Eagles-Ravens takeaways: The race for the NFC’s No. 1 seed begins; breaking down Birds’ most valuable defense

The Eagles left Baltimore with another statement win and further proof that they are one of the NFL’s best teams on Sunday.

The 24-19 victory over the Ravens moved them to 10-2 with five games left to play and maintained the team’s position in the race for the No. 1 seed in the conference.

Here’s what we learned:

The race in the NFC is truly on now.

Sunday’s win went a long way to quell any remaining doubts about this Eagles team having a Super Bowl ceiling. Traveling to play the Ravens just as the season’s stakes begin to rise was the type of matchup that can prove instructive for how a team will fare in actual playoff atmospheres. And the Eagles passed the test with arguably their most impressive win of the season.

The statement road win also went a long way toward the Eagles not needing one when it might truly count. With five games left to play, the Eagles remain just one game behind the Detroit Lions for the top seed in the NFC and the first-round playoff bye that comes with it. Simply put, they’ll need Detroit to drop at least one game to have a chance at topping the conference through a tiebreaker or, if the Lions lose two games, they could overtake them by winning out.

A lot can change in the next five weeks. A lot can change in the next five days, even.

Thursday night will be the next chance for a seismic shift between the two teams, with the Lions hosting the 9-3 Green Bay Packers at Ford Field. A Lions win would go a long way toward them securing the tiebreaker over the Eagles through record against common opponents, while a loss would give the Eagles a chance to hold the tiebreaker over Detroit by winning out.

Even if the Lions beat Green Bay, the path for the Eagles is still there. Detroit has the third-hardest strength of schedule remaining with home matchups against the Packers, Buffalo Bills, and Minnesota Vikings, and road games against the San Francisco 49ers and Chicago Bears. By comparison, the Eagles’ remaining slate ranks 23rd, according to tankathon.com. It’s worth noting the reason for the lack of reference to scenarios in which the Eagles have control over their own destiny is because the 10-2 Vikings could complicate things if they win their remaining five games.

Eagles coach Nick Sirianni downplayed any notion that the team is starting to consider how the seeding might shape up after Sunday’s win, opting instead for some of his most-utilized coachspeak expressions.

“Our job is to control what we can control,” Sirianni said. “That doesn’t make for good press, that doesn’t make for good stories. We’re boring. But the monotony, the boring, day-by-day grind is what gets results. So we’ll continue to keep a narrow focus.”

The Eagles’ focus may remain narrow — and it might need to be if they want to avoid giving up any more ground to Detroit or Minnesota — but the playoff seeding is coming into picture in an encouraging way nonetheless.

Do the Eagles have the most valuable defense in the NFL?

It’s not a conventional title, but the group has a legitimate case for being the most cost-effective unit in the league on either side of the ball.

According to overthecap.com, the Eagles rank 28th in positional spending on defense this season. What’s even more staggering is that the defense managed a statement performance against Baltimore’s elite offense without its three highest earners (Darius Slay, Bryce Huff, and James Bradberry).

It’s not hard to understand how the Eagles’ surging defense became such a bargain. Of the 11 defensive starters against Baltimore, six of the them were on rookie contracts. Zack Baun and Isaiah Rodgers are also on low-cost deals after signing one-year contracts with the Eagles in free agency. Rodgers replacing Slay in the lineup and second-year edge rusher Nolan Smith filling in for an injured Brandon Graham led to the average age of the Eagles’ starting 11 on defense falling to a youthful 24.4.

» READ MORE: Nick Sirianni deserves credit for the Eagles’ physicality in beating the Ravens. He may also deserve a contract extension.

Much is made of the window for teams to compete with an elite quarterback still on a rookie deal, but Eagles general manager Howie Roseman has built a Super Bowl contender with the inverse. The Eagles have spent heavily on the offensive side for a collection of stars around Jalen Hurts and compensated with a cast of defensive draft picks that are now overachieving.

It’s a winning formula, and one that stuck out on Sunday.

The Eagles have a serious interior defensive line pair brewing.

For a second week in a row, Jalen Carter drew consistent double teams to the benefit of Milton Williams. According to Next Gen Stats, Carter faced two blockers on 25 of his 43 pass-rushing opportunities. Carter also played 70 straight snaps before sitting out the Ravens’ final play of the game, a logic-defying stat that seemingly happens every week for the second-year defensive tackle.

» READ MORE: Eagles’ secondary buckles down in a win against Lamar Jackson and the Ravens’ top-ranked offense

Carter’s growing reputation in the league and the respect that offenses are starting to show him once again resulted in ample opportunity for Williams to wreak havoc. Next Gen Stats credited Williams with a team-high five pressures on 26 pass-rushing snaps. Carter also impacted the game despite the double teams, logging three tackles for losses, two quarterback hits and one sack.

I wrote last week that the pair is reminiscent in some ways of the Eagles’ defensive tackle partnership of Fletcher Cox and Javon Hargrave during the 2022 season. The current duo needs the production to match, but Sunday’s game was another step toward making those comparisons more realistic.

Up: Cooper DeJean. The Eagles’ rookie slot cornerback is listed at 6 feet, 198 pounds. Ravens star running back Derrick Henry is 6-2, 247. Those numbers defy the fact that DeJean made the signature play Sunday, decleating Henry after the back caught an underneath pass with the Ravens facing third-and-11 in the fourth quarter. DeJean conceded that even he didn’t expect to lift Henry off the ground and said he felt Henry’s strength even when delivering the hit rather than receiving it. Still, the moment was emblematic of the elite play the Eagles have gotten from the second-round pick this season.

Down: Avonte Maddox. Speaking of DeJean, the player he replaced as the starting slot cornerback might be staring down another demotion before too long. Maddox struggled as the dime defensive back once again on Sunday, getting charged with defensive holding early in the game that negated a sack by Josh Sweat. The Eagles have enough young defensive backs to try someone else in sub packages, especially given how Maddox has played.

» READ MORE: Sielski: The Eagles’ defense is the best reason to believe they can win the Super Bowl

Up: Braden Mann. The Eagles’ multiyear search for a punter has settled on Mann, who played a vital role in the win with two punts inside the 5, one of which landed at Baltimore’s 1-yard line. Sirianni and Baun mentioned how Mann’s punts were game-changing in the field-position battle. For as well as the defense played, the precision from Mann and the gunner pair of Sydney Brown and Kelee Ringo are deserving of some credit for the score line as well, especially considering the Ravens gained 372 yards but scored just 19 points.