Join the huddle. Sign up here for Ravens updates in your inbox.

The stakes have changed slightly. So have the expectations.

A year ago, the Ravens and Bengals combined for 148 points in two instant-classic shootouts. Their offenses were among the NFL’s best. Their quarterbacks were Most Valuable Player front-runners. When the league announced in May that Baltimore’s Lamar Jackson and Cincinnati’s Joe Burrow would meet again on Thanksgiving, the Week 13 matchup looked like a football feast: a main course of AFC North supremacy, with heaping sides of touchdowns.

Over the past 10 weeks, however, the menu for prime time has changed. Burrow got hurt in Week 2, and the Bengals started losing. A lot. Jackson got hurt in Week 4, and the Ravens continued to lose — for a little while, anyway. A five-game winning streak has vaulted the Ravens back on top of the AFC North, but offensive struggles have their Super Bowl hopes fading. Burrow’s set to return Thursday, but the Bengals’ playoff hopes have been nearly extinguished.

Now it’s unclear which star quarterback is in better shape: the one dealing with a string of minor lower-body injuries (Jackson) or the one coming back from turf toe, one of football’s most painful ailments (Burrow).

“It doesn’t matter that he didn’t play a lot,” Ravens outside linebacker Dre’Mont Jones said Tuesday of Burrow, who’s been on the field less than six quarters this season. “It matters how can we find ways to stop him. When he’s back there, he’s lethal, so we have to do our part.”

As the Ravens (6-5) and Bengals (3-8) try to rediscover their high-octane form, here’s what to watch in their Week 13 game at M&T Bank Stadium. All stats are courtesy of Sports Info Solutions, Pro Football Focus and the NFL’s Next Gen Stats unless otherwise noted.

1. If there’s any defense remaining on the Ravens’ schedule that can give their offense a shot of confidence, it’s the Bengals’.

Cincinnati has the worst defensive DVOA, an opponent-adjusted efficiency metric, for any team over the first 11 games of their season since 1978, according to FTN. The Bengals are allowing 6.3 yards per play, 415.8 yards per game and 32.7 points per game, all league highs. Opponents have scored on 49.6% of their drives, another league high.

Cincinnati’s sack rate is 3.7%, tied for second worst in the NFL. Its pressure rate is 32.1%, sixth worst. The Bengals have given up 42 completions of at least 20 yards, the most in the NFL, and 11 carries of at least 20 yards, tied for the third most. Tight ends are averaging a combined 88.4 receiving yards per game against Cincinnati, which would be the highest allowed by any defense in over a decade.

Of course, Week 12 looked like a get-right opportunity for the Ravens, too. But against an underwhelming New York Jets defense missing two traded-away stars (defensive tackle Quinnen Williams and cornerback Sauce Gardner), the offense posted easily its worst success rate of the season (34%), according to analytics website RBSDM.com. (The Cleveland Browns’ season-long success rate, which measures how often a team generates positive plays, is an NFL-worst 34%.)

A faster start would help. The Ravens have scored just three first-half touchdowns since Jackson’s return in Week 9. Cincinnati’s allowing 15.7 points in the first half this season, the third-highest average in the NFL.

“Got to put points on the board,” Jackson said Tuesday. “We can’t keep putting [kicker Tyler] Loop out there on each and every drive, because there’s going to be some times when we’re going against a high-motor offense, and they might score a lot of points, and we’re going to have to match those guys. So we just have to do our job.”

2. Derrick Henry is breaking fewer tackles than ever before this season. Two games against the Bengals over the next three weeks could help him break loose.

Stymied for much of this year by poor run blocking, Henry has broken a tackle or forced a missed one on just 6.6% of his carries this season, well below his previous career low (9.6% in 2021 with the Tennessee Titans).

Cincinnati’s tackling struggles have been even more pronounced. The Bengals lead the NFL with 129 missed tackles, according to Pro Football Reference, 35 more than the runner-up Pittsburgh Steelers (94). Their four leading tacklers — safeties Jordan Battle and Geno Stone and rookie linebackers Barrett Carter and Demetrius Knight — all have a missed-tackle rate between 14.3% and 17.5%. (The rates of the Ravens’ top four tacklers, meanwhile, range between 5.5% and 8.1%.)

The Bengals’ lackluster run defense bottled Henry up for long stretches in their two losses last season. They held him to 41 yards on his first 14 carries in Week 5, only to allow a 51-yard run in overtime. In Week 10, Henry finished with 16 carries for 68 yards and a touchdown.

Henry, who’s 19 yards away from passing Jim Brown (12,294 career rushing yards) for 11th place in NFL history, appeared irritated after he finished with just 64 yards against the Jets, his fewest since Week 5.

“Play better. Execute. I don’t know what else to say,” he said. “We just need to play better, and everybody just has to do their job. All 11, it takes all 11 to be able to execute, put plays together, put drives together and put up points.”

3. Besides Joe Burrow, the Bengals’ most dangerous skill position player is wide receiver Ja’Marr Chase. But their next-most important skill position players might be their running backs.

Cincinnati coach Zac Taylor told reporters Tuesday that the Bengals “want to be mindful” of Burrow’s injury history as he reacclimates to game speed. That could mean more quick throws. That could also mean more early-down runs.

Cincinnati has one of the NFL’s highest passing rates in neutral game scripts, according to RBSDM.com, despite having a surprisingly efficient run game (fifth in DVOA, according to FTN). The Bengals’ erratic quarterback play and leaky defense have limited their reliance on handoffs, but Burrow’s return — and their desire to keep him upright — could change that.

Running back Chase Brown has averaged 84.8 rushing yards per game and 6 yards per carry over the past five games. Backup Samaje Perine, who’s set to return for the first time since suffering a Week 9 high-ankle sprain, is averaging only 22 rushing yards per game but 6.2 yards per carry.

“I think our line’s playing really well,” Taylor said Tuesday. “I think they’ve done a great job giving us confidence there. ... We’ve got a lot of guys on the perimeter — tight ends, receivers — that are bought in, too, and are doing their part. The coaches have done a good job with the scheme, putting these guys in position.”

The Ravens’ run defense has improved considerably, too. Over the season’s first eight weeks, they allowed 128.9 yards per game, and opponents had a 41.2% success rate on designed runs. Since Week 9, they’ve allowed just 97.8 yards per game, and opponents have had a 36.4% success rate.

4. The Ravens couldn’t stop Chase last season. And they probably won’t ask any one defender to stop him this year, either.

Every level of the Ravens’ pass defense will have to hold its own against the All-Pro wideout, who exploded for 21 catches, 457 yards and five touchdowns in the Bengals’ two matchups against the Ravens last season. On his most impactful plays, he took advantage of more than just shoddy cornerback play.

In Week 5, Burrow and Chase seized on an apparent breakdown in zone coverage from cornerback Marlon Humphrey and safety Marcus Williams, connecting deep for a 41-yard touchdown pass just before halftime. In the fourth quarter, inside linebackers Malik Harrison and Roquan Smith couldn’t corral Chase on a wide receiver screen, and Williams watched as Chase accelerated by him in the second level for a 70-yard catch-and-run.

In Week 10, Chase found a pocket of space over the middle of the field during a Burrow scramble, then shrugged off Williams as he picked up 26 yards on the Bengals’ opening drive. In the third quarter, Chase caught an in-breaker over the middle of the field, turned the corner, picked up a block on Humphrey and outran Williams to the end zone on a 67-yard catch-and-run. In the fourth quarter, Chase ran by cornerback Brandon Stephens and Williams on a vertical route on his way to an uncontested 70-yard score.

With Chase lining up in the slot on over a third of his routes this season, he’ll likely see a mix of Nate Wiggins, Chidobe Awuzie and Humphrey on outside snaps and safety Kyle Hamilton (if healthy), cornerback Keyon Martin and Humphrey on inside snaps. And with a concussion sidelining wide receiver Tee Higgins, Chase will also also draw the occasional double team.

“Ja’Marr Chase certainly does merit double coverage,” coach John Harbaugh said Tuesday. “He’s one of the premier receivers in the league, for sure. It’s hard to get to that, because you’ve got some weapons out there, and as soon as you start pulling the coverage too far away from other guys ... other guys start making plays on you. So we’ll have to balance all that out with what we do.”

5. The Bengals have missed the playoffs the past two seasons. The Ravens can all but put a nail in the coffin for this year, too.

Cincinnati enters Week 13 with less than a 1% chance of making the postseason, according to The New York Times’ playoff simulator. With a win, those odds would go up slightly, to about 4%. With another loss, however, the Bengals would have little hope of making it past Week 18.

The Ravens, meanwhile, are well positioned to take control of the AFC North. A victory would boost their division title odds from about 85% to 89%; a loss would drop them to 73%. If the Ravens win and the Steelers lose Sunday to the Buffalo Bills, who are 3.5-point road favorites, Baltimore’s odds of a three-peat would go up to 92%.