16 Reasons I Hate the Hated Ravens

I have decided that the hated Ravens don't make me poop my pants as much as they make everyone else poop their pants, especially the Steelers. Of course, the Steelers would only poop their pants because of the mutual respect that the hated Ravens and the Steelers share, so there's that.

I read this today and it started to get my blood up. This is what the rivalry with the Browns should be. But, right now, our rivalry with the Browns is about as much as a rivalry as the one between Texas and Baylor.

We need to make the most out of our rivalry with the hated Ravens while we can.

1. First rule, no mutual respect and no pooping of pants. Hatred only.
   
2. How the hell did Joe Flacco throw for 193 yards on us in the first game? How did it happen? Todd Heap was hurt, no one remembered that Mark Clayton was on the team, and Derrick Mason is 148 years old. How did he do it? I'm gonna go with the power of the unibrow. So, I hate Flacco because of that unibrow and because people are comparing him to Ben Roethlisberger.
3. The Steelers have 1,350 yards rushing (23rd) and the hated Ravens have 1,872 (5th). Know what the difference is? Know why they're so far ahead? Attempts. They run the ball almost 10 more times per game than we do, so they have a bunch more yards. I hate that everyone will look at the 5th vs. 23rd ranking and say that they're way better at running the ball than we are.
4. Flacco has thrown for 2,410 yards, 13 touchdowns, and 10 interceptions. Ben has 2,616 yards, 14 touchdowns, and 12 interceptions. The stats are basically identical, but who would you rather have? I mentioned I hate the comparisons, right?
5. Hines Ward is better than Derrick Mason, Santonio Holmes is better than Mark Clayton, Nate Washington and Limas Sweed could probably beat out Clayton for the second receiver job in Baltimore. Heath Miller is healthier than Heap. But... they still out gained us through the air in Week 4.
6. I hate that we're 10-3 and haven't clinched the division yet.
7. Not only have we not clinched the division, but we could miss the playoffs. At 10-3. It's not gonna happen, but the fact that it could makes me mad and fills me with hate. And the hated Ravens are the reason for that. If we played out west, we'd have already clinched our division like the 8-5 Cardinals and Broncos.
8. I hate how people talk about how hot the hated Ravens are right now. "They've won 6 of 7 and they've been beating up on teams." We've won 8 of 10 and haven't, at any point in the season, lost three games in a row. Baltimore lost their next two after we beat them in overtime.
9. Fans of the hated Ravens have been claiming that we "stole a win" or "got lucky" or, my favorite, that the hated Ravens "should have won" the last game. Yeah. They totally would've won if they hadn't lost. If we hadn't done all the things that allowed us to beat them, they would've emerged victorious. I hate that. Unless your name is Doctor Emmit Brown, revisionist history is a waste of time.
10. Because he is on my fantasy team, I hate Willis McGahee. He also went to Miami (FL).
11. Because, at best he sat there and did nothing while two people were murdered or at worst he killed two people, then wasn't dumb enough to rob someone in Vegas so he could go to jail, I hate Ray Lewis. I hate him a lot. Guess where Ray Ray went to school?
    
12. They say the hated Ravens have a pressure defense and that we can't protect the quarterback, but we only allowed three sacks that first game. First time Ben gets pressured, the announcers are going to talk about how we can't pass block and they're the greatest defense of all time. I hate that. Gonna be like the Redskins game all over again. And, this isn't revisionist history, this is just a stat: Our quarterbacks have been sacked 38 times this season; 21 times by NFC East teams (4 games), 17 times by everyone else (9 games). If we didn't have to play the NFC East, there wouldn't be the perception that we can't pass block.
13. I hate Le'Ron McClain because he reminds me of Jerome Bettis and we weren't the ones that drafted him.
14. I hate that there will be at least 30,000 Steelers fans in the stands on Sunday and we're 3 point underdogs because of "homefield advantage."
15. Haloti Ngata isn't anywhere near as good as Casey Hampton, but there will be comparisons on Sunday. Guess what? I kinda hate that.
16. The hated Ravens have been the luckiest, most opportunistic, most injury-free team in the universe over the past decade. They won 13 games in 2006 with no offense, a slow defense, and the ghost of Steve McNair at quarterback. And all anyone talks about is how we lucked out and got favorable calls in the 2005 playoffs. Man, I hate that.

Everyone else thinks that this game is going to end in a 0-0 tie, but I must be one of the few people on the planet that A) doesn't think it'll be close and B) doesn't think it'll be all that low scoring.

The over/under for this game is 34 and I'm taking the under.

Remember Myron Cope Night in 2005? Both teams came into the game needing a win, it was only Ben's second year, so they wanted to insulate him and not ask him to do too much, Jamal Lewis had just gotten out of prison, and Jerome Bettis was still playing. Oh. Anthony Wright was Baltimore's quarterback. If you're asking, "Who the hell is Anthony Wright?" my point has already been proved.

At any rate, everyone expected that game to end in a 0-0 tie. Or, at least, they expected that the two teams would run the ball a gazillion times and try to beat each other into submission. Instead, a total of 75 passes were attempted -- including one by No-Block Gardocki -- and the game ended 20-19, Steelers, covering the Over.

I think this game will take a similar path, with both teams throwing way more than they probably should. Roethlisberger is better than Anthony Wright and Flacco isn't as far along in his development as Roethlisberger was on that Halloween night.

We made Tony Romo and Matt Cassel look like totally incompetent assholes the past two weeks and we'll do it again to the man with the iron unibrow on Sunday.

Except this time, we'll actually make something out of those turnovers and score more than 20 points. Their offense? Not so much.

Prediction:

Steelers 27, Hated Ravens 10