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“Next time we play the Tennessee Titans, we’ll kick their ass.” Sam Adams at The Barn in Oct. 2000 to @NestorAparicio during Ravens Super Bowl XXXV run. And then January happened! Remember the Titans? We do… #RavensFlock
Two things were pretty obvious to everyone who watched the 2000 Baltimore Ravens during the first half of the season. When they passed the ball, they made mistakes and were ineffective. But each time they tried to run the football with any consistency, they succeeded.
The Ravens came to Miami on Sept. 17, 2000, for the first time in their five-year existence and the fans from Baltimore were out in force. It was the first time a Baltimore football franchise had played in South Florida since Dan Marino’s rookie season. A lot had changed from that day in 1983.
It has been said that you need to crawl before you can walk. For the 2000 Baltimore Ravens, much of that crawling was done during the end of the 1999 season. Before Shannon Sharpe came to play. While Trent Dilfer was still sitting on the bench in Tampa Bay, waiting for redemption. While Jamal Lewis and Travis Taylor were still attending college classes and hoping to become first-round draft picks in the NFL.
While the 2000 Baltimore Ravens will always receive credit from fans and foes alike for being the team that allowed the fewest points in NFL history – and punctuated that task with a defensive unit shutout in Super Bowl XXXV – only four men can properly put into perspective the pain, the growth and the joy of a group that ultimately captured greatness.
It has been two decades since Nestor took Tony Siragusa to The Barn for some crabs. Let the late, great Goose tell you about what he did in the locker room before the big win on January 28, 2001 as we celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Baltimore Ravens’ grab at glory in Super Bowl XXXV in Tampa.
From Ozzie Newsome and Phil Savage, the Ravens dominance began on their first draft day in 1996. Nestor takes you inside that inaugural War Room that netted Jonathan Ogden and Ray Lewis.
Purple Reign, Chapter 5: “Canton Comes to Baltimore” Nestor recounts what an outpost franchise the Ravens were when Rod Woodson and Shannon Sharpe showed up in Owings Mills
Purple Reign, Chapter 1: “The Boss Arrives” “Hi, Coach Billick? My name is Nestor Aparicio. I own the all-sports radio station in Baltimore and I’m about to become your new best friend.”
Purple Reign, Chapter 4: “Slapdicks, Quarterbacks, and Pranks”. Nestor chronicles the room of Dilfer, Banks and Redman and the Super Bowl XXXV champs that went a month without a TD
Purple Reign, Chapter 3: “The Original Birds and the Mean Machine” Nestor chronicles the very beginning and April 1996 draft with a new name, no colors and no logo – but two future Hall of Famers coming to Baltimore.
To honor the Super Bowl XXXV champions and the upcoming ESPN 30-For-30 on the Baltimore Ravens title, Nestor Aparicio is re-releasing the original “Purple Reign: Diary of a Raven Maniac” here. This is the prologue.
Nestor tells Dennis Koulatsos highlights of Ravens Super Bowl XXXV ESPN 30-for-30 night at Meyerhoff
Nestor is joined by Chris Pika and Luke Jones to discuss the Dick Cass departure and the future of Steve Bisciotti
Nestor is joined by Chris Pika and Luke Jones to discuss the Dick Cass departure and the future of longtime Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti.
Don Mohler quizzes Nestor on 30 years of radio on The Recon for Christmas
Don Mohler was one of the first guests on the Budweiser Sports Forum in early 1992. Now, three decades later, he asks The King of Baltimore Sports Media about how a kid from Dundalk made the journey to thirty years of talking to people.
The Marching Ravens leader John Ziemann joins Nestor to reminisce about old Memorial Stadium tales and the time Lou Grant took him around town to learn the magic of the Baltimore Colts marching band. Did you see “The Fanatics” or “The Fumbleheads” back in the 1990s?
Nestor joins the ESPN Cleveland crew for a look at NFL Draft and AFC North civic angst.
The Goose Tony Siragusa cooks up 20 years of ring stories and lost tales of Super Bowl XXXV in Tampa
Marvin Lewis tells the tale of the greatest defense in NFL history 20 years later
Nestor tells Dennis Koulatsos a little Christmas story about going to Cleveland for the holidays
The Browns are surging. The Ravens are trying to get the team back on the field after a COVID outbreak. This is the biggest football game in a generation in Northern Ohio. Baker and Lamar under the bright lights and Nestor laments why watching it on TV won’t be as much fun as touching the real leg lamp during Christmas season.
Cue “We Are The Champions”! Or, in this case, “Who Let The Dogs Out!” This is the lost Mike Flynn videotape of Super Bowl XXXV parade through streets of Baltimore.
Vinny Testaverde scored Baltimore’s first NFL touchdown on Sept. 1, 1996.
Lawrence Guy was one of three former Ravens players to raise the Vince Lombardi Trophy on Sunday.
A three-part holiday series evaluating the ghosts of professional football past, present and future for Baltimore by veteran local sports journalist and WNST.net & AM 1570 founder Nestor Aparicio
He was an iconoclast and the real architect of the Baltimore Ravens as you know them. I’ll really miss David Modell…
It was 15 years ago today that the Ravens emphatically validated Baltimore’s place in the NFL.
Peter G. Angelos once told The Baltimore Sun: “No one wants to litigate but one has to sometimes…”
So many memories of Ted Marchibroda. They started with me on Bank Street in Dundalk taking the No. 22 bus
(This blog brought to you by Atlantic Remodeling. Visit www.atlanticremodeling.com to learn about their Red Cent Guarantee!) After being included
The late Ravens owner was among the first five finalists eliminated in New Orleans on Saturday.
Dreams of Jonathan Ogden and Art Modell as Hall of Famers and Ray Lewis retiring as a champion have the Ravens general manager not wanting to wake up.
The return of Ray Lewis is just one of many events to leave Ravens fans shaking their heads in disbelief during this improbable playoff run.
The first draft pick in Ravens history is in his first year of eligibility for Canton while the late owner has been named a finalist for the first time since 2001.
Former Baltimore Ravens offensive tackle Jonathan Ogden and late owner Art Modell were named among the 27 semifinalists in consideration
Looking into the purple crystal ball to see what happens on Monday night…
(Updated: 4:35 p.m.) OWINGS MILLS, Md. — After growing up in Ohio and rooting for the Cleveland Browns as a
