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Weathering a long, hard road ahead

David Steele
September 15, 2008

Think of it this way. Imagine if, in the first game of the John Harbaugh Era and the first game of the Joe Flacco Era, the Ravens had lost. With Hurricane Ike shaking up the remaining schedule (among other things), everybody would have had an extra week to marinate in the gloom and doom.

Instead, there's an extra week to bask in the glow of victory. Thank you, Cincinnati Bungles.

After that, though, it's hard to find many other benefits to the Ravens - strictly from a football sense, of course - getting a bye in Week2 of a 17-week season. Oh, one could make a case for the walking wounded being spared the pounding yesterday. Kelly Gregg's status was still up in the air. Ed Reed, Chris McAlister and the rest who gritted their teeth through the season opener probably were not much healthier this week. Troy Smith probably could have used the break, what with much of his daily routine still being taken up by intravenous treatments.

But try polling the players about whether they would have wanted that break now - when they didn't know they were getting it and thus practiced all week only to get the unexpected mini-vacation starting yesterday - or the second week of November, after the grind of nine weeks and before they go to East Rutherford, N.J., to face the defending champion New York Giants.

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Or, to take it a step further, whether they would choose to play three straight road games, as they now will - at Cleveland, at Houston, at the Giants - to begin November, and five in six weeks.

Fresh and rested now, or later? Yup, looks like all the hands are up.

This, let's point out, is not to join the Conspiracy Chorus, the bunch who is convinced the NFL's sole priority was to stick it to the Ravens, apparently because the league spends a huge portion of its time devising ways to keep Charm City down. (The rest appears to be dedicated to fine-tuning the excessive-celebration rules.) Remember - again, from just the football aspects of this - the Houston Texans aren't exactly being handed a gift, either. Same thing for them as with the Ravens: 15 straight weeks of football.

Plus, if they didn't have Ike to occupy their minds, they would be occupied by this: Pittsburgh Steelers 38, Texans 17. Ouch. Now they have their next two on the road, not exactly in hospitable places (Tennessee and Jacksonville), before their home opener. Against the Indianapolis Colts. If their stadium is ready to be used.

Go ahead, you switch places with them if you think the Ravens are getting such a raw deal.

The bottom line is this: Both teams were ready to play games that count after the usual insufferably long preseason, and as soon as they jumped into real action, Mother Nature brought it all to a halt. The Ravens did have momentum, some positive reinforcement, and we'll know next week against the Cleveland Browns at home whether that momentum was broken.

It will be a couple of months - about the time the Ravens arrive in Houston, actually - before we know the toll the premature bye week took. How the players are able to stay at a physical and mental peak the rest of the way. And where Flacco stands, with his big debut long past, with defenses starting to catch up to him, with Smith healthy and hungry for the chance his illness denied him, with a possible rookie "wall" looming, and with no bye week as a crutch.

Apparently, someone thought Harbaugh's first year as an NFL head coach didn't have enough bizarre challenges.

Listen to David Steele on Fridays at 9 a.m. on WNST (1570 AM).


Copyright © 2008, The Baltimore Sun

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