Falcons. The bulk of their flags were attributed to the offense, as they were not only still getting acclimated to running the Declan Doyle offense in live action, but they also had shuffling pieces on the offensive line and at the skill positions due to players going down and even being lost for the season due to injuries.
It might've been the fact that they were playing with a small margin of error, with a backup quarterback under a national spotlight for the first time this season, that made them dial in even more last week. Nonetheless, they find themselves in a similar situation heading into this matchup and will need to do their best to repeat the feat or do even better.
Can secondary keep a No.1 wide receiver from having a day?
Overall, the Ravens rank in the middle of the pack when it comes to passing yards allowed per game with 223.6, and for the past four weeks, nearly half and sometimes more than half of that production has come from the connection between the opposing quarterback and his top wideout. They've allowed a 100-plus-yard receiver in three straight games during their win streak. Even though Chris Olave fell just shy of reaching the century mark in Week 2, he was unguardable when the New Orleans Saints needed him most as they spoiled the Ravens' home opener in an upset.
This trend wouldn't be especially puzzling if the Ravens didn't have one of the league's most talented defensive backfields, which they've invested four first-round picks and free-agent resources in over the years. They've had their top two cornerbacks, Nate Wiggins and Marlon Humphrey, make big plays in key moments against these upper-echelon wideouts, but haven't been able to fully put the clamps on for a full or even most of the game. The Browns' leading receiver through five weeks is second-round rookie Denzel Boston with 330 receiving yards, three touchdowns and a league-leading 20.6 yards per catch.
"Every team has a good one. I feel fortunate that we have good corners," defensive coordinator Anthony Weaver said. "We don't really have to necessarily travel to people. I think we do in certain spots just because of specific skill sets of our guys, but we feel confident in all the DBs that we do have. In terms of the guys that we've faced thus far, we've had our good days and bad days. But I think, just collectively as a whole, that group is starting to gain confidence."
Does former Ravens OC familiarity give Browns an edge?
Before becoming Cleveland's head coach this offseason, replacing Kevin Stefanski, a two-time AP Coach of the Year, Todd Monken spent the previous three seasons from 2023-25 orchestrating the most prolific offense in franchise history, including what should've been back-to-back MVP-winning seasons for Jackson in his first two at the helm. Even without their star dual-threat signal caller, Monken is just as familiar with the strengths and weaknesses of several returning players on offense and defense.
"I'm not playing defense. I just know that he's going to try to give us [his] best shot, especially starting the game," Huntley said. "We have to be ready for all the different little gimmicks that he has for our game plan, and we [will] just go from there."
The Ravens have a lot of new pieces on both sides of the ball that Monken is not familiar with, a whole new scheme on offense and a slightly different scheme on defense. It's not like Jon Gruden facing the former Oakland Raiders in the Super Bowl, as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers' head coach in 2002, when he knew his former team's entire playbook. Still, he has some insight into how a Huntley-led offense and overall team will approach this game because he successfully pulled it off twice last year in impressive fashion.
"[Monken] has a great game plan, and he's a great coach," Huntley said "We have to be ready to put our thinking caps on and be ready to go follow our keys and win us a game."
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