Sunday, September 07, 2003

By Ed Bouchette, Post-Gazette Sports Writer

The Steelers and Baltimore Ravens traded more insults the past week than California gubernatorial candidates. If the 1 p.m. game today between the division rivals at Heinz Field is half as good as the performance leading to it, the NFL season for both teams will be off to a rousing start.

	There is sure to be some trash talking when Steelers wide receiver Plaxico Burress and Ravens cornerback Chris McAlister get together. (Peter Diana, Post-Gazette photos) Click photo for larger image.

"What more do you want than to have the Baltimore Ravens come to Pittsburgh?" Steelers receiver Hines Ward said. "It's a case of two teams respecting one another, but we dislike each other a lot.

"There's no love lost. It's going to be a physical game. It's going to be a playoff atmosphere. We're going to treat it like a playoff game."

About the only people who held back this week were coaches Brian Billick of Baltimore and the Steelers' Bill Cowher, and that has not always been the case in this short, but intense series. After the Ravens won for the third consecutive time in Pittsburgh in 2001, Billick mentioned that he had never lost on the road to the Steelers. After the Steelers beat the Ravens in 2002, Cowher returned the favor. He made a point of telling reporters that his team had just won its sixth consecutive game in Baltimore.

"I don't even think the coaches like one another," Ward observed.

Could the strong distaste the Steelers admittedly have for the Ravens have to do with jealousy?

The Steelers have dominated this series since the old Cleveland Browns moved to Baltimore in 1996, winning 11 of 15 games between them. During that seven-year span, the Steelers won four division championships; the Ravens won none. But Baltimore won a Super Bowl, claiming a wild-card playoff berth in 2000, then sweeping four games to take home a championship the Steelers have been chasing unsuccessfully since 1980.

The Steelers helped to dethrone the Ravens when they eliminated the defending Super Bowl champions in a Jan. 20, 2002, playoff game at Heinz Field, 27-10. But for the third time in eight years, they lost the AFC championship game at home the following week and failed again to bring home the Vince Lombardi trophy Billick hoisted in just his second season as a head coach.

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So, yes, the Steelers admit, there's some ring-finger envy behind their dislike for the Ravens.

"That might have a little bit to do with it," cornerback Dewayne Washington acknowledged. "Maybe it's a little jealousy on our part. They got it done, and we haven't yet. In the past couple of years, they kind of struggled, and we've done OK. But, at the end of the day, they've still got the ring, and we don't."

There aren't many left in Baltimore who wear them. Only 12 Ravens remain from their Super Bowl team of three years ago. Only three starters endure from their dominant defense of that season -- cornerback Chris McAlister, outside linebacker Peter Boulware and inside linebacker Ray Lewis.

The Ravens ran into salary-cap problems last year and remodeled. They dipped to 7-9 last season, butw many believe they will challenge the Steelers for the AFC North supremacy this season primarily because of one player's return.

Voted this June by NFL coaches as the league's most dominant player, Lewis became only the second to win both the defensive player of the year and Super Bowl MVP awards. He's a five-time Pro Bowl player. But he played only five games in 2002 before a shoulder injury ended his season, and the Ravens slipped to No. 22 in the league on defense.

His healthy return to the middle of their lineup is reason enough for optimism in Baltimore.

"He's an emotional leader," Ward said. "He sets the tempo for their defense. He's the best linebacker in the game. By him being out there healthy, that just helps their defense a lot. He's going to let his presence be known."

The Steelers said the Ravens' switch from a 4-3 defense to a 3-4 did not affect Lewis' play much when he went from a lone middle linebacker to half a pair of inside linebackers. But it does give linemen a more open shot at him.

"It's definitely a little easier to get to him," Steelers All-Pro guard Alan Faneca said. "There's not two 350-pound guys sitting on top of the two guards. It's definitely easier to see him to get to him, but you still have to get there and block him."

How good is Lewis?

"He's good, man," Faneca said. "When he's on, he's the best there is. There's nobody else as fast and as physical at that position."

One Steeler might take issue with that. Outside linebacker Jason Gildon, whose 71 sacks are three short of overcoming L.C. Greenwood for the team's career lead, sounded less than impressed with Lewis' credentials than some of his teammates.

"What's he done?" Gildon said. "Is he the only linebacker to be MVP and have a Super Bowl ring?"

	Ravens running back Jamal Lewis managed only 120 yards in two losses against the Steelers in 2002. Click photo for larger image.

Gildon went on to praise Lewis as "a great linebacker, the linebacker of his generation" who has done much for the position and his team, but he's not ready to christen him as the best of all time.

"There were great linebackers before him and there will be great linebackers after him," Gildon said.

The linebackers on both teams dominate their defenses, two of only a handful in the NFL that run the 3-4 as their base and feature four linebackers. But their offenses have provided the focal point for the matchup today.

Baltimore's Kyle Boller becomes the first rookie quarterback to make his debut in an opener in Pittsburgh since John Elway -- originally drafted by the Baltimore Colts -- began his pro career in Three Rivers Stadium with the Denver Broncos Sept. 4, 1983. And he has halfback Jamal Lewis, who ran for 1,327 yards last season, to take some pressure off him.

The Steelers' offense has turned more into a West Coast passing style than the old power-running attack that Cowher installed when he first came here in 1992 and maintained through the beginning of last season. Even Jerome Bettis was benched in favor of 5-foot-8 halfback Amos Zereoue, giving quarterback Tommy Maddox one more target among many. The days of the Bus ramming through the middle have given way to Ward, Plaxico Burress, Antwaan Randle El and even tight end Jay Riemersma vying for Maddox's attention.

It's a whole new concept on offense for the Steelers, who hope they've finally discovered a combination that can unlock their Super Bowl prospects, and envy the Ravens nevermore.

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