Take what you learned about the Ravens most of this season and write it down. Then crumple up the paper and throw it away.

The Raven’s that will show up tomorrow, the Ravens that have had two long weeks to prepare, the Ravens that pulled off some real voo-doo-it-do-do by vanquishing the Patriots with 30 minutes of sleek, 21st century-style football, will play a game so perfectly designed that if it were a song, even Beyonce’ couldn’t get away with lip-syncing it.

Phew! That’s some rosy-smelling stank for a 10-6 team that hung on a prayer to make the playoffs, and then had to suck it up for a slugfest in Indy, and then had to squeeze out a last minute win in Denver in double overtime.

The Ravens may have struggled all season to figure out what their identity is, but I think they found a prototype to stick to against the Patriots. Give Flacco the ball and let him throw outside the numbers for the big gain, let Ray Rice bounce around like a bowling ball for the short stuff and have the linebackers be the brains of the defense, and Baltimore will walk away from the Superdome with the Lombardi hoisted high.

That last ingredient to the recipe will be especially necessary to stop Colin Kaepernick and the 49er’s zone read offense. But never mind that it took nearly 74 quarters to put it all together, Baltimore knows what it needs to do to pull off the victory over the four-point favorites.

And Perhaps the beauty of it all is that it took more than a season’s worth of research to publish the Ravens’ almost complete thesis, and that along the way there were a number of failed experiments. The Raven’s had Ray Lewis then lost Ray Lewis then got Mr. Everything back again. Terrell Suggs was never there, until he was. They threw out the offensive coordinator and rebooted, and they loosened the reins on Flacco’s trigger finger.

My friend, Denise, points to San Francisco’s big, mid-season change from Alex Smith to Colin Kaepernick at quarterback as one of the catalysts for the 49ers subsequent beast-mode season. But just look at the Ravens’ year and you know they have had their fair share of learn-on-the-fly moments. John Harbaugh had to make a sweeping change to his team as well by selecting Jim Caldwell to replace Cam Cameron as the team’s play-caller…in December. But, as Ray Rice pointed out, it has been a good thing, if not even great.

“One of the things he’s doing is utilizing the weapons we have,” Rice said about Caldwell in a Superbowl Media Day interview. “We have the talent, but we sometimes had a hard time trying to get everybody the ball. Right now, everyone’s touching it, and we’re happy.

They must be. I mean the Ravens are making plays all over the field. Even Anquan Boldin is having a youthful post season. He’s got nearly 300 yards through three games, and in a year where he only caught four touchdown passes in the regular season, the Bold and the Beautiful has three end zone trips already this postseason.

Baltimore also has the advantage here in part because of how high it’s riding coming into this showdown in New Orleans, but it also has the upper hand because it is playing football at an unconscious level as of late and it starts with Joe Flacco. Over the course of the first seven games, Flacco averaged a yawn-inducing passer rating of 86.2. He grew to throw nearly a 93 rating over the next twelve games which would put him among the league’s top ten, and in the playoffs he is tossing a league-best 114.7.

And whether its deer-antler spray or mutant super-powers or that Ray Lewis found and got drunk in the Fountain of Youth he is a tackling machine again. He is like that annoying alarm clock that whips around on the floor, blaring at the top of its lungs until you shut it up. (I mean that in the best way possible?) At 37 he leads his team tackles in the postseason and that tenacity will be key in stopping Kaepernick from slipping through the cracks and busting a big zone run.

(Side note: How long until the Ray Lewis movie comes out? Looks like this would work as a trailer….or at least material for an stone etching to memorialize outside M&T Bank Stadium. You hear that, Tebow? Let’s see you trademark that!)



If recognizing that the Ravens aren’t meticulously built for this moment is all too hard a pill to swallow, then here is a pinch of obscure/coincidental stats to back it up.

John Harbaugh is 11-0 when having 2 weeks+ to prepare for a game, outscoring opponents 301-131. (Thanks to Reddit user thejm0 for that one).

Baltimore has never lost in the Superdome (1-0. Steve McNair was quarterback and Billy Cundiff knocked in three field goals)

Look, I’m not saying the Ravens are just going to blow the 49ers out of the water. In fact, in every way, the Niners present the perfect challenge to Baltimore because they are just as complete a foe on both sides of the ball. I am saying the Ravens have it all figured out. I am saying that it’s going to be a tight one, and in the end Flacco will out duel Kaepernick, the Ravens will shut down the zone read enough to make the 49ers look frustrated and send Jim Harbaugh into an ants-in-his-pants tantrum on the sideline.

The elder Harbaugh will win this annual epic. You can write that down and save it…

Or maybe just wait to write down whatever Ray Lewis unintelligibly cries at the end and make your own epic Youtube video with highlights and his speech and Hans Zimmer all mashed together….kids these days.