The most consequential question of this Ravens regular season — Can they win the AFC North? — won’t be answered until Week 16, at the earliest.

That’s when the Pittsburgh Steelers come to Baltimore for a rematch of the division’s top two teams. A Ravens win, and their chances of repeating as champions live on. A loss, and the team’s hopes of a top-four playoff seed in the AFC are over.

But as the Ravens (8-5) prepare for their final four games before the playoffs, starting with Sunday’s road trip to take on the woeful New York Giants (2-11), more practical questions are in play. Here are six Ravens storylines to follow over the next month.

Can Lamar Jackson shore up his accuracy?

Over the season’s first 10 weeks, Lamar Jackson threw one of the NFL’s most receiver-friendly balls. According to Sports Info Solutions, among quarterbacks with at least 100 attempts, Jackson ranked first in the league in catchable-pass rate (89.6%).

Harassed or unbothered, Jackson gave his teammates a good chance on almost every drop-back. His catchable-pass rate when unpressured was 93.1%, which led the league; when pressured, it was 81.5%, which ranked fifth among the 28 quarterbacks with at least 50 such attempts. Overall, Jackson completed 69.1% of his passes through Week 10.

But over the past three games, his accuracy has suffered. Pass protection woes have been a factor in the Ravens’ passing game, and so has Jackson’s deeper target range, but even in clean pockets, he’s been inconsistent. Jackson’s catchable-ball rate and on-target rate, which SIS defines as the share of throws that did not require a receiver to unnecessarily adjust, were both among the NFL’s worst marks from Week 11 to Week 13.

A break could do Jackson some good. He’s dealt with minor back and knee injuries this season, and he was visibly frustrated after the Ravens’ Week 13 loss to the Eagles. Despite going 23-for-36 for 237 yards and two touchdowns against Philadelphia, Jackson missed a couple of open receivers on drives that ended with punts.

“He was just really agitated that we lost the game in the fashion that we lost the game and, as always, the frustration of leaving plays out there,” Ravens quarterbacks coach Tee Martin said last week. “When something developed, or you got pressure when guys were open, or guys were open and you didn’t see them — all of those things happened — and when you look at the [Microsoft] Surface [tablet] on the sideline and you see the picture, you’re like, ‘Ugh.’ There’s frustration, but there’s only one football. If you’re looking this way, someone’s open that way; sometimes you don’t see them. There’s always, ‘Wait until the next time.’ But sometimes you don’t have the next time, so that’s where the frustration lies.”

How committed are the Ravens to the run?

Over his eight seasons with the Tennessee Titans, running back Derrick Henry was never an easy matchup. The best a defense could hope for was to get him early on its schedule, not late. In September, according to TruMedia, Henry averaged just 3.9 yards per carry and had a 38.2% success rate (the percentage of plays with positive expected points added); in December and January, 5.2 yards per carry and a 42.1% success rate.

Henry’s production derived in part from his heavy usage; Tennessee deployed him as a battering ram, and was rarely content with a handful of knocks. In each of his three most productive seasons with the Titans (2019, 2020 and 2022), Henry finished first in the NFL in second-half carries.

Entering Week 14 this season, Henry is third in the NFL in carries (240) and third in second-half carries (131). But running backs coach Willie Taggart said last week that the 30-year-old hasn’t had “a lot of wear and tear on him this year.”

“I think it’s set up perfectly for him to finish the year like he’s capable of and what we expect out of him,” Taggart said. “Derrick is fresh right now, and that’s great. I think this bye week is perfect timing for us, and again, he’s hungry. He wants to get back. He wishes we were playing this week, but I think the way he trains himself, the way he practices, the way he prepares, he’s going to be ready to finish the year like we need him to.”

In Tennessee, the Titans often leaned into Henry’s physicality over the season’s final third. In 2019, 2020 and 2022, they were among the NFL’s most run-heavy teams in “neutral” game scripts after Week 12, with early-down run plays called over 55% of the time each year, according to RBSDM.com.

Will the Ravens follow the same track? They’ve been a fairly balanced offense on early downs this year, with only a 50.3% pass rate.

Can the Ravens improve vs. man coverage?

Two AFC North rematches loom down the stretch. In Week 16, the Ravens will face the Steelers. Two weeks later, they’ll wrap up the regular season against the Cleveland Browns. The Ravens’ offense will need better answers against both of their man coverage schemes.

In a Week 8 loss in Cleveland, Jackson went 6-for-11 for 63 yards and a touchdown against man-to-man, but he took three sacks on 15 drop-backs and averaged a dreadful minus-0.23 expected points added per drop-back, according to TruMedia. In a Week 11 defeat in Pittsburgh, Jackson fared better, avoiding sacks and going 9-for-16 for 130 yards, a touchdown and an interception, but still averaged an average 0.02 EPA per drop-back.

Defenses are typically reluctant to deploy man coverage against the Ravens, who have a supreme scrambler in Jackson and a dangerous after-the-catch threat in wide receiver Zay Flowers. But the blitz packages the Browns and Steelers paired with most of their man looks effectively limited Jackson’s scrambling lanes (just one carry for 22 yards) and helped them hold serve against Flowers (four catches on six targets for 57 yards overall). Cleveland sent five or more pass rushers after Jackson on 10 of its 15 man coverage plays, while Pittsburgh sent five or more on 12 of 16.

Those blitz packages kept Jackson under fire and disrupted his rhythm on downfield opportunities. Jackson was pressured on over half of his drop-backs against man (54.8%), compared with a 40% pressure rate against zone. And he was a combined 0-for-5 on passes of at least 20 air yards, though he was unlucky to see a well-placed throw to running back Justice Hill intercepted by Steelers linebacker Payton Wilson.

Offensive coordinator Todd Monken should be better prepared for the rematches. The Ravens could counter with more man-beating route concepts, more quick-hitting throws and more screens — they attempted just one screen against man coverage in the two divisional games. It came against a standard four-man pass rush and ended with the Steelers forcing and recovering a fumble by tight end Isaiah Likely deep in Ravens territory.

Can Patrick Mekari and Daniel Faalele turn it around?

The bye week came at a good time for the Ravens’ starting guards. Patrick Mekari and Daniel Faalele were manhandled in the loss to the Eagles, with Mekari giving up nine quarterback pressures, according to Pro Football Focus, and Faalele struggling mightily as a run blocker.

But their starting jobs are, for now, not in any real jeopardy. Coach John Harbaugh said last week that the Ravens are “pretty well set” at offensive line, adding that he was “not down on anybody on the offensive line.” Harbaugh backed Mekari, who has already surpassed his single-season career high for offensive snaps and has “played pretty much every snap. That’s an accomplishment, because that had been a challenge for him in the past, so I think he deserves a lot of credit for that. He’s played very good football.”

And last week, offensive line coach Geroge Warhop gave a vote of confidence to Faalele: “I think Daniel’s doing a great job. I am excited about him. Every week he gets a little bit better. He’s a big, physical dude. What truly is impressive is his pass [protection]. What’s really impressive is to watch him change direction in short area and get his hands on guys. That’s still a work in progress, his hands. But the way he moves laterally, and the things he can do in pass pro, I think, is pretty impressive, so I’m excited about him and his future.”

Still, the Ravens need more from the duo. Over their past three games — from Week 11 to Week 13 — Faalele and Mekari graded out as two of the NFL’s 10 worst guards, according to PFF. Mekari had a blown-block rate of 4.9% in that span, according to SIS, seventh highest among 72 qualifying guards, plus two holding penalties, tied for the most at the position. Faalele had a blown-block rate of 3.3%, which ranked 29th highest.

How good can the pass rush be?

Over the season’s first six weeks, the Ravens had a healthy Travis Jones — and an inconsistent pass rush. When the hulking defensive lineman was on the field, helping keep double teams off Nnamdi Madubuike, the defense’s pressure rate was among the 10 lowest in the league (31.9%), even while its sack rate was among the five highest (8.9%), according to TruMedia.

In Week 7, Jones hurt his ankle. Over the next six weeks, the Ravens’ pressure rate with a still-limited Jones playing surged to a top-five mark (39.8%), while their sack rate largely held firm (8.5%). The Ravens’ improvements in coverage helped, but so did the steadiness of outside linebacker Tavius Robinson and a couple of breakout performances from outside linebacker Odafe Oweh and Madubuike.

Jones isn’t the Ravens’ most important or most impactful pass rusher, but he has been the most banged up. Outside linebacker Kyle Van Noy, who’s tied for Oweh with a team-high eight sacks, missed the Week 13 loss to Philadelphia with hamstring and neck injuries but should be back for the stretch run. Oweh, meanwhile, didn’t register a pressure against the Eagles. The week off should do them all good, offering a refresher ahead of a crucial homestretch.

“With the staff today, I said, ‘The bye week is going to help him [Jones] the most on our team, from a defensive standpoint,’” defensive coordinator Zach Orr said last week. There are “a lot of people it’s going to help, but it’s going to help him, because when he’s healthy, when he’s feeling good, he’s going to be dominant. And I can’t wait for him to get some rest and come back out of this bye week feeling really good and get him back playing how he was playing. And he’s been playing good, but he’s out there, basically, on one leg, essentially. So, it’s not as dominant as it’s been, but the bye week is going to do great for him.”

Can the defense force more turnovers?

The Ravens should have more than their seven interceptions this season. Quarterbacks have attempted 23 “turnover-worthy” passes against them this season, according to PFF, but less than a third (30.4%) have been turned into picks. The Minnesota Vikings, by comparison, have an NFL-high 20 interceptions on 30 turnover-worthy pass plays (66.7%).

Overall, a year after leading the league in takeaways (31), the Ravens have slumped to the bottom third (11). Their interception totals have fallen off, from 1.1 per game to 0.5 per game, along with their recovered-fumble totals, from 0.8 per game to 0.3 per game. The Ravens have forced more than one turnover in just one game this season, their Week 7 win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Last year, the Ravens’ defense had six multi-turnover games over its first 13 games.

“The No. 1 thing is getting takeaways,” Orr said last week. “We’re not turning the ball over enough, and we’ve got to get the football. Like, we have to. That changes games. That will help us out tremendously from a defensive standpoint and for our team.”

Assistant head coach and pass game coordinator Chris Hewitt said the Ravens have “simplified” their schemes in recent weeks, which has helped their defense hold four of their past five opponents to 202 yards passing or fewer.

But the Ravens’ more conventional play calls might be a double-edged sword, limiting big plays for both teams. Since Week 9, the Ravens have just two interceptions and have forced just five turnover-worthy passes. “When you have new guys, and you have all of these toys, you want to try to put them in positions to try to confuse the offense, and in turn, sometimes it confuses the defense,” Hewitt said.