The Baltimore Ravens begin their preseason by hosting the Philadelphia Eagles on Saturday night.
Both teams are Super Bowl contenders and with heated competition at several positions, this should be an intriguing tune-up game. Although most teams don’t care too much about wins and losses at this time of the year, the Ravens have dominated the preseason during the John Harbaugh era.
Oddsmakers expect that success to continue with NFL odds installing the Ravens as 4.5-point home favorites. Here are our best free NFL preseason picks and predictions for Eagles vs. Ravens on Saturday, August 12.
Eagles vs Ravens odds
Eagles vs Ravens predictions
Since John Harbaugh took over as the Baltimore Ravens bench boss in 2008, they’ve gone a sizzling 38-16-1 (70.4%) against the spread during the preseason.
They are currently on an incredible 23-game winning streak during exhibition play. Not only have they not lost in the preseason since 2015 but 10 of their last 12 wins have come by at least seven points.
This is a squad with plenty of depth, especially at quarterback where Tyler Huntley has shown that he can be a spot starter and Anthony Brown played very well during the preseason last year. They also have extremely talented backups at running back and wide receiver where plenty of training camp battles will need to be settled.
That sort of competition should result in some talented — and heavily motivated — skill position players suiting up for Baltimore.
The Philadelphia Eagles also have plenty of depth and a very capable backup QB of their own in Marcus Mariota. However, head coach Nick Sirianni generally places more value on joint practices than preseason contests.
Philadelphia went 1-2 SU and 0-3 ATS in exhibition play last year with their lone victory coming by just a single point. In 2021, they were even worse in preseason action going 0-2-1 SU.
Brian Johnson and Sean Desai are Philadelphia’s new offensive and defensive coordinators and given the team’s approach to preseason games, they’ll likely experiment with different packages and wrinkles. That will make it tough for them to cover the spread against a Ravens squad that tends to have more of a killer instinct at this time of the year.
My best bet: Ravens -4 (-110 at SIA)
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