There is one theme that only time and space can give proper perspective. At the time when fans were watching them and coaches were coaching them, these players were in the NFL. They were playing football at the world’s highest level. But based on how many players made their last stop in the league in Baltimore, it becomes painfully obvious how bad and unqualified they were.
Mike Croel, Isaac Booth, Keith Goganious, Tim Goad, Vashone Adams, Elliott Fortune, Dorian Brew, Craig Powell, Eugene Daniel, Rondell Jones, Tyrus McCloud and Ralph Staten are all names from the 1996 and 1997 defensive unit. Baltimore would be their last stop in the NFL. For others like Ed Sutter, Donny Brady, Mike Frederick and Jerrol Williams, it would only be a matter of time.
The immediate goal was simple. Work on the pass rush first. The thought being, that if the quarterback doesn’t get rid of the ball, nothing bad can happen in the secondary.
That’s how Peter Boulware and Michael McCrary fit in so nicely in 1997. Both were a threat at any time to give the quarterback a little shove if not a sack. Boulware had 11.5 sacks and McCrary finished with nine. At least the team defense would improve some, surrendering just 345 points in a 6-9-1 season.
“Every little thing helped,” Marvin Lewis said. “We signed (former Indianapolis cornerback) Eugene Daniel, who was aging and hurt in ’97, and just having him for a little while made a significant impact on the defense. Just shutting down one corner a little bit.”
It wasn’t that the effort wasn’t there, Lewis said.
“(Cornerbacks) Antonio Langham and Donny Brady played to their knees,” Lewis said. “They gave everything they had. They just couldn’t make the plays. And there was no doubt that DeRon (Jenkins) was taking longer than we thought to develop.”
The results began to change dramatically during the 1998 season, when the team surrendered 335 points in a 6-10 season. But in 16 games, the defense allowed just 50 fourth quarter points. They were tightening up late in games, allowing them to win tight contests at home over Indianapolis, Oakland and Cincinnati.
They were also benefiting from free agent additions like McCrary, defensive tackle Tony Siragusa and defensive back Rod Woodson, but the drafts were providing instant gratification as well.
By 1999, with Duane Starks in his second year and Chris McAlister showing tremendous promise as a rookie, the team turned the corner during the second half of the season.
The team got out of the gate poorly that year, losing its first two games to St. Louis and Pittsburgh. After winning two tight games with Stoney Case at the helm against Cleveland and at Atlanta, the team went into a tailspin yet again. Wide receiver Patrick Johnson dropped a sure touchdown pass in Nashville that would have sealed a victory over the future AFC Champion Tennessee Titans, and after a bye, the Ravens were destroyed by turnovers on a nationally televised Thursday night game at home against Kansas City.
The early losses could easily have been pinned on the offense, having utilized three different starting quarterbacks just seven weeks into the season.
But that would all change after a 10-day break heading into a game against the Buffalo Bills at PSI Net Stadium on Halloween Sunday.
The team defense, which was beginning to show up on the NFL statistical leader boards for the first time, had been good enough to keep the Ravens in three of the four early losses, but hadn’t really had a chance to slam the door shut to win a close game.
This was the first of several games where the defense was given some brutal Monday morning video reviews at the hands of Marvin Lewis.
Despite the fact that it was the seventh game of its incredible run of 37 consecutive games without allowing the opposing squad’s leading rusher a 100-yard effort, it was a dark day of ugly memories for the few veterans who had been abused on the ’96 and ’97 squads.
On that grim holiday, the defensive unit’s morale sank as the team squandered a 10-3 lead by allowing the Bills and quarterback Doug Flutie a pair of scores in the final 6:21 to win a 13-10 heartbreaker. It was newly-appointed quarterback Tony Banks who was stripped of the ball by linebacker Gabe Northern at his own 45-yard line to set the table. But it was the defense that – much like the woeful 1996 unit – allowed Flutie to escape a fourth-and-15 play from the 39-yard line with a 17 yard run to the Ravens 22 that set up a 5-yard touchdown pass to Jonathan Linton with just 1:36 to lose the game.
It was a sign of the immaturity – the one breakdown at a key time of the game – that would have to be corrected for this team to pull itself into any hope of a postseason berth.
The Ravens destroyed the expansion Browns in Cleveland the following week and readied themselves for their personal house of horrors, Alltel Stadium, where the franchise had come close but had never won a football game. The ’96 breakdown was legendary; in 1997, it was quarterback Eric Zeier who tripped on Jonathan Ogden’s left foot, while attempting to go into the end zone with the tying two-point conversion in the game’s final minute; and in ’98 they were manhandled defensively, allowing the Jags 519 total yards.
This time, they vowed, it would be different.
It was a pride game for both vaunted defensive units. The Jaguars came into the game ranked No. 1 in the league on defense and the Ravens were No. 2, trailing by a few yards and wanting to leave the game on top in that battle.
The game backed up the hype of the two, now-veteran squads.
It was a game of lies, damned lies and statistics.
The Ravens allowed the Jags just nine first downs (only seven from scrimmage) and held the former juggernaut offense to just 132 yards of total offense, by far their best effort against their nemesis. Quarterback Mark Brunell and the offense would only muster one play of more than 10 yards in 60 minutes. But once again the Ravens’ offense couldn’t muster any points. The Ravens played on a long field all afternoon, losing the field-position battle and the game, 6-3, in a morale buster for the franchise, its seventh consecutive loss to the Jags since coming to Baltimore and ninth total.
The week after putting its best effort forward in Jacksonville only to see its record drop to 3-6, the defense crashed and burned the following two weeks, showing Marvin Lewis that there was plenty of work to be done.
Holding a 31-14 lead in the third quarter in Cincinnati, the Ravens came completely unglued. The first sign was a 60-yard drive that was capped by a 15-yard touchdown pass from Jeff Blake to Darnay Scott. After a failed possession, the Bengals’ Craig Yeast returned an 86-yard Kyle Richardson punt for a touchdown, embarrassing the special teams unit. After allowing the Bengals to drive 78 quick yards to their 1-yard line, the defense stood tall on three consecutive plays and forced the Bengals to kick a field goal to tie the game. A short drive led by Tony Banks and a 50-yard field goal by Matt Stover sealed the win and the defense – despite a lackluster effort – escaped but certainly didn’t look like a unit that was destined for greatness that day.
“We were really humbled that day,” Marvin Lewis would later say. “The offense really bailed us out of an embarrassing situation.”
The following week the Jaguars came back to PSI Net Stadium and that always meant trouble for the Ravens in the form of the bird killer, Brunell. Up until the game three weeks earlier, Brunell had made a career during his two chances a year to torch the Ravens. On the heels of as tight a defensive match as you can have two weeks earlier in Jacksonville, the game received tremendous hype, with national stories and much fanfare – as much fanfare as a game between 9-1 and 4-6 teams could have garnered. At this point, the Ravens and their defense were starving for attention.
The game was the antithesis of the previous matchup in the swamp. With the Ravens leading 16-7 at the end of the third quarter, the game became a slugfest in the fourth quarter and, again, it was the Ravens’ ineptitude on offense and a series of defensive mistakes at the heart of another loss to Jacksonville.
