# Ravens Punditry Check: 41 Straight AFC North Picks for Baltimore, and a Graded Record of 0-for-68 | MissedTakes Daily *Published 2026-09-11 — MissedTakes* There are 41 ungraded division-winner calls about the Baltimore Ravens in the database. Every single one picks Baltimore to win the AFC North. Not a single pundit in the file has taken Cincinnati, Pittsburgh or Cleveland over them this summer. That unanimity is worth holding up against the receipts, because the Ravens are the club punditry has been most consistently, most confidently wrong about. ## 0-for-68 on Baltimore in January Across all graded seasons, Ravens takes split into two very different businesses. The contender calls — the ones about where Baltimore finishes — have produced nothing. ![Ravens contender calls, graded](/posts/visuals/1e299ff2-6b1c-4c1b-bdb0-5c90a436dca5.png) Thirty-five graded division-winner calls on the Ravens, average accuracy 0. Nineteen conference-champion calls, 0. Fourteen Super Bowl picks, 0. That is 68 graded claims that Baltimore would win something, and none of them landed. The 34 graded playoff-berth calls average 17.6. There is an honest caveat in the scoring: most of those division picks carry a skill delta of 0, because the naive baseline — last season's division winner — was also Baltimore. Pundits weren't beaten by a better idea; they simply repeated the prior and the prior stopped being true. [Chris Brockman](/pundits/chris-brockman) in June 2025: ["It's only Baltimore in the AFC North."](/opinions/dae54f58-abf4-4487-a016-ca777751ebd4) [Manti Te'o](/pundits/manti-te-o) in late October, with the season already sideways, [doubled down](/opinions/3f3320f6-29af-4e09-abd8-d1b1978f855d). Baltimore finished 8-9 and missed the playoffs. The win totals tell the same story with numbers attached. Six graded 2025 calls on Baltimore, averaging 11.5 wins against an actual eight. ![2025 Ravens win-total calls vs. reality](/posts/visuals/9a32b61e-e73f-4519-851c-35d883ac7eaa.png) The 2026 numbers are no more cautious: [Nick Wright](/pundits/nick-wright) has them 13-4 and the AFC's No. 1 seed, [John Breech](/pundits/john-breech) 12-5, [Jason McIntyre](/pundits/jason-mcintyre) at "13 or 14 wins," [Colin Cowherd](/pundits/colin-cowherd) the most restrained of the group at 10 to 11. Wright's own graded division-winner record is 12.5 accuracy on 14 calls, a MissedTakes Score of -45.46 — his weakest category by a distance, against 82.26 accuracy on 95 mock-draft picks. ## Where Ravens coverage actually earns its keep The other business is player-level and draft-level work, and it is genuinely good. Mock picks involving Baltimore grade at 67.7 average accuracy across 47 calls, with a +35.23 skill delta. Calls about the Ravens' interior offensive line are the best position room in the file: 76.4 accuracy over 11 graded guard calls. [David Harrison](/pundits/david-harrison) and Nick Wright both put Olaivavega Ioane at No. 14 to Baltimore in April; he went 14th. Among pundits with at least five graded Ravens takes, the ones worth listening to on this club are not the loudest ones. ![Ravens takes: average accuracy by pundit](/posts/visuals/eceef55a-63e2-457c-a18f-4c341d29f4cc.png) [Gregg Rosenthal](/pundits/gregg-rosenthal) leads the meaningful samples at 51.6 accuracy and +23.19 skill over 14 graded Baltimore calls; [Kyle Crabbs](/pundits/kyle-crabbs) grades out at +38.29 over 12, mostly on draft work. At the other end, [Ryan Wormeli](/pundits/ryan-wormeli) sits at -108.77 skill across eight — he faded Zay Flowers as a bust (Flowers finished WR8) and called Rashod Bateman and Justice Hill sleepers (WR102 and RB66). [Jake Ciely](/pundits/jake-ciely) took the exact opposite side on Bateman and Hill and scored 100 on both. One quiet contrarian hit: [Rich Eisen](/pundits/rich-eisen) said in December that you couldn't call Lamar Jackson [a top-10 quarterback this year](/opinions/c1629080-72cf-41b6-b276-22183b1f396c). Jackson finished 23rd in passing yards. Eisen scored 100 with a +128 skill delta. Rosenthal has since [moved his MVP pick off Jackson](/opinions/42a25cd0-45a3-40a9-a737-8e7a635f2e5d) to Patrick Mahomes. ## The one real argument: Ja'Kobi Lane The rookie receiver has 45 takes in the file and not one of them is graded yet, so treat all of it as untested. But it is the only place pundits actually disagree about Baltimore. - [Jason La Canfora](/pundits/jason-la-canfora), Sept. 9: Lane opens the season ["basically a starter,"](/opinions/d34f985c-a867-42bf-96d1-e96758de61de) heavy slot usage in Week 1. - [Nathan Jahnke](/pundits/nathan-jahnke) and [Zachary Pereles](/pundits/zachary-pereles): third receiver, behind Flowers and Bateman. - [Carter Bahns](/pundits/carter-bahns): a real path to the No. 2 job. Pereles, separately, calls "Lane has passed Bateman" fiction. - [Chris Broussard](/pundits/chris-broussard) picked him for Offensive Rookie of the Year; McIntyre has him at 50 catches and six or seven touchdowns. Jahnke is the most decorated grader in that group — 86.72 accuracy on 51 graded takes overall — and he is on the conservative side of it. ## The league's day in brief The last seven days graded 1,155 takes, and 1,154 of them were [roster-spot calls](/predictions/roster-spot) — cutdown week, settled by the announced 53s. [Jared Koch](/pundits/jared-koch) and [Scott Kennedy](/pundits/scott-kennedy) both scored 100 with +200 skill on Houston tight end and Atlanta quarterback roster reads. [Paul Schwartz](/pundits/paul-schwartz) and [Evan Tarracciano](/pundits/evan-tarracciano) both took zeros for having Darius Slayton cut by the Giants. Another 485 new takes came in. On the season awards, the field's 2025 MVP ballot had Matthew Stafford on top with 26 of 100 picks and he won it; Jackson drew seven. Offensive Rookie of the Year was a genuine coin flip — Tetairoa McMillan won with five of 29 picks, tied with Ashton Jeanty. [Lance Zierlein](/pundits/lance-zierlein) still leads the board at 39.1, ahead of [Derek Brown](/pundits/derek-brown) at 35.62 and Harrison at 35.41, all on limited-confidence samples. Full standings on the [leaderboard](/leaderboard).