On Thanksgiving Night in Baltimore, Joe Burrow dropped two calling cards into the middle of the AFC North race that briskly announced his Pro Bowl return from a 74-day turf toe exile. Relentless Bengals tight ends coach James Casey, grinding as usual in between inhaling a lunch and exhaling a workout, is watching the first one on this game-planning Tuesday.

Third quarter. Clock blinking 7:28. Third-and-nine from the Ravens 14. Bengals lead, 12-7, on four Evan McPherson field goals. With the game swinging in the Inner Harbor wind, they need more than a fifth.

As Tanner Hudson, his cooly efficient eight-year backup tight end, sticks out his left hand while his right one fends off Ravens Pro Bowl safety Kyle Hamilton, Casey freezes the tape.

"That's really the only spot that ball could have been for him to make that play," Casey says. "If it's a little bit shorter, Kyle is going to be able to break it up. If it's a little bit longer, Tanner's not going to be able to reach it. On this play, it's just both of those guys, Burrow and Tanner, just making a play out there. Just being unbelievable athletes, unbelievable professionals. Some of the best in the world at what they're doing."

For Casey, football is an intricate ballet; an infinite set of possibilities on each play that combines athleticism, anticipation, and wits. What Casey loves about Hudson is that you can set a watch by his reliability. Daylight savings or not. He caught Joe Flacco's first Bengals' touchdown even though he had only once accidental rep with him. And, this would end up being just one of six snaps Hudson took all Thanksgiving.

"He's making this huge play on Play 61 of the game," Casey says. "He may have only played two snaps before that. It's really, really difficult to go out there, basically cold. He's playing some special teams. But it's a different feel when you're not playing all the time, and you're not in the mode of the game, Just going out there cold. And that gave us a ton of momentum. On the road. Thursday night. Crowd going crazy. Put us up 12."

Casey unfreezes the tape, and every Cincy school kid knows what happens next. Touchdown. 19-7. The game plan could stay intact. Soon, the Bengals were flying back with all the fixings. Hudson beat Hamilton to the back right pylon and made a wondrous one-handed grab with that left hand.

"You want to feel it stick. You want to feel that stick right in your palm. That's what you go for," says Hudson, back from the Thanksgiving bye and remembering everything. "But it didn't stick right away. So you do the best you can to corral it in. Once you bring it into your body, it's just whatever you can do to pin it against yourself.

"At the time, I didn't realize as I went for the ball, he had my right arm pinned. It's one of those things you just try to stop the tip of the ball and reel it in the best you can."

Hudson, one of only two men to catch a pass from Burrow and Tom Brady (Giovani Bernard is the other), thinks about his 85 catches in 66 games.

"Best catch all-time? In a game?" Hudson ponders. "Probably. Thanksgiving. Night game. All of those things. Yeah, probably my best play."

That one and Burrow's missile seven minutes later for a zip-line 29-yard touchdown to wide receiver Andrei Iosivas over a zone are the two throws that have flung Burrow back into the NFL conscience.

"It's just the way he's wired. Like a lot of people have said," Hudson says. "It's very enjoyable to play with someone like that. That he can see it from a receiver's perspective as a quarterback."

Four years ago this week, Hudson made the Bengals his fourth NFL stop. For some reason, the journeyman tight end on the practice squad and the Heisman Trophy quarterback clicked immediately. Maybe because they both starred as small-town high school quarterbacks. Burrow in Athens, Ohio, and Hudson in even smaller Camden, Tenn.

"I doubt he knows where the Southern Arkansas Mule Riders play," Hudson muses of his college alma mater. "He just wants you to come and do your job and be where you're supposed to be."

Where Hudson is on this Thanksgiving Night is on Burrow's right, lined up slightly offset inside in a bunch set. Iosivas settles next to him in the slot. On the outside of Iosivas is wide receiver Mitchell Tinsley.

Hudson senses the Ravens are in man-to man because the formidable Hamilton has locked eyes with him. The play has been in all week, designed to beat a red-zone defense taking away All-Pro wide receiver Ja’Marr Chase. Chase is on the other side of the field, split out by himself as the Ravens are poised to double him with a "robber safety," if he goes inside.

It wasn't the first time Hudson saw himself lined up against Hamilton, one of the NFL's best.

"I saw this play in my mind 100 times before the game," Hudson says. "(Hamilton) is very good at cutting your route off and using his length to his advantage, trying not to let you get an edge on him, or getting a good press on the line, or knowing kind of where you're going to break, your depth. He's kind of sitting there already."

Maybe it also helps that Casey is an old quarterback himself. Not only that, he pitched for the minor-league White Sox before he ended up in the quarterback room of future Texas head coach Tom Herman at the University of Houston. He would go on to make 72 catches as an NFL tight end. If anyone knows about slinging it, it's Casey.

Casey is freezing the tape when Hudson hits the five-yard line. Burrow is starting to throw as defensive end Kyle Van Noy pinches inside, allowing Burrow to roll right.

"This is what makes Burrow one of the best in the world, with his accuracy and how this was just such a phenomenal throw," Casey says. "He's got to release it so early, and he's releasing it when Tanner's on the five. But he's gauging Tanner's trajectory of where he's running to. Right here, Kyle's still on top of him a little bit. So Burrow knows that he's really going to have to back-shoulder this throw to give Tanner a shot to catch it."

And then there's this. Burrow and Hudson know the throw is going to tail away from Hudson because Burrow is running right. A little geometry in the ballet.

"Since he's moving when he releases the ball, the inertia of his body is going to the right. The inertia is going to stay through that football, and it's going to carry the ball a little more right than where he's intending it," Casey says. "A lot of trust."

On top of all that, Hudson had to get there first. The bunch formation helped because Hamilton couldn't press him. Iosivas and Tinsley ran good routes, but Van Noy's inside move took Burrow's eyes to Hudson.

"I'm just trying to get by him," Hudson says. "If I'm in the game, I'm thinking the ball's coming to me no matter what. Whether I'm first in the progression or last. I know if it were me, Ja'Marr would be pretty much No. 1 most of the time. I was probably the third (option).

"I'm very confident just in my ability across the board, zone or man … You build your toolbox throughout OTAs and training camp. What's my best move in this situation with this kind of leverage against this type of guy?"

Hudson went with "a stutter and go-ish," move. Casey says Hudson's change of direction is elite, particularly when it comes to stopping on a dime in a zone. Here, the stutter steps may have deked Hamilton into thinking it was a choice route that he breaks off. Instead, Hudson turns it into a double move and heads vertically.

"Kyle does a great job. He stays firm, but he does stop his feet," Casey says. "It's little things. Like, he stops his feet because of the juke."

Now, Casey says, is where NFL games are decided. By elements such as Burrow's arm, Hudson's hands, Hamilton's mélange of physical gifts.

"The defenders are so strong, and they're so fast, so athletic, especially a guy like Kyle. If you're not a strong, physical player, once you take off, they can kind of get hands on you," says Casey as he freezes and rewinds.

Ravens head coach John Harbaugh is screaming about Hudson committing offensive pass interference. But as Casey observes, Hamilton is doing his job of trying to force Hudson into the sideline with his length. Hudson is using savvy and athleticism to hold his ground. Both trying to stay away from the dreaded flag with hand fighting and body position.

"Tanner's in year eight, and he's a very experienced player, so he understands all of these things," Casey says. "What Tanner is doing a really good job right here is holding his line right there. So, as he goes double move and pushes vertical, he's kind of pushing back into Hamilton.

"Once he kind of breaks vertical, he's just outside the numbers. So he's saving a lot of grass outside for Burrow to throw the ball to. So because Tanner does a really good job with his body control of kind of leaning into Kyle, he saves Burrow a lot of room."

Of course, it can't happen without Burrow throwing it to the only place he can and Hudson using one wing to make this Thanksgiving special.

His wife was back in Cincinnati with her best friend watching. The family back in Camden had gathered earlier in the day, but he wasn't sure if they were all together still because by the time he made the one-hander, Thursday was thinking about becoming Friday.

It's been a long year, too. Minutes after catching two touchdowns in Philadelphia during the preseason, Hudson took a call in the locker room and found out his grandmother was about to pass.

"Usually, we have Thanksgiving at her house. Either at her house or at a church kind of near her house. I think they still did it at the church," Hudson says. "My sister said there was a lot of people, good turnout. Most of the family showed up,

which is always nice to have because we're scattered, like a lot of families are.

"My other grandma was there as well. It was so late, everybody may have been gone home."

Hudson, it turns out, has helped bring Burrow home, grabbing one of those calling cards.

"He just wants to be great," Hudson says, "and if you're willing to put in the time, do the right things, be in the right spot, know his checks and all that, then he wants you to be great with him."