Ravens Dealing with Rice Situation as They Tackle Steelers
By Charles Jay
The media loves controversy, because it sells. And they’ve got something that would seem tailor-made as the Baltimore Ravens meet up with the Pittsburgh Steelers in Thursday night football betting. The short week hasn’t exactly done the Ravens much good, as they got word on Monday that not only had the website TMZ revealed a video of teammate Ray Rice landing a one-punch knockout blow on his fiancee (now his wife) in an Atlantic City elevator, but word had come down that Rice was released from his contract.
So VietBet customers can imagine what that created in terms of preparations and distractions.
It is difficult to determine just how the Baltimore players are going to react for this game, but when you have only a couple of days to practice, and have to field questions about Rice from every direction, it is an arduous task indeed.
Neither of these teams could have been all that happy with their respective results on Sunday. Pittsburgh looked like a million bucks as they got off to a 27-3 against the Cleveland Browns, but the market crashed, so to speak, in the second half, as they somehow allowed the Browns to come all the way back and tie the score. The Steelers had to kick a field goal with time running out to escape with a 30-27 victory. Baltimore got an uneven effort from quarterback Joe Flacco and fell behind 15-0 to the Cincinnati Bengals, despite not allowing a touchdown. Then they battled back to take a 16-15 lead before the Bengals’ AJ Green took a pass all the way to clinch the win (23-16).
In the Thursday night football betting odds that have been established at VietBet on this CBS-televised game, the Ravens are the favorites:
Baltimore Ravens -2.5 (-120)
Pittsburgh Steelers +2.5 (+100)
Over 44.5 Points -110
Under 44.5 Points -110
When watching the Ravens last week, one could not help seeing Flacco force a lot of plays. The pointless scramble he went into in the final seconds of the first half, when he could have thrown the ball away and given his team a chance at a field goal, was an especially bad play. It is, frankly, too early to come to the conclusion that he is going to be comfortable working with the offense of the new coordinator, Gary Kubiak, with Jim Caldwell having departed to the Detroit Lions.
Football bettors know that when you throw 62 passes, either it means you don’t respect your own running game, or you are out of control. This was a frequent complaint even when Rice was there, but of course he is not going to be available now. But there are people like Justin Forsett and Bernard Pierce around, so it’s not like the cupboard is bare. But this game plan is not likely to change.
Both of these teams got strong games out of the people who are supposed to be big-play receivers. Steve Smith, who had been brought over from Carolina, caught an 80-yard touchdown pass from Flacco, while Antonio Brown had 116 yards in receptions and even threw a nice jump kick on somebody during a punt return.
VietBet patrons can expect that both clubs will be looking to get plays off quickly. The Steelers have enjoyed mixing in a no-huddle approach, while the Ravens got off 82 plays against Cincinnati. So maybe this total (44.5 points in the Thursday night football betting odds) is approachable, although one must understand that nine of the last ten regular season meetings between these clubs have been decided by a field goal or less.
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