Burrow's 16-of-18 second half turns a 13-0 hole into Bengals +3 by 25

Bengals 35, Ravens 13, a 25-point cover that flatters us. We were down 13-0 at the half holding a dead ticket. Then Joe Burrow went 16 of 18 for 249 yards and four touchdowns after the break, Tee Higgins caught six for 148, and Cincinnati scored 35 unanswered. The Lamar Jackson read was right, he sat a third straight week. The mechanism wasn't: Tyler Huntley threw for a career-high 298. Baltimore lost this on three empty red zone trips and two failed fourth downs, not on arm talent.

Cincinnati arrives with one player on its injury report, Kyle Dugger's quadriceps, off a bye, and Joe Burrow has a 4.5% sack rate behind an offensive line with nobody listed at all. Baltimore has 15 players listed. Lamar Jackson got what head coach Jesse Minter called a little bit of limited work on Wednesday, in street clothes with a wrap on the left ankle, his first participation of any kind since October 4, and Minter has said for three straight weeks that Jackson could play without much practice and then ruled him out on Friday every time. The gap is enormous and it is measurable: Jackson averages 10.1 yards an attempt and Tyler Huntley 6.0, and Baltimore scored 10 points at Cleveland in Huntley's second start. We are on Cincinnati because the side holds whichever way Friday breaks, which is the lesson we paid for last week: if Jackson plays our number is Ravens -2.5 and we give up half a point, and if he sits this is a pick'em and we are getting three. What cuts against us is Baltimore's run game, third in the league at 151.5 yards a game, against a Cincinnati front allowing 5.0 a carry, 30th, and that argument survives the quarterback question, though Derrick Henry managed 17 carries for 58 yards and a fourth-quarter fumble at Cleveland. Tavius Robinson, Baltimore's leading sacker, did not practice with a pectoral, and four of five Ravens line spots carry a designation, offset by Cam Jurgens practicing in full and sliding back in at center. We make it Ravens -1; the market says -3.