Ravens retroactively changing Lamar Jackson’s availability status quickly became a boondoggle

As recently as a few years ago, it probably wouldn’t have been a big deal had the Baltimore Ravens announced Saturday that Lamar Jackson would miss Sunday’s game despite being listed as “probable” on Friday.

However, with sports gambling now one of the driving financial forces in the NFL and other major American sports, it has the potential to be a huge deal.

Jackson was listed as limited in practice on Wednesday and Thursday but was upgraded to a full participant in Friday’s practice. The implication being that the quarterback had a decent chance of playing on Sunday against the Chicago Bears.

However, in a very unusual move, the Ravens announced Saturday that Jackson had actually been limited on Friday as well and was officially out for Sunday.

There has been an update to Lamar Jackson’s Friday practice and game status. Jackson was downgraded from a full practice participant to limited, and he has been ruled out for tomorrow’s game vs. Chicago.

— Baltimore Ravens (@Ravens) October 25, 2025

ESPN’s Adam Schefter followed that up by reporting that Jackson “just was not ready to play with a hamstring injury that sidelined him two previous games, especially with another game on a short week Thursday night in Miami.”

NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport reported that Jackson had practiced with the scout team on Friday, which would have been a clear indication that he was unlikely to play on Sunday had that been known. He also reported that Ravens head coach told reporters that Jackson “had a full practice” on Friday but wouldn’t commit to whether he would play on Sunday.

NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero later added that because Jackson practiced with the scout team, he should have been classified as limited and not upgraded in the team’s Friday report.

Jonathan Jones of CBS Sports reported that the Ravens genuinely believed they could list Jackson as a full participant because he was at practice on Friday, regardless of who he was practicing with.

The switcheroo, intentional or not, could be considered a big deal as the NFL requires teams to provide accurate information about a player’s status during game weeks. Otherwise, it would be easy for people with inside information to give those details to gamblers that the general public would not otherwise know.

Presumably, the Ravens were trying to game the Bears, keeping them in the dark about whether or not they needed to prepare for Jackson. However, that kind of rope-a-dope doesn’t fly as well now that gamblers are placing millions of dollars on the outcomes of these games, based mainly on the assumption that this kind of information is accurate. Case in point, the line on the game immediately shifted several points towards the Bears, which won’t sit well with everyone who bet on the Ravens on Friday following that initial report.

Furthermore, this happens the same week as the stunning FBI arrest of NBA coach Chauncey Billups and player Terry Rozier over gambling accusations, not to mention the ever-growing list of gambling-related incidents and suspensions involving NFL personnel. The league is already facing scrutiny over its sports-betting relationships, and a situation like this is precisely the kind of thing critics will look at and wonder what it means.

To show just how big a deal this became in a short time, the Ravens released a new statement Saturday afternoon, explaining that Jackson was “present for and participated fully in our entire Friday practice.” However, “upon further evaluation today and after conferring with the league office, because Lamar didn’t take starter reps in practice, we updated our report to reflect his practice participation.”

pic.twitter.com/2jQg4Ru0zM

— Baltimore Ravens (@Ravens) October 25, 2025

According to Rapoport, the NFL will look into the situation, as we’re sure they’ll want to ensure something like this doesn’t happen again, whether purposefully or not.