New York Giants Week 15 Storylines: Rested Ravens Come to Town

The home team has the nickname “Giants,” but when it comes to this weekend’s game against the Baltimore Ravens, the New York Giants, losers of their last eight in a row, have a tall order to overcome.

The Ravens are coming in fresh off their bye, poised to ensure they’re part of the 2024 postseason. Last year, following their bye, they rattled off four straight wins, with their opponents scoring 20 or fewer points in three of those four games, according to Pro Football Network. 

As expected, the Ravens are heavily favored over the Giants. Per NFLPickWatch.com, Baltimore is the unanimous choice of the betting experts to emerge with a win despite the whopping 15-point spread set for this weekend’s game.

By the way, that point spread is the largest opening spread of the 2024 season and, for the Giants, the largest any team has faced since 1966.

The Ravens come in with a potent offense whose accomplishments include leaving the NFL in plays of 10+ yards (24.8%) and plays of 50+ yards (9) and averaging 2.63 points per drive, the second-best mark in the NFL.

That’s not good news for head coach Brian Daboll’s banged-up Giants team. But if there’s one thing this team seems to take solace in, it’s that in their 11 losses this season, seven were by one score or less.  

“I think if you just watch the way our team played on Sunday, I think our play is indicative of how guys feel and the effort the guys are giving, especially on defense,” said receiver Darius Slayton. 

“I think guys flew around for sure on defense. They came up with stops and held one of the league’s best rushers to a relatively quiet day. I think our play on Sunday (against the Saints) speaks to where guys’ minds are at in the locker room and the status of our team as a whole. That also goes for the offensive side, as far as an effort standpoint goes. We just have to execute better on that side of the ball.”

The Giants know what they have to do–they have, really, all season long. But knowing and doing have been two very different challenges that the Giants just can’t seem to pair up on any given Sunday lately. 

Here’s our look at the storylines ahead of, and leading up to that game.

Unfortunately, the Giants continue to lose players due to season-ending injuries. The latest player to fall is promising young cornerback Tre Hawkins III, who suffered a lumbar fracture in his back. Hawkins became the 11th Giant to land on IR and the fifth Giant to land on IR over the last three weeks.    

But what about some of the other players who appeared on the injury report last week, like cornerback Deonte Banks (rib), linebacker Bobby Okereke (back), and cornerback Dru Phillips (shoulder), all of whom were among the inactive? 

Per The Athletic. Okereke has a herniated disc in his back, and Phillips has a partially torn rotator cuff, two injuries that might keep them both sidelined for a while. 

Starting left guard Jon Runyan Jr. has an ankle issue that Daboll said makes him “week to week.” Starting safety Tyler Nubin has an ankle injury, quarterback Drew Lock has a foot issue, and center John Michael Schmitz and defensive lineman Rakeem Nunez-Roches both are dealing with neck injuries. 

And those are just the injuries we know about. At this rate, it’s fair to wonder if the Giants will soon have to start pulling people from the stands to field a team.

As noted above, Lock is dealing with an issue for which he had X-rays after last week’s game and an MRI the day after. Daboll has already declared Lock will be the starter if he’s healthy. But is he, or will it be Tommy DeVito who got the one start against Tampa Bay before having to sit out the game against Dallas with a forearm injury only to be “Wally Pipp’ed” by Lock?

Whoever it is, it would be nice if he could throw a touchdown or two. The Giants quarterbacks have thrown eight touchdown passes this season, all by former quarterback Daniel Jones.

And whoever it is, good luck going against a Ravens defense that, since Week 11, has allowed just 165.0 yards per game, the second-best mark (behind the 49ers) in the league.

Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson has had the number of NFC teams he’s faced over his career. Jackson holds a 23-2 career mark, the best-ever interconference winning percentage (.920) by a quarterback in NFL history. 

Over that span, Jackson has thrown 42 touchdowns to just nine interceptions and has rushed for nine touchdowns.

Jackson, who will play in his 100th career game on Sunday, leads the league’s best red-zone offense, scoring a league-best 39 touchdowns on 52 red-zone drives. From a personal standpoint, Jackson is just 22 yards shy of recording his sixth career campaign with at least 700 rushing yards.

Odds refresh periodically and are subject to change.

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