Saturday, Football Week 18, doubleheader, open thread

Welcome to Week 18 of the 2024 NFL Regular Season!

It’s an AFC North-style day today as the entire division wraps up its regular season on Saturday. There will be one game in particular that will be important for Denver Broncos fans to keep an eye on, so stay tuned.

Cleveland Browns at Baltimore Ravens

Kickoff is scheduled for Saturday, January 4, 2025 at 2:30 p.m. Mile High Time at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore, Maryland and will be broadcast on ESPN.

According to FanDuel, the Baltimore Ravens have everything to achieve and with a win they will lock up the division title. This makes them 19.5 point home favorites over the 3-13 Cleveland Browns. I don’t know if they will win by 20 points, but I know they will win. Personally, I don’t like taking such a spread in a game within the division, so I won’t do it here with my prediction of the final result.

Prediction: Ravens 31, Browns 16.

Cincinnati Bengals at Pittsburgh Steelers

Kickoff is scheduled for Saturday, January 4, 2025 at 6:00 p.m. Mile High Time at Acrisure Stadium in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and will be broadcast on ESPN.

According to FanDuel, the Cincinnati Bengals are a surprising 2.5-point favorites on the road against Russell Wilson and the Pittsburgh Steelers. If the above result occurs in the Ravens game, the Steelers don’t really need to win this game. For the Bengals, however, their entire season is at stake here. I actually think Cincinnati has the edge in this game and will put maximum pressure on the young, inexperienced Broncos to get the win at home on Sunday.

Prediction: Bengals 23, Steelers 19.

Open the thread in the comments section below. Discuss the game action there!