Today’s 1pm EST / 10am PST game between the Baltimore Ravens and Chicago Bears features two teams fighting to stay alive in the NFL playoff race. Last week the 4-5 Bengals let one slip away against the lowly Miami Dolphins, while the 5-4 Ravens’ win put three teams within 1.5 games of the division lead. Today’s grudge match for the chance to even sniff the post-season is live on CBS, but if you can’t catch the TV broadcast you can watch Ravens vs Bears online free live using one of several different methods.
The Ravens win in Week 10 was their first victory in more than a month. With the taste of a win now firmly in their mouths, quarterback Joe Flacco will be rearing to get last year’s Super Bowl champions back into the driver’s seat of their playoff destiny. Flacco hasn’t been remarkable this season, with a quarterback ranking of just 20th, and season totals of 204-346 for 2,307 yards and 12 touchdowns. However, last week he was there when it counted, hitting receivers on key downs and pulling his team into not just a moral victory, but a victory that basically saved their season.
Flacco’s chances to go on a two-game winning streak are surprisingly decent when they travel to Chicago’s Soldier Field today. Although the Ravens offense hasn’t been stellar — it’s ranked a pitiful 29th in the NFL through 10 weeks — they’ll line up today against a Bears defense that ranks 26th in the NFL, which essentially levels the playing field. The Bears defense is also allowing almost 70 more yards per game than the Ravens’ D — 372 vs 307 — which bodes well for a Ravens offense that’s in need of a spark.
Yet the Bears won’t be playing with a full deck on offense themselves. When you watch Ravens vs Bears online free live, you won’t see Bears QB Jay Cutler, who continues to be out with a weeks-old groin injury. Until he went down, Cutler was having a solid season, with a #10 QBR and 13 touchdowns. Fortunately for Chicago, the Bears have a great ground game, as running back Matt Forte has rushed for 691 yards this season, and Alshon Jeffery has come through in spurts with a 10.4-yards-per-carry average on the season.
For Forte to continue that dominance today against the Ravens, he’ll need to get better blocking from the offensive line. For the first time all season, the Bears offense last week lost the battle at the line of scrimmage, and they were unable to make many explosive runs against the Detroit Lions defensive front. If the Bears can clean up some of their execution against Baltimore, Forte should be able to have a great rebound game today against the Ravens. He’ll frankly need to if Chicago expects to win, because without the Ravens needing to commit to the Forte threat, they’ll be unable to setup their play-action passing game with QB Flacco.
You can watch Ravens vs Bears online free live on DirecTV’s website if you have the NFL Sunday Ticket Package. The package requires a subscription, but anyone who has one can watch the live streaming version free of any game, including today’s 1pm EST / 10am PST NFL game between the 4-5 Baltimore Ravens and 5-4 Chicago Bears.