His career highlights are a click away. You can see all of the brilliance alongside the handful of boneheaded plays and mistakes.
Ed Reed was a human highlight reel.
He didn’t have a celebration dance. He didn’t talk fire in the huddle. He didn’t thump his chest. Certainly, he had a healthy dose of ‘Canes confidence’ about him, but the childlike joy he brought to the field wasn’t just from afar. NFL Films captured him in 2004 playing the playground game scissors/paper/rock with Will Demps vs. the Jets to see who would be the blitzer on the next play.
In his first three seasons he had blocked punts against Denver, Arizona, and Seattle. Despite Billick’s concern about an injury and what the loss of Reed would mean to the secondary, No. 20 was a special teams machine, and when he fielded a punt he was a threat to go all the way every time.
But there were some dark moments as well. In his rookie season, he had picked off Jon Kitna and returned a sure touchdown on an amazing run through 10 Bengals only to hold the football up to taunt the Cincinnati offense just as wide receiver T.J. Houshmandzadeh caught him and swatted the ball away and recovered it in the end zone for a touchback. Reed cost the Ravens a sure touchdown with a hot dog move that infuriated the entire coaching staff.
NFL Films captured Billick screaming at Reed exactly what every Ravens fan was thinking: “Are you shitting me?”
But during his first three seasons, he also had 21 interceptions, including a memorable 106-yard jaunt from deep in his own end zone and through a crowded New York Jets offense, once again with 11 guys trying to chase a kid playing street ball. Reed, who never had much to lose as a kid, was always a gambler. NFL Films captured Billick, once again, exasperated starting his monologue with “Get down, Ed” to “God danggit, Ed” to “Gooooo Ed! Goooooo, Eeeedddd!” as Reed explodes into the open pasture of the Meadowlands en route to the end zone after intercepting a halfback option pass from Lamont Jordan on the other end of the stadium.
In November 2004 on a Sunday night game televised on ESPN, with the Ravens leading by a touchdown and backed against the wall with just 30 seconds remaining, Reed intercepted a Jeff Garcia pass in the end zone that would essentially end the game had he taken a knee. Instead, Reed opted to run the ball out of the end zone and eventually 106 yards later the Ravens had a two-touchdown lead with 20 seconds remaining. He did it, really, just for the fun of it although the Browns weren’t thrilled, and it most certainly wasn’t a heady football decision.
Once again, it was just Ed being Ed.
When he got his hands on the ball, his instinct was to score. A month before his Browns audible, his textbook strip, recovery, and touchdown run after mugging quarterback Mark Brunell on a blind side blitz helped get the Ravens on the board in what became a key 17-10 win over the Washington Redskins.
But the fear was that what Reed could giveth Reed could taketh on the very same play. In January 2010, Reed intercepted Peyton Manning in a playoff game in Indianapolis by stepping in front of Colts wide receiver Pierre Garcon and was caught but then stripped 40 yards downfield on a play that would’ve changed the momentum of what became a season-ending 20-3 loss at Lucas Oil Stadium.
There’s no statistic for how many games were won or lost based on one read, one route he jumped, one play he made during the years when the Ravens’ offense struggled. And some coaches say the fans will also never know how many times Reed gambled, freelanced, and got the Ravens defense burned over the top by guessing wrong.
No other fan base in the league was given this kind of weekly high wire act. Just think about how hard it is to get an interception in the NFL and how hard quarterbacks and offenses work to avoid them? Reed managed 61 of them in the regular season and added another nine interceptions in 11 career playoff games. And every time he got the ball in his hands, he wanted to go to the end zone, partially out of sheer competitive spirit and ego and partially because if he got tripped up at the 20-yard line there was very little confidence in his early days in the league that Kyle Boller – or fill in your subpar Ravens quarterback of choice during that era – could get the ball into the end zone, even starting in the red zone.
There were many weeks during his first five seasons in the NFL when it seemed that Ed Reed was the Ravens’ best offensive weapon.
In 2002, Reed was a part of the rebuilding efforts of Newsome and Billick, and in 2003 the Ravens drafted Terrell Suggs, who would join him and Lewis by winning a Defensive Player of The Year award in 2011. Lewis was a two-time winner of the award in 2000 and 2003. During the summer of 2004, Lewis and teammate Corey Fuller put forth a recruiting blitz to talk another two-time Defensive Player of The Year winner (1993 and 1994) out of retirement and into coming to Baltimore for another Super Bowl run.
Deion Sanders – a.k.a. “Primetime” or simply “Prime” to his teammates and posse – came to Reed’s third training camp in Westminster and suddenly there was a whole new leader, role model, and mentor next to Reed, cocky Pro Bowler Chris McAlister, future Hall of Famer Lewis, and a very raw Suggs.
While Reed was impressed and always respected Lewis, he was absolutely awed by everything about Deion, whom he idolized as a kid in St. Rose. Everything about Prime’s game was viewed, studied, and even emulated by Reed a decade earlier. Reed was in the eighth grade trying to get through school and into Destrahan when Sanders was winning Super Bowls and dancing his prance and preening his way from Atlanta to Dallas to San Francisco and hoisting Lombardi Trophies along the way to Canton.
During the 2003 season, Reed intercepted a Kelly Holcomb pass and raced 54 yards through heavy Cleveland Browns traffic and at one point completely steamrolled the quarterback en route to the end zone where he did Deion’s patented shuffle dance spontaneously to the delight of the Baltimore faithful to cap a 33-13 win. A year later vs. the New York Giants, Reed intercepted a pass from Eli Manning and lateralled it to Primetime, which he admitted was a personal thrill, a bucket list pitch.
Like Sanders, Reed was looking to make history every time he touched the ball.
As a kid he wanted to be Deion. As an adult, he played next to him.
Sure, Reed was completely unpredictable once he got the ball. But, for opposing offensive coordinators and quarterbacks, he was equally as unpredictable in finding ways to disrupt an offense and a game plan.
In the NFL Films piece, “A Football Life…with Bill Belichick” there’s an insightful clip of Tom Brady and the most accomplished defensive mind of the last half-century sitting in Foxborough discussing the tendencies and the mutual fear of Ed Reed. It was not staged or “made-for-reality-TV” fare. This is what goes on when the New England Patriots prepare to play against Baltimore.
First, Belichick addresses his team and pays tribute to the Ravens. “Baltimore they’re one of the teams that’s going to be in it for the long haul. You know it. I know it. They know it.” In ticking off Ravens’ players’ names in a 2009 private meeting with Brady, he goes through schemes, match ups on Randy Moss and glosses over cornerback Domonique Foxworth before arriving at the final name on his scouting report: Ed Reed.
Belichick: “I think we know about Ed.”
Brady (sighing): “Our favorite. Ed Reed is Ed Reed. He covers up for a lot of stuff.
Belichick: “Everything he does, he does at an exceptional level. He looks like he’s guessing more than he ever has.”
Brady chuckles heartily and adds, “Which is saying something.”
Belichick (watching film): “Yeah. Yep. But, he’s got a burst. You know he’s crouching down low back there. Ya know, playing low, but he changes it up. It’s just so obvious when he’s reading the quarterback. Those receivers will run right past him and he never flinches. He doesn’t even acknowledge them.”
Brady says, “yes” in agreement with every word from Belichick.
Belichick: “And he’s just reading the quarterback.”
Brady: “He’s always moving. One thing about playing against Ed is you’re just always so aware of where he is. And it’s almost like he sneaks up on you, but he can’t sneak up on you. When we played him in the rain here five years ago [in 2004] every time you’d break the huddle that’s who you’re looking at. You’re not going, ‘Ok, let’s just snap the ball and read this out.’ You’re saying, ‘Where’s he at?’ ”
At one point while watching film of Reed releasing a receiver to the post – essentially guessing based on the eyes of a quarterback – Brady simply says, “Unbelievable.”
So, here for all NFL fans to see, even future Hall of Famer Tom Brady has no appropriate words for what Reed does except he knows to be prepared for anything. And to know where No. 20 is on the field at all times.
