Three Ravens also had a bit of a personal grudge with the Texans. Fullback Vonta Leach and safety Bernard Pollard both left Houston unceremoniously two years earlier. Jacoby Jones, who had become a difference maker in just seven games for the Ravens, was in a Texans helmet in Baltimore nine months earlier and played the role of the goat, muffing a punt that led a to an easy touchdown in a seven-point game. Afterward, Jones was brutalized by the fans in Houston. His jersey was burned. His home was egged. “They did me wrong,” Jones said. With a surplus of wide receivers, Jones was released by the Texans. Head coach Gary Kubiak said Jacoby “was like a son.”
All three were tough, hard-nosed guys who played like they had something to prove, like they had a chip on their shoulders every week. But you could tell that the Houston experience meant a little more to them, especially given the stakes of first place in the conference.
When Pollard was asked what his favorite part of football was he didn’t mince words: ““I get to hit people. All of my frustration I go through during the week – what I don’t like at work, who I don’t like, the things that make me mad, stress in family life – I just take all that aggression and apply it on the field. But, I do it in a smart way – not just running out there being crazy. I play smart and channel it right.”
In other words, he aspired to “Play Like A Raven.”
“I’ve told him before — he played on the other two teams [Kansas City and Houston] just to warm him up,” said Lardarius Webb prior to his injury when he was asked about the physicality that Pollard brought to the secondary. “This is where he’s supposed to be. He plays more like a Raven than anybody I know. We’ve got a Ray Lewis, a Haloti Ngata, a Terrell Suggs. Bernard exemplifies all of them.”
Over his first two seasons with the Ravens, Leach, who played two seasons with Pollard in Houston but five overall there, had become a one-man battering ram for Ray Rice in the offense, pounding opposing linebackers and safeties and opening holes for the diminutive running back. “He’s a bruiser,” Rice said. “He wants to do one thing – he wants to destroy linebackers, and that’s all he thinks about doing. He’s like my armed security guard. I feel like I can go anywhere with Vonta, even if it wasn’t playing football.”
Both teams had plenty to prove. Both were 5-1 and they were the only two teams in the AFC with records above .500 heading into the weekend. The national media circled the carcass of the Ravens defense with scathing reviews. The defense had been in the Top 10 for nine consecutive years, and the defense had been ranked higher than the offense for 14 straight years. Now, heading into midseason, it was the offense controlling games and the defense was withering, allowing back-to-back 200-yard rushing games after going years without allowing a single 100-yard performance. With Ray Lewis and Lardarius Webb out, Ngata struggling physically, and Suggs attempting a somewhat risky and questionable return in Houston, how would the defense withstand Schaub and the Texans’ combo air and ground attack?
The defense took care of Schaub with a three-and-out series to begin the game and Flacco led a drive into Houston territory and the drive stalled at the 33-yard line, where Justin Tucker’s 51-yard boot gave the Ravens a 3-0 lead.
If only the game could’ve ended then for the Ravens.
Other than Terrell Suggs coming out flying in the first half, there would be very little positive to say about any facet of the Ravens’ productivity in Houston on the third Sunday of October. Suggs blew past Derek Newton in the first quarter, embarrassing the second-year tackle from Arkansas State with an inside bull rush, clubbing Schaub in the backfield. Suggs marched forward, opened his arms to the Texas sky as if to exclaim, “The 2011 Defensive Player of the Year is back!”
