Super Bowl XLVII Afterword: 49ers vs Ravens

Jim Harbaugh may have had a legitimate gripe over a missed
holding call late in the 4th quarter, but it fell on deaf ears.
Photo credit to Times-Standard.

Saturday, I gave the offensive edge in this game to San Francisco, I labeled the coaching edge as ‘even,’ and I gave Baltimore the edge in both defense and special teams. A lot of people who commented on that write-up must have lost some serious coin yesterday.

They said the 49ers had the best three linebackers in the NFL, but I didn’t see them pressuring Flacco or containing Dennis Pitta or keeping Ray Rice from breaking out on screens. One even said Donte Whitner and Dashon Goldson is the best safety tandem in the league. Funny how they looked like Denver on Jacoby Jones’s long touchdown reception late in the second quarter.

Via Madden, I predicted the 49ers to win. I had been leaning to San Francisco for most of the week and then toward Baltimore as I finished preparing to write my preview, so I have no idea who I would have picked without using Madden.

The first half of the game was pretty lame. By that, I just mean that we haven’t had a blowout Super Bowl in quite a while and I’m hoping we’ll never have one again. The past several years have been great, so when the Ravens went up 21-3, and then led 28-6 after a second-half kickoff return touchdown, I would have been ready to turn the TV off if I were an average fan.

As it was, the power outage in the Superdome a couple minutes later was the most exciting thing that had happened up to that point.

The power outage seemed to allow San Francisco to regroup, because during a 4:10 period shortly after the outage, the 49ers scored 17 points. But the Ravens can’t blame the stadium malfunction for letting San Francisco back in the game. The first play once the game resumed was a failed 3^rd & 13 attempt, which forced the 49ers to punt. The Ravens didn’t have to let the power outage affect the game.

San Francisco came all the way back, but failed on a two-point conversion try that would have tied the game. If they had made it, they never would have had to try for the touchdown on their final possession, a field goal could have tied the game and sent it to overtime.

Instead, a failed 4^th & goal effectively ended the game. Baltimore won it’s second Lombardi Trophy while handing San Francisco their first loss on the league’s biggest stage.

I am still not ready to jump on the Joe Flacco “elite” bandwagon – I’ll explain on The All-Sports Crew on Wednesday – but he had a phenomenal postseason. Despite only leading two field-goal drives in the second half, he added three touchdowns and no turnovers to his tally, bringing his postseason total to 11 touchdowns and no interceptions and earning Super Bowl MVP in the process. Not bad for four games considering his only threw 22 touchdowns in 16 regular season games.

I give a lot of credit to John Harbaugh. I’ve felt for a long time that Jim is the better head coach, but we saw some things on special teams that we never would have seen in a Super Bowl without John trying them. They failed by just two yards on a fake field goal in the first half but they ran a kick back and the way they took the safety late in the game was genius. Defense is the one thing that could keep the Ravens from getting back here soon.

The 49ers, meanwhile, will definitely be back. They have a terrific team and they aren’t likely to lose too many key players. What they may lose, they can get back through the draft, especially since they ought to get a decent pick for Alex Smith.

Thanks for reading my blog all season. I’ve enjoyed maintaining it and I will make some changes to make it even better in 2013. To stay updated on my blog as new posts are published throughout the offseason, ‘like’ my blog’s Facebook page and follow me on Twitter, @cpuffnfl.

Super Bowl XLVII: Baltimore Ravens

Super Bowl Sunday Countdown: 4 Days

In Ray Lewis's final game, the Ravens look to win their second Lombardi Trophy
and hand the 49ers their first Super Bowl loss. Photo credit to NFL Network.

It would be too easy to just copy what I wrote yesterday about the 49ers and apply it to the Ravens. It would be easy to say that this was a two-year, a three-year, a five-year process that Baltimore’s franchise has worked through to this point. After all, they went to the AFC Championship last season and they are the only team in the NFL that has made the postseason each of the past five years.

But it is for that very reason that I say it has not been a five years process. Something had to have happened to get over the hump, to take this team to that next level that has eluded them since John Harbaugh and Joe Flacco came to Baltimore.

The Ravens, in my mind, are Ray Lewis’s team without a doubt. The most faithful Ravens fans who think they know their team inside and out while say that it wasn’t just Ray who sparked this postseason run. Remember that Bernard Pollard also returned from injury in that wild-card game against the Colts.

But I still point to the teams they played during the Regular Season. Ray Lewis played in Baltimore’s first six games, in which they went 5-1. They should have gone 6-0 – yes, I’m still bitter against the replacement refs for that Week 2 game, even though I didn’t really have much interested invested in it.

The first week that Lewis did not play, the Ravens got pummeled by the Texans, 43-13. They had a bye week and then won four straight, but the only semi-impressive win was their 55-20 victory over Oakland, which was a statement made by their offense. It wasn’t an impressive display by their defense considering nobody else scored 20 against them during that winning streak.

Then they lost four of their last five. Two, and maybe three, of those games were matchups they should have won. Not having Ray Lewis made it very difficult for Baltimore to do what they needed on defense. Not only is Ray Lewis an emotional leader, he is still one of the best middle linebackers in the NFL on a physical level.

Baltimore has given up fewer than two touchdowns in five of Ray Lewis’s nine games played this season. Without Ray, they’ve achieved that feat three times in ten games, and in one of those games they still gave up five field goals.

I look forward to finding out what the Ravens look like without Ray Lewis next season. My outlook isn’t as bright as many Ravens fans’ outlooks. But one thing is for sure, with Ray Lewis in at middle linebacker, this team has a great shot at winning the Super Bowl on Sunday.

It certainly doesn’t hurt that Joe Flacco has found his mojo this postseason. Eight touchdown passes and no interceptions over three games is always a formula for success.

Tomorrow I will recap some of the things that caught my attention during Media Day – not the news of Ray Lewis possibly using Deer Antler Spray; I’ll wait for more info to come out before I address that. Stay tuned all week, as I’ll have a new post every day and my official prediction on Sunday by noon. For links to blog posts as they’re published, ‘like’ my blog’s Facebook page and follow me on Twitter, @cpuffnfl.

First Impressions: Super Bowl XLVII Matchup

Jim (49ers) & John (Ravens) will lead their teams against each other for the
second time in their careers, this time with a Lombardi Trophy on the line.
Photo credit to ESPN First Take (Facebook).

Over the next three days, I will look back at the 2012 postseason, one round at a time, as a general recap to put a close on yet another fantastic season. Today, however, I want to take the time to give my first thoughts on the upcoming Super Bowl.

The Ravens and 49ers have played four times since Baltimore got their new franchise. San Francisco won the first meeting but Baltimore has won all three since, including last season on Thanksgiving in the first matchup between the Harbaugh brothers.

Despite a pretty low score, just a 16-6 victory, Baltimore pretty clearly was the better team on both sides of the ball.

What has changed since 2011?

The 49ers are pretty similar on defense. They’re still pretty young overall, which means the extra year of experience will pay off a fair amount. On offense, the obvious change is the switch at quarterback from Alex Smith to Colin Kaepernick. His rapport with Michael Crabtree and Randy Moss, another acquisition since last season, will make the 49ers look very different against the Ravens than they did in 2011.

On the Baltimore side, Joe Flacco has been hot all postseason. 8 TDs and no interceptions speak for itself. The other quarterbacks who have had similar numbers in a given postseason have all not only won the Super Bowl but been named MVP in it. Torrey Smith is becoming a deep threat, which is important considering the Ravens only attempted one deep pass in last year’s matchup. Smith is quickly inserting himself with guys like Calvin Johnson and A.J. Green as the league’s top possession receivers.

Baltimore’s defense is pretty similar to last year’s group, and everyone has remained healthy throughout the postseason, so there will be no easy pickings for Kaepernick.

Will I have a rooting interest?

I have to. I always do for the Super Bowl. Even if I really don’t care, I always pick a team to root for, for two reasons. First, it makes the game more fun for me. During the regular season I don’t mind just watching a game for the fun of it. Even during the playoffs I can do that. But I want to get excited during the Super Bowl, not just sit there as an emotionless observer.

My other reason for having a rooting interest is for my Madden prediction game, which I’ll explain in my Super Bowl XLVII preview the morning of the game.

So which team will I be rooting for? This is one of the few Super Bowls I can remember where I really don’t care which team wins; I don’t like either but I also don’t dislike either. However, because I’m from Maryland and will have to deal with poor attitudes from Ravens fans if they lose, I will be rooting for Baltimore.

Just a note for the heck of it, keep in mind that if Baltimore wins, Pittsburgh will retain sole possession of the record for most Super Bowl victories. San Francisco would tie them with a win.

The Harbowl

From what I’ve been able to gather, John and Jim Harbaugh never faced each other as coaches before last Thanksgiving.

John started out coaching running backs and linebackers at Western Michigan in the mid-80s and then, after a couple stops elsewhere, took a job as special teams coordinator at the University of Cincinnati, holding that position for eight years. His first NFL experience was in the same position with the Philadelphia Eagles, a job he kept from 1998 until 2007 when he became the defensive secondary coach with the Eagles. He made the jump right from that position to Ravens head coach.

Jim started his coaching career earlier than you would expect. During his final eight seasons as a quarterback in the NFL, beginning when he moved from Chicago to Indianapolis, he was an unpaid assistant coach under his dad, Jack Harbaugh, at Western Kentucky University. When his playing career ended, he became the quarterbacks coach with the Oakland Raiders for two seasons before taking a head coaching position with the University of San Diego. He held that job for three years and his position as head coach at Stanford for four. 2011 was his first season as the head coach with San Francisco.

Though it felt like a lot of hype was placed on their Thanksgiving matchup last season, it was nothing compared to the hype of what could have been during the postseason. Both John and Jim led their teams to their conference championship games, only to fall to the Patriots and Giants respectively, both due to poor late-game execution.

This year, they led their teams back to the AFC and NFC Championship games, and this time they both won. A lot will be made of their matchup over the next two weeks. I wanted to get mine out of the way. So congratulations to the two brothers, and to their parents, Jack and Jackie, on a fantastic season that will end in New Orleans.

I can’t even begin to imagine what it will be like for their family in the days following the game. There is nothing to base it on. The Manning brothers have never made this matchup happen, and I can’t think of many other brothers who have had the opportunity (Tiki and Ronde Barber both play(ed) in the NFC).