Ravens QB Jackson, the first member of the 4,000-900 club, looks toward playoff run

BALTIMORE (AP) — Lamar Jackson capped a sensational regular season with a rather ordinary performance. It was still plenty good enough to set a pair of NFL records and lead the Baltimore Ravens to a second straight AFC North title.

Jackson completed 16 of 32 passes for 217 yards and two touchdowns in a 35-10 victory over the Cleveland Browns on Saturday. He also ran for 63 yards.

His numbers weren't eye-popping. But Jackson unspectacularly did his share to bring the Ravens a victory and their fourth division crown in his seven years as a starter.

“There were certainly some plays that he made, especially on third down, escaping and making some plays down the field,” Browns coach Kevin Stefanski said. “It’s a challenge when he’s making the throws from the pocket. It’s a challenge when you have to defend for the duration of the down with his ability to move.”

Whether he's jitterbugging behind the line of scrimmage, running downfield or delivering a how-did-he-do-that throw on the run, Jackson has done it all for the Ravens (12-5) this season. Along the way, he piled up some unprecedented numbers.

Jackson is the first quarterback in NFL history to pass for 4,000 yards and rush for 900 in a single season. No one had ever hit 4,000 and 800, but Jackson lifted the bar higher.

And that's not all. Jackson's 12-yard touchdown pass to Mark Andrews in the second quarter made him the first quarterback in NFL history with at least 4,000 yards passing and 40 touchdown passes with four or fewer interceptions.

Jackson completed the regular season with 4,172 yards passing, 41 touchdown passes and 915 yards rushing.

As far as the 2016 Heisman Trophy winner is concerned, he was just one part in a very intricate machine.

“That’s all my teammates included in that," Jackson said. “It’s not just me. I do what I’m supposed to.”

Jackson is the third Ravens quarterback to throw for 4,000 yards in a season. Vinny Testaverde did it in 1996, Baltimore's first season after moving from Cleveland, and Joe Flacco threw for a team-record 4,317 yards in 2016.

Jackson would like to become the third Ravens quarterback to win a Super Bowl, following Trent Dilfer and Flacco. The journey begins next weekend, when Baltimore opens the playoffs at home in the wild-card round.

To get this far is great, but Jackson knows he's got to do more to make this season a complete success and make everyone quit talking about his 2-4 record in the postseason.

“We got the job done. But the job is undone,” Jackson said. “I’m cool with what’s going on today, but my mind is on something else.”

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Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson throws during the first half of an NFL football game against the Cleveland Browns Saturday, Jan. 4, 2025, in Baltimore. (AP Photo/Nick Wass)

Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson drops back to pass during the first half of an NFL football game against the Cleveland Browns Saturday, Jan. 4, 2025, in Baltimore. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)

Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson throws during the first half of an NFL football game against the Cleveland Browns Saturday, Jan. 4, 2025, in Baltimore. (AP Photo/Nick Wass)

Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson, right, fakes a hand off to running back Derrick Henry during the first half of an NFL football game against the Cleveland Browns Saturday, Jan. 4, 2025, in Baltimore. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)

Baltimore Ravens tight end Mark Andrews (89) celebrates after scoring during the first half of an NFL football game against the Cleveland Browns Saturday, Jan. 4, 2025, in Baltimore. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)

Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson scrambles during the first half of an NFL football game against the Cleveland Browns Saturday, Jan. 4, 2025, in Baltimore. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden is taking a message to the grieving families of victims in the deadly New Year's attack in New Orleans: “It takes time. You got to hang on.”

Biden on Monday will visit the city where an Army veteran drove a truck into revelers in the French Quarter, killing 14 and injuring 30 more. It's likely to be the last time Biden travels to the scene of a horrific crime as president to console families of victims. He has less than two weeks left in office.

It's a grim task that presidents perform, though not every leader has embraced the role with such intimacy as the 82-year-old Biden, who has experienced a lot of personal tragedy in his own life. His first wife and baby daughter died in a car accident in the early 1970s, and his eldest son, Beau, died of cancer in 2015.

“I've been there. There’s nothing you can really say to somebody that’s just had such a tragic loss," Biden told reporters Sunday in a preview of his visit. "My message is going to be personal if I get to get them alone.”

Biden often takes the opportunity at such bleak occasions to speak behind closed doors with the families, offer up his personal phone number in case people want to talk later on and talk about grief in stark, personal terms.

The Democratic president will continue on to California following his stop in New Orleans. The White House was moving forward with plans for the trip even as a snowstorm was hitting the Washington region.

In New Orleans, the driver plowed into a crowd on the city's famous Bourbon Street. Fourteen revelers were killed along with the driver. Shamsud-Din Jabbar, who steered his speeding truck around a barricade and plowed into the crowd, later was fatally shot in a firefight with police.

Jabbar, an American citizen from Texas, had posted five videos on his Facebook account in the hours before the attack in which he proclaimed his support for the Islamic State militant group and previewed the violence that he would soon unleash in the French Quarter.

Biden on Sunday pushed back against conspiracy theories surrounding the attack, and he urged New Orleans residents to ignore them.

“I spent literally 17, 18 hours with the intelligence community from the time this happened to establish exactly what happened, to establish beyond any reasonable doubt that New Orleans was the act of a single man who acted alone,” he said. “All this talk about conspiracies with other people, there’s not evidence of that — zero.”

The youngest victim was 18 years old, and the oldest was 63. Most victims were in their 20s. They came from Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, New York, New Jersey and Great Britain.

Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, a Republican, was asked on Fox News Channel what the city was hoping for from Biden's visit.

“How can we not feel for both the families of those who die but also those who’ve been injured in their families?” he asked.

“The best thing that the city, the state, and the federal government can do is do their best to make sure that this does not happen again. And what we can do as a people is to make sure that we don’t live our lives in fear or in terror — but live our lives bravely and with liberty, and then support those families however they need support.”

Associated Press writer Fatima Hussein contributed to this report.

President Joe Biden speaks with reporters after signing the Social Security Fairness Act in the East Room of the White House, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)