Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - CROSSOVER: Daniel Jones, Indianapolis Colts Host Lamar Jackson, New-Look Baltimore Ravens
Episode Date: September 10, 2026Daniel Jones and the Indianapolis Colts host Lamar Jackson and the new-look Baltimore Ravens at Lucas Oil Stadium on Sunday. For the Colts, this game is about getting back what they lost, as several p...layers return from 2025 injuries. The Ravens, meanwhile, have a new coaching staff for the first time in nearly 20 years.What individual matchups will make the difference in this game, and what does each side need to capitalize on to win?Crossover Thursday returns as Jake is joined by Kevin Oestreicher of Locked On Ravens! EVERYDAYER CLUBIf you never miss an episode, it’s time to make it official. Join the Locked On Everydayer Club and get ad-free audio, access to our members-only Discord, and more — all built for our most loyal fans.Click here to learn more and join your team’s community: https://lockedonpodcasts.com/everydayerclub Find and follow Locked On Colts on your favorite podcast platforms:🎧 https://lockedonpodcasts.com/podcasts/locked-on-colts/📺YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLdpxJspi1hMh5HL7ExpWOQLocked On NFL League-Wide: Every Team, Fantasy, Draft & More🎧 https://lockedonpodcasts.com/podcasts/locked-on-nfl/ Follow Jake and Zach's written work on ColtsRoundtable.com, and give them a follow on Twitter: @JakeArthurNFL, @ZachHicks2, and @LockedOnColts! Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!HomeChefFor a limited time, Home Chef is offering my listeners FIFTY PERCENT OFF and free shipping for your first box PLUS free dessert for life! Go to http://HomeChef.com/LOCKEDONNFL. QuoTry QUO for free PLUS get 20% off your first 6 months when you go to http://Quo.com/LOCKEDONNFL. IndeedListeners of this show get a $75 Sponsored Job Credit to help give your job the premium placement it deserves at http://Indeed.com/podcast.PrizePicksVisit https://prizepicks.onelink.me/LME0/LOCKEDONNFL and use code LOCKEDONNFL and get $150 if you win your first $5 lineup!OdooGreat organizations win because operations matter. And that’s why you should get Odoo. Try for free today at https://Odoo.com/lockedon.GustoTry Gusto today at http://gusto.com/LOCKEDONNFL, and get three months free when you run your first payroll.KALSHIFor a limited time, download the Kalshi app and use code [LOCKEDON] to get $10 when you trade $10.GametimeToday's episode is brought to you by Gametime. Download the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDON for $20 off your first purchase.FanDuelGet three hundred fifty dollars in Bonus Bets — GUARANTEED — when you bet five dollars every day for seven days. Join all the action at https://FANDUEL.COMFANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as non-withdrawable free bets that expire in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
Transcript
Discussion (0)
The season kicks off this Sunday, and there will be some much anticipated returns for your Indianapolis Colts out there on the field at Lucas Oil Stadium.
Let's get to it.
You are locked on NFL crossover.
Part of the Locked on podcast network.
Your team every day.
All right.
Welcome back to crossover Thursday.
That's right.
It is already the first one of the year.
I am Jake Arthur of Locked on Colts.
joined by my friend Kevin Ostriker of Locked on Ravens.
And we are back with you guys.
Again, cannot believe it is already here.
Kevin, I mean, it's been an eventful offseason for both sides.
You guys are dealing with a new regime change for the first time in almost two decades.
The Colts, it almost feels like they're getting a whole new team back because of all the injuries.
Man, we made it.
It's incredible that we're here.
I know I've been waiting for football for so long.
and obviously with the way the Raven season ended.
I mean, it's kind of, it was a difficult thing to recover from.
But you know what?
There's been a lot of change in Baltimore for sure.
And for Indianapolis, you know,
they're a team that's looking to get off to a hot start too.
So I think it's two teams that have potential to make some ways in the
AFC facing off on week one.
Yeah, two teams with identical records.
The first two out in the AFC, no playoffs for the Colts.
It's been five years.
The Ravens aren't quite used to that.
But today, guys, we're going to take you through.
through what each team needs to do to win on Sunday.
It's a 1 p.m. Eastern kick at Lucas Oil Stadium on CBS.
What each team needs to do to win.
We're going to look at kind of some individual matchups that might really be key in this one.
But first, let's start up with the biggest storyline.
So Kevin, obviously, we kind of alluded to it already, but it's the first game of the year.
There's a lot of change.
But what is like the biggest thing that is kind of circling around the Ravens right now?
Yeah, I just think it is all the newness and the excitement of it and just kind of the anticipation, right?
I think one of the advantages the Ravens have in this game is there's no film on who this Ravens team is anymore, you know,
like we have not seen a Jesse Minter defense called by Jesse Minter in Baltimore, not seen a Declan Doyle offense called by Declan Doyle in Baltimore.
You know, it's that uncertainty, but it's the anticipation of knowing what that is.
And so, you know, overall Baltimore heads into this thing relatively healthy, you know, the big question.
guess one of the bigger storylines overall, and I'd probably say the biggest, just to narrow it down to
one, is the potential availability of Nambi Madd of BK, who suffered a neck injury in week number two last
season was out for the remainder of the year. Actually, remained the Ravens sack leader with two sacks
for like half of the season. It was that bad. He was fast versus that bad last year. But he's a
huge part of their defense. But, you know, it's felt like a return in week one was almost a long
shot, but I mean, we've really seen him take a lot of good steps and really nice progress.
So he was limited to practice on Wednesday.
Obviously, it doesn't mean he's playing or not playing.
But I think that people in Baltimore are just really excited to see him back on the field
because interior pass rush is getting harder and harder to find in the NFL or at least
good interior past rush and past rushers.
And so NAMD kind of transforms what they do defensively.
If he's not in there, the Ravens have enough depth, I think, to survive him not being there.
This year, they signed Clayus Campbell back after a couple of years away.
They have Travis Jones.
Eni's Peebles is there.
They signed Trey Hendrickson as well on the outside to be able to generate some pressure
as well.
But NAMD coming back would transform everything and against that Colts offensive line
would do some damage if he was in there.
Yeah, Colts in a similar boat.
DeForest Buckner's season also ended because of a neck injury.
And he is also an incredibly important three tech that provides that interior pass rush.
for the Colts, you know, I would say they've got, they don't have experience, obviously,
with this specific Ravens team, but they faced Jesse Mentor last year when he was with
the Chargers.
They faced Anthony Weaver when he was with the Dolphins.
They had success against both, but I'm still a little bit weary.
I think Shane Steichen knows how to attack that scheme, but, you know, there's Kyle Hamilton,
you know, there's Roe-Wan Smith, there's those really good defensive back.
acts like this is still, I know it was tough times last year, but this is still a Ravens defense
that I worry about a little bit. When it comes to the Colts, it's not newness necessarily,
but I think we're finally going to see, number one, some of what really brought a spark to the
Colts early in the season. Last year got off to that incredibly hot start, eight and two.
They were on top of the NFL, but also what they were lacking throughout a lot of.
lot of the year. So like Daniel Jones, he's back. He has been full go since training camp after
tearing his Achilles in December. You're getting Sauce Gardner back. He had a, after they traded for him
in November, he had a calf injury that limited him to just two full games. They wanted to pair
sauce Gardner with Charverius Ward. And Ward had big time concussion issues. Three concussions that
landed him on IR twice, played in just seven games. They're finally going to be able to see their pairing of
two shutdown corners together.
And then like I mentioned with DeForest Buckner coming back as well,
Alec Pierce was healthy last year,
but he missed the entire offseason.
He's going to be getting, you know,
kind of transported into this wide receiver one role.
So for the Colts,
it's a lot of additions of their own players, really.
The season completely went off the rails last year when injuries pile up.
Daniel Jones goes out,
but in the back half, again,
they didn't have Buckner or Gardner
or reward and you're missing all these important players and they went from where the playoffs
felt like a certainty they had like a 95% probability at one point to losing the final seven
and they just barely miss the playoffs really it's it's kind of crazy to think about everyone has
just been kind of waiting for these guys to return to see if they pick up where they left off
with how hot of a start they had so there aren't like a ton of new faces with the Colts
like it is Baltimore, but it's just kind of a site for sore eyes type of situation where it's
like, oh, thank God, you're back type of thing. Daniel Jones especially. I think everyone was a
little skeptical nationally about his really hot start last year. And then here we go again.
He gets injured, which has been the story of his career. I think everyone's waiting to see the
encore now. Like for the first time in your career, Daniel, do you put together two solid years?
Do you get hurt again? Like, he's a guy that has a lot of things to prove out.
Yeah, and I think the big thing for the Ravens kind of going on that same breath is that Lamar Jackson is fully healthy this year, you know, as well, where he admitted he, and we obviously knew it.
But, I mean, he missed a ton of time last season, all things considered.
I mean, I think it was, it was only four games that he was banged up for practically the entire year on the injury report with like three or four different lower leg injuries and got injured in week three.
Before he got injured, he was on pace for another MVP caliber season, ranked.
in the top one or three and many of the different passing categories out there.
And obviously also lost a lot of his explosiveness.
It was his worst rushing season of his career, as lowest attempts.
I mean, like all of that factored into what was a not up to Lamar Jackson's standard of his season last year.
And him being back healthy and also just the belief that I think we're seeing from these players.
You know, one of the first things that Jesse Minter and new offensive coordinator, Declan Doyle talked about is relationship building.
You know, they really have taken the time to build up their relationships with Lamar Jackson and the rest of these guys.
And you can tell that the buy-in is there from everybody on what they're doing offensively and defensively and just around the team in general.
It just felt during the end of John Harbaugh's tenure, you know, I had questioned all year.
Like, I'm not really sure the message is getting through anymore.
You know, you've been there for 18 seasons.
you got to switch up your message and sometimes it just goes stale especially because, you know,
winning cures everything.
And Baltimore wasn't doing a lot of it early.
They started one in five last year.
And, you know, somehow miraculously made it to a point where it was in the hands of their
rookie kicker at Accordshire Stadium in Pittsburgh.
Did either send them to the playoffs or send them home.
And unfortunately, the latter is what happened.
But I think there are definitely a lot of what ifs, you know, if Lamar never got injured,
but all this stuff kind of, I think the excitement level in Baltimore.
is around the fact that, you know, clearly it's just, they, they'd reach their ceiling with
the John Harbaal Lamar Jackson pairing. And Lamar, he's not 24 anymore. Lamar Jackson is going to be
30 at the end of this season. So, you know, it's not like he doesn't have plenty of years left.
I think he does. But, you know, he also, this is year nine for him. It's crazy to think about
that he's in year nine. And, you know, it's every year you don't win the Super Bowl with Lamar
Jackson is a year of his prime that you are wasting. And it gets.
Again, like it's very hard to do that.
There are many great quarterbacks that have never won a Super Bowl before.
But at the same time, you know, you've had a lot of chances that you've fallen short on,
2019 when they went 14 and 2 in Lamar's second season.
He won his first MVP that year.
2023.
They were one of the most dominant teams in NFL history and they lose in the AIT championship game at home to the Chiefs.
And, you know, for reasons of like, yeah, Lamar has not been the best playoff quarterback of all time.
And I won't sit up here and say he is.
but, you know, it's also coaching.
It's also defense and lack of turnovers.
And so I think that Lamar Jackson has used the term breath of fresh air a lot of times
from describing kind of what it feels like right now in Baltimore.
And I think that's a pretty good way to put it because it definitely feels like the vibes are better.
And it feels like there is a sense of just kind of turning the page to a new chapter here in Baltimore and seeing what happens.
I guess the good news is last time we saw Lamar healthy, he had an unbelievable season and may or may not
have been robbed of the MVP, we don't know. But yeah, we'll talk more about Lamar here in just a
moment, I'm sure. But guys, we're going to get to some individual matchups that could be really
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All right.
Welcome back to crossover Thursday.
Everybody, I am joined by Kevin Ostriker of Lockdown Raven.
I am Jake Arthur of Locke on Colts,
and we are talking about the Colts and Raven season kickoff this Sunday
at 1 p.m. at Lucas Oil Stadium.
Kevin, when I look at this matchup,
I see a lot of individual matchups that really, really are intriguing to me.
But what stands out to you right off the bat?
Well, I do need to say this,
because I think I have made it very clear.
Grover Stewart was one of my favorite players in the entire NFL.
I wanted him on Baltimore for years, so you and I can negotiate that after we're done.
Perfect.
We're courting this.
But I think that the Colts, the Grover Stewart and the Colts interior defensive line against
Javon, Gwen, who is the new Ravens starting center, is one that I'm really looking at, especially up front.
Because everything starts in the trenches for me.
And the Ravens had a really poor offensive last season.
It was horrendous.
And I think that they upgraded it through guard spots.
They brought him Van Guillo Hane for Daniel Falele, which I've said might be the single
biggest upgrade in the entire NFL based off how that went last year.
And then John Simpson comes back to Baltimore for Andrew Voorhees, who is now a backup with the
Ravens. But they lost tire of Linderbom. And Linderbom's a great center. He goes to Las Vegas on a
contract. And I probably think it's going to end up being a pretty big outlier at that position
for a while. But still, the Raiders had the money and they paid him. And the Ravens said,
you know what, we're good on that. So they had a center competition throughout the entire
offseason, which did include former Colt Danny Pinter, who unfortunately suffered a very
serious injury that will keep him out for the entire season. He was actually, I think he probably
had an inside track to win the job before going down in the joint practice with the biking.
So really unfortunate a situation for him. I think the Ravens really liked what he brought to the
table. But Javon, when after Pinter went down, he ends up winning the job over veteran Ethan
Posick, who's coming off of Torn Achilles that he suffered in December. So, you know, with offensive
of them, you always got to wonder about the burst coming off of injuries like that and
getting, you know, one of the things the Ravens have reached a ton new offensive line coach,
Duane Ledford is speed off the ball. And so that's something that is there. You know, I think
Gwen is someone who is very athletic. He moves side to side very well. We saw in the preseason
and in joint practices, him being able to get to the second level very effectively and impact the game
that way. But, you know, it's funny because Linderbalm obviously is an undersized center. And I think
a lot of people in Linderbong left here in Baltimore are like, all right, we're going to get this like,
like Ethan Bosa is 6-6, for example.
Like, yeah, we're going to get this big guy at center.
It's going to be different.
And Javon, Gwen is the same height as Tyre Lindervalm and five pounds heavier.
So it's kind of like, I described as like the Thanos,
where does your failure bring you back to me?
Like, it's the same thing.
But at the same time, I do think Gwen has a lot of potential.
But going up against some of those guys in that Coles Interior defensive
Wydenham, it's a tough test in week number one,
especially considering if you want to talk about the ground game in general,
Indy was a top two rush defense last season in terms of yards per attempt.
So it's something where if you want to establish that, yes, you have Derek Henry.
You have Lamar Jackson and his ability with both his arm and his legs.
But you're going to have to be able to make room up front because as good as Lamar and Derek are,
they can't do everything by themselves if there are guys in the backfield in two seconds.
So that's a mess of I'm really looking forward to.
I actually had that same one circle.
I'll throw DeForest Buckner and Atatanoa.
Mettabari into there as well.
So you've got to imagine that trio is going to be going up against Gwen quite a bit.
Buckner, again, December neck injury.
He's back.
Head surgery in December.
He's been full through at least the last few weeks before the season starts.
And he looks pretty explosive still.
He's got this devastating swim move that he's always been able to work with.
He has some power, but he does a lot of good finesse stuff.
He moves very well.
He's a bigger body guy.
six foot seven, like 290, 300 pounds.
Whereas Grover, as you know, he's the big space eater, you know, well over 300 pounds,
a lot of power there.
And then Atatama, Atabare, he's more of an inside pass rusher, a bit underside.
He's got a really interesting frame.
He's got long arms, but he's a very short, lighter defensive tackle.
But he's very explosive as well.
Zach and I on our show have kind of singled him out as a guy who kind of a sneaky potential
to get like six or seven sacks this year.
He's at a great summer.
So if the Colts can attack this center matchup with their defensive tackles,
which it does look like they have an advantage.
But from what I've seen, it sounds like Gwen has had a pretty good summer.
Is that about right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
So I think on paper it favors the Colts,
but, you know, the big X factor being, you know,
Derek Henry coming at this run defense,
I think that could be a little bit concerning.
So another one I had circled here is Colts rookie safety, AJ Halsey.
So he missed the last two weeks with an ankle injury, but he's back this week.
So if he keeps practicing, it sounds like it's pretty promising for him to play.
I think him defending Lamar Jackson in the run, I don't know who they're going to use to spy Jackson.
It probably won't, I don't know.
But Halsey, you know, I think when it comes down to it, even if he's not the spy,
him being the box safety, it's going to come down to him a lot.
I think him defending Lamar in the run, but also Mark Andrews, I'm guessing,
is going to be a big part of this offense as well.
Now that he's a little more healthy, I imagine, and there's no Isaiah likely.
You know, it seems like Mark Andrews might be back into a more prominent role.
I think AJ Halsey is going to be a big, big part of defending those two things for Baltimore's
offense this week. And as a rookie, I really like him, but that's a tall task in week one.
Yeah, Andrews is looking for a bounceback. It was definitely a tough year for him after obviously
what happened in the previous year's playoffs in Buffalo with the fumble and the dropped two-point
conversion. But he is the guy that, you know, the Ravens drafted two rookie tight ends and Matt Hibner
and Josh Quavis, they will probably factor in as well. And then Durham Smite, who's more of a
blocker, came over from Chicago with Declan Doyle, who's their offensive coordinator. But, you know,
I think one of the really intriguing things just within that matchup is, you know, Baltimore
running a lot more under center looks and play action looks as well. And I think if Baltimore
can establish their, I mean, that's why I think that in the trenches is so important.
And, you know, both things that we've talked about kind of go hand in hand because if the Ravens
can establish their ground game against that Colts defensive front, then naturally the
safeties and linebackers are going to have to take a step up on whatever looks like a handle.
And you can work guys over the top if you're Baltimore in that regard, because if you
have that play action and it's a good play action fake you know defenses are automatically going to need
to be like all right we need to like derrick henry's averaging nine yards of carry we to go and stop
derrick henry and they're automatically going to creep up and take that step and then they'll be caught
in between rock and a hard place with either andrews or someone else going right in the sweet spot or
even behind the defense so i think that you know with a lot of this but on both sides of the ball
it's going to be a lot about discipline, whether it's gap discipline or discipline on those play
action looks because we saw it even during the preseason. It was very vanilla, obviously,
you're not going to show your whole playbook in the preseason. But, you know, we saw a lot of play
action rollouts from Tyler Huntley, which I thought was really cool. And Joe Fagnano as well,
who made the team as a third quarterback. So I think that it's a really intriguing matchup for
sure because Andrews is somebody that I think needs a fast start here. And, you know, the cold
driver is going to look to shut him down. And that's what teams have done in the past. It's kind of like
take away Mark Andrews and see who else.
beat you but now you do have zay flowers rashab bateman's hoping for a bounce back to coby lane has
been like the talk of the nfl this preseason with what he's been doing so the ravens have a lot of
options as well yeah without a doubt all right guys so coming up here in a moment what is either side
going to need to do to win this matchup because i don't think it's one of the sexier ones so far
that people are talking about but colts and ravens i mean it's it's got quite a bit of juice to
it we're going to talk about that in just a moment welcome to your mom
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locked on that's o d o o o o dot com slash locked on all right everybody welcome back to cross
over thursday the first one of the year colts ravens i am j garthar from locked on colts
joined by kevin oestriker of locked on ravens and kevin there's a lot of new stuff going on
here, especially with Baltimore.
You got a new head coach, new D-Corpsator, new offensive coordinator, who's a first-time
play caller.
So how do you see this, you know, what does Baltimore really need to do to win when it comes
down to it?
Yeah, I think there are a few things.
I mean, first of all, I think that Baltimore needs to, one, like we talked about,
be able to establish the run game.
It's easier to set and done with that front the Colts have, but I think that's really big.
The second of all, it's being able to stop the Colts in conversion scenarios.
The Colts are really good at that last season, eighth and third down percentage and fifth and red zone percentage.
And you need to be able to stop that.
I think Red Zone is one of the biggest keys for me here offensively because, again, the Colts were a top five red zone offense last year.
The Ravens were a bottom five Red Zone offense last year.
So that's really big.
I mean, three points compared to seven points is a really big deal.
And so I do think that, you know, it's still the unknown and the uncertainty of like, okay, what is Declan's little call in the red zone?
is going to be different from what Todd Muck can call him in the red zone.
But I think he has a lot of talent at his disposal.
That's really where I am with that.
I also think that Baltimore does need to make sure that the Colts cannot get any big plays behind their defense.
You know, obviously, you know, the Colts are going to want to probably stretch the field a little bit,
maybe try some Alec Pierce deep shots, but you cannot let that get behind you.
You have to let everything stay in front of you.
You know, if you allow some of the short stuff to, you know, kind of get the Colts down the field a little bit,
ideally what the Ravens have done in the past is Ben don't break and you can hold them to
fuel goals in that situation. And like I say, if you hold a team to kicks the entire game and you
fuel goals or punts, if you're that Ravens offense, you're probably winning the game
considering who you have on that side of the ball. And then I would also just say you cannot have
penalties. You know, penalties were a killer last year for the Ravens and they are for all teams,
but it just felt like for Baltimore, you know, key moments came up, big first down or big third
down stop and up there's laundry on a field.
disadvantaged Baltimore.
So you need to be able to do that because, again,
this is a game of momentum.
It's a game of runs sometimes.
And you can lose momentum or you can give the other team momentum
if you have a penalty that isn't a big spot or a big moment.
So I think this is going to be a good game.
And I'm anticipating both sides, putting up a fight,
but I think it will just come down to who executes more cleanly on both sides of the ball.
Yeah.
So when it comes to the Colts, offensively, I think Daniel Jones has looked great physically
throughout the summer, you know, he's moving well.
He doesn't look like a guy coming off in Achilles,
but you don't want to put him at a disadvantage.
So as long as like the blocking holds up just fine,
not just the offensive line, which I'm confident in the offensive line,
very little turnover there, but like the peripheral blocking,
like Jonathan Taylor and Seth McGowan on passing downs,
picking up blitzes, you know, Tyler Warren, Moe Wally Cox,
the tight ends, you know, sealing things off well on the edges.
is keep Jones relatively comfortable, if possible.
And that also includes in the kickoff return game,
which the Colts think they've kind of found a secret to success.
They are investing in kick returners who are more running back types,
bigger guys who they think can kind of run through what they feel are like
kind of rugby scrums on kick returns and have good vision and kind of contact balance.
Looks like it'll be Ashton Doolin and Seth McGowan.
If those guys can give them good field position and it doesn't allow, you know, mentor and
Weaver to use that defense to kind of smell blood in the water and send a bunch of pressure there,
then I think the Colts offense can string together some momentum, you know, be successful
on third downs and just kind of keep putting up points on the board.
It doesn't have to be a touchdown every time.
But I think this could be a game where whichever team gets to 23, 24 points can win.
like it doesn't have to be like a super huge high scoring game.
But I think as long as they do that.
And then on the defensive side of the ball,
we're going to be very skeptical of their four-man rush throughout the season.
So you've got to be very careful, obviously, sending pressure at Lamar
because it takes someone away from the back end of the defense, typically.
So get home with the blitzes.
If you're sending pressure, make sure it's something that is really going to affect Lamar.
otherwise you could be looking at a big gain from his feet.
So I think if you could keep those things under control,
then you know,
you can wind up coming out on top.
I don't think either team is really going to separate itself
by a couple scores.
I think this could be one where, you know,
again, a team that gets to 24,
can win like a 24 to 20 type of game.
I don't see either team dominating this one.
But I think either side could win.
Yeah, I'm really excited for it.
You know, I think that these are two teams that are looking to get off to a really fast start.
And I think fast starts are important.
I mean, Baltimore started so slow these last two seasons.
They started oh and two, almost oh and three, two years ago, one in five this past year.
You know, you can't afford to do that a third year in a row because, again, like, the Ravens were a kickaway from making the postseason this past season.
But it's like, what if they had just been able to win one of those close games earlier?
So, like, my saying that I kind of coined and probably should trademark at this point is that September losses don't matter in September, but they certainly do matter in December when you're fighting for playoffs vests.
And so for both these teams and an AFC that honestly is wide open to me.
There's not a Rams in the AFC.
There are a lot of teams that are really good.
And I think these two teams are in that conversation.
But there are like 10 or 12 teams that you can maybe make an argument for.
of like, yeah, maybe, maybe less than 12.
Like maybe like 10 of these teams to make the playoffs.
Oh, breaking news, they're only seven spots.
So you got to be able to get off these wins early in the season.
Give yourself a cushion.
So stuff does go wrong.
And I know for the Colts, they did exactly this and it still didn't work.
But like, even still, you got to do it because like it took a very big outlier situation
with the injuries of the Indianapolis and everything to happen the way it did for it to not work.
But assuming that both teams have a more clean bill of health this year, that starts.
are really important and, you know, I think it'll be a really good fight.
That is without a doubt.
All right, guys, well, hopefully you feel a little more prepared for this matchup.
I feel like I know more about this iteration of the Ravens now.
After, you know, knowing the vibes for the last like 18 or so years, there's a lot more
to learn about this team now.
So Colts fans, I hope Kevin taught you quite a bit there.
Stick with us throughout the week.
We got shows on Friday.
We got shows coming up after the game.
Thanks for joining us today on Locked on Colts and Locked on Ravens.
video, we're going to send you to our 24-7 locked-on NFL YouTube channel for the 2026 NFL season preview.
All three episodes are airing right now until Sunday at 1 p.m. Eastern. What team will be the final one standing?
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With that, thank you guys. Have a great day and we will see you again on Sunday after.
after the game.
