Washington (AFP) – Reigning NFL Most Valuable Player Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills will host two-time MVP Lamar Jackson and the Baltimore Ravens in a Sunday opener that is a rematch of a playoff thriller. The Bills edged Baltimore 27-25 in Buffalo last January to end the title dreams of Jackson and the Ravens, only for Kansas City to beat Buffalo the following week and go to the Super Bowl. Now the Bills and Ravens, both hungry to reach the championship spectacle, meet again with emotional memories adding to the drama.
“You want to get that bad taste out of your mouth from that last game,” Ravens defensive lineman Nnamdi Madubuike said. “It gets everybody fired up and ready to go. It’s a motivational factor for us in practice. Everybody is fired up. Everybody is pumped up. Everybody is ready to go.”
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Allen knows the hunger of passionate “Bills Mafia” fans for Buffalo to win a long-sought NFL crown. “It continues to drive us,” Allen said. “When you have everybody in the city and Western New York and Bills Mafia across the globe pulling for you and rooting for you, it makes you play that much harder, train that much harder.” After losing four consecutive Super Bowls into the 1990s, the Bills missed the playoffs from 2000-2016. Buffalo eliminated the Ravens in 2020 and 2024 but the Bills were ousted by Kansas City in 2020, 2021, 2023, and 2024.
“It’s the only thing on my mind during camp — what can we do to bring the Lombardi Trophy home?” Allen said. “And when we do get to the season it’s one week at a time and do whatever we can do to make the playoffs. There are steps you have to take then just put our heads down, work hard and hope for the best.”
Both Jackson and Allen are 4-2 in openers. Since Jackson, a pass and run threat, arrived at Baltimore in 2018, he has won the NFL MVP award in 2019 and 2023 but the Ravens have only gone 3-6 in the playoffs. “You always get motivated by disappointment, for sure, and that’s something that certainly motivates us,” Ravens coach John Harbaugh said. “There’s a lot to learn. We have to understand how the game went, the way the game is played, what we could have done better, what we did well.”
Ravens quarterbacks coach Tee Martin told ESPN that Jackson has added motivation from playoff frustration. “We’ve had two back-to-back years of some really tough losses that ended the season in a way that we don’t want,” he said. “If you know Lamar, like I know him competitively, he has probably thought about that every day, every minute, during the offseason. That comes with a sense of urgency and a sense of purpose.”
The Bills, 13-4 last year, are 86-45 in eight seasons under coach Sean McDermott. “He really gives his players the freedom to be themselves,” Allen said. “It’s that family-like atmosphere. We’ve got a lot of guys we feel very confident in.” Allen has had an NFL record five seasons with at least 25 passing touchdowns and five rushing touchdowns.
© 2024 AFP
