OTL: What to Watch for in Week 10’s Purple vs. Purple Matchup in Minny

Lamar Jackson and the Baltimore Ravens are set to play the Minnesota Vikings this Sunday for just the second time in the quarterback’s eight-year career. It’ll be a matchup of two first-round quarterbacks, as Vikings’ second-year QB J.J. McCarthy will start in just his 4th career game, after missing all of 2024 with a knee injury. Jackson notched a win in his lone game against Minnesota, a 34-31 come-from-behind victory, after Baltimore trailed 24-10 early in the third quarter. It was one of those early-career Jackson performances, in which he threw for 266 yards, three touchdowns, and two interceptions, while also leading the team in carries with an eye-popping 21 attempts for 120 rushing yards. Fortunately for the Ravens and Jackson’s legs, this year’s team is not the same sub-par backfield from 2021, which saw a running back duo of Devonta Freeman and Le’Veon Bell as the one and two.

Jackson might have to dig into that bag of tricks he has on the ground this week, however, as Minnesota enters Week 10 with the second-highest blitz rate on dropbacks in the NFL (43.7). Lamar has been more than effective when facing the blitz this season, currently holding the highest passer rating in the league (136.4) and an EPA of +0.42 since 2024 (+0.12 more than any other QB) when facing such packages. Despite missing three and a half games due to his hamstring injury, Jackson still finds himself atop the league in multiple quarterback stats. On a minimum 20% of dropbacks, Lamar sits third in completion percentage (72.9), tied for 12th in passing touchdowns (14), fourth in EPA/dropback (+0.21), and the second-lowest INT total (1). Getting the ball out through the intermediate passing game has been Jackson’s bread and butter over the last few seasons. In the Ravens’ win over the Dolphins in Week 9, Lamar completed 4 of 5 passes for 84 yards and two touchdowns when targeting receivers 10-19 yards out. Following 10 days between games, Jackson and the Ravens offense are looking to pick up where they left off against a Brian Flores-led defense coming off a big win over Detroit.

In just three starts, McCarthy hasn’t put up any big numbers to really write home about. But the inexperienced second-year starter enters Week 10 with a 2-1 record, including wins over division foes Detroit and Chicago. McCarthy carries a 1:1 TD to interception ratio, with four of each entering Sunday’s contest with Baltimore. Despite averaging the third-longest time to throw in the NFL this season (3.12 seconds), the Vikings’ offensive line has still surrendered 14 sacks against their young QB thus far. It’s been an ongoing problem for Minnesota this season, as veteran QB Carson Wentz was just placed on IR following a beatdown in Week 8, in which Wentz was sacked five times. Baltimore’s pass rush is coming off its first 3+ sack game of the season a week ago, and new additions Dre’Mont Jones and Carl Lawson look to add more juice to the group. With Aaron Jones returning to the injury report and Jordan Mason averaging just 4.3 yards per carry, the Vikings could enter Sunday with a more pass-heavy offense.

Baltimore’s secondary struggled mightily to begin the season, before acquiring safety Alohi Gilman from the Chargers. Prior to the trade, the Ravens defense was averaging 35.4 PPG against, 408.8 total yards against, and 262.4 passing yards against, and had managed just two takeaways. Since Gilman’s arrival, Baltimore has sliced those bad numbers in half, averaging 13.0 PPG, 315.0 total yards, 229.3 passing yards, while climbing to five total takeaways. It won’t be the same easy defense to carve up for McCarthy come Sunday. Zach Orr’s squad has really seemed to find its stride over the past few weeks, and shutting down an offense that features a future HOFer in Justin Jefferson in Week 10 will only fuel more momentum down the final stretch of the season.

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