Next Man Up

by John Feinstein

  Billick had opted not to discipline Travis Taylor for taking off in Pittsburgh without talking to any of the coaches. Taylor had let security director Darren Sanders know he was leaving and he had been told he was going to be inactive. But on a team where the inactive list had changed almost every Sunday just prior to its being submitted, he had put the team at risk by leaving. Billick had decided Taylor had been through enough. He was scheduled to be inactive again against the Dolphins. There was no doubt Sunday would be his last day as a Raven.

  The morning was sunny and cold, though certainly not nearly as cold as one might have expected on the second day of the New Year. When Billick crossed the Hamburg Street bridge, the cheers that usually went up as the tailgaters spotted him were noticeably absent. “They’re all just cold, Coach,” Vernon Holley said.

  Billick laughed. “Hey, at least they’re not booing,” he said. “I’m grateful for that.”

  The locker room was almost lively, the inactive players mingling with the active ones, a lot more conversation going on than normal. “It feels like the last day of summer camp,” Jedd Fisch said. “Maybe loose will be good.”

  Long before most of the team arrived, Anthony Weaver, the defensive end from Notre Dame whose looks, sense of humor, and vocabulary had already landed him a TV job in town even though he still had many years to play, sat on the bench looking around at the empty stadium.

  “I just can’t believe this is almost surely our last game,” he said. “I’ve thought about it and thought about it and I still can’t fathom it. It just wasn’t supposed to be this way.” He paused, staring at the field for a moment. “Something happened in that Cincinnati game. We lost our aura of invincibility in that fourth quarter. We came back and played well in Indy, but it wasn’t the same. We didn’t have our swagger, and other teams saw us as vulnerable. We’ll have to get that back next year.” He laughed. “Listen to me talking about next year, with a game to play. I sound like a fan or something.”

  Or a broadcaster.

  Mike Nolan didn’t think the invincibility had been completely stripped by the disastrous fourth quarter against the Bengals. “We played as well as we can play the first half against the Colts,” he said. “Being down 6-3 after the way we played at halftime really hurt. I think our guys lost something right there. Then Chris made the mistake on the play-action pass to Harrison. After that, it was over. We were hurt and tired and discouraged going into Pittsburgh.”

  Jim Fassel arrived in the locker room, armed, as was almost always the case these days, with a job rumor: “Cleveland’s going to hire their general manager today or tomorrow,” he said. “I think it may be [former Saints GM] Randy Mueller.”

  Billick was surprised. “That would leave Phil [Savage] out.” He had heard from Newsome that Savage was the Browns’ number one choice. Fassel was still hoping a head coaching job would open up for him, but it was looking more and more like a year with limited opportunities. The Dolphins had already hired Nick Saban as their next coach. (Interim head coach Jim Bates and his staff were all actively looking for jobs.) The Browns job was open, and rumor had it that San Francisco, Seattle, and New Orleans could open. Fassel’s ear was to the ground at all times.

  Zauner came in to tell Billick that Bart Scott’s knee was still hurting and the doctors had recommended he not play. “Someone go tell Travis [Taylor] that he’s up,” Billick said.

  There was one problem: Taylor wasn’t in the locker room. Chad Steele, the public relations manager, found him eventually—upstairs in a box, planning to watch the game from there. He hustled downstairs and into uniform. He never set foot on the field. It was a sad ending to his career as a Raven.

  The tone for the day may have been best summed up when the officials walked in for their 11:30 meeting with Billick. All season long, the officials had shown up in their stripes, ready to go to work. On this day, they were still in their street clothes.

  Billick knew the intensity wasn’t where he wanted it after warm-ups were over. “If I see anybody out there not playing with passion for the day and passion for the game, you’re coming out, I promise you that,” he said. “Celebrate being football players. Live for the day, for three more hours of joy.”

  Walking out of the locker room, Deion Sanders turned to Ray Lewis: “I don’t know about you,” he said. “But I have a feeling something’s going to happen before this is over.”

  Lewis shook his head as if in disbelief. “That makes seven,” he said. “Seven confirmations that I’m right. We’re gonna play next week.”

  They started out as if they had forgotten the need to play this week. The Dolphins were down to Sage Rosenfels, their third-stringer, at quarterback. It was the first start of Rosenfels’s career. On the first play of his first start, Rosenfels dropped back on a play-action fake, completely suckered Gary Baxter, and hit wide receiver Chris Chambers in stride going down the left sideline. The play was good for 76 yards and a touchdown, sixteen seconds into the game.

  There were surprisingly few no-shows in the stands, given the circumstances. Most of the fans had just taken their seats when Chambers crossed the goal line. Many left those seats quickly to let the Ravens know how they felt about that play—and, no doubt, about the season.

  The lightning-fast touchdown may have been a break for the Ravens because it seemed to wake everyone from their malaise. The offense quickly responded with a 64-yard drive that culminated on a shuffle pass from Boller to Terry Jones. Then the defense began to dig in. Billick had said several times that there was no reason for the Miami offense to gain “a single f —— yard.” That goal wasn’t going to be met, but the defense did begin to dominate. After a Stover field goal made it 10-7 early in the second quarter, Rosenfels dropped on a third-and-14 from his own 16 and tried, under pressure, to swing a short pass to running back Travis Minor. Jarret Johnson, in the game as part of the nickel package, made a spectacular play, leaping high to deflect the pass into the air. He then caught it, spun away from Rosenfels and Minor, and dove into the end zone for a touchdown. It might have been the most amazing play made by a Raven defensive player all season and it made the score 17-7. A late Stover field goal pushed the margin to 20-7 at halftime.

  Throughout the first half, almost no one in the stadium knew what was happening in Buffalo, where the Bills were hosting the Steelers. A Buffalo victory would eliminate the Ravens. So would a Denver or Jacksonville victory, but those games didn’t start until four o’clock. Billick had decided before the game that he didn’t want anyone—players, coaches, or fans—focusing at all on what was happening in Buffalo. What the Bills did or did not do was irrelevant unless the Ravens won. He didn’t want cheers or groans going up during plays or in between plays, and he didn’t want the players studying the scoreboard for updates, instead of concentrating on the field.

  So he told Kevin Byrne to keep the Buffalo-Pittsburgh score off the crawl that normally ran throughout the game at the bottom of the video boards at each end of the field. This created a problem for a good long while because it appeared that the only way to keep updates of the Buffalo-Pittsburgh game off the crawl was not to put anything up. Thus, midway through the second quarter, it appeared that none of the other one o’clock games had started. By halftime, the video staff had figured out a way to scroll the other scores without Buffalo-Pittsburgh. On the sideline, several people had BlackBerry handheld computers or cell phones that allowed them to get updated scores. When Billick wasn’t looking, players would sidle over to those with the BlackBerrys and ask the score. Which meant that virtually everyone on the sideline knew the score as the game moved along.

  Billick had predicted earlier in the week that, even in a meaningless game for the Steelers, Bill Cowher would not roll over for a team coached by Mike Mularkey, his onetime defensive coordinator. He was proven right. After trailing early, the Steelers had come back to take command of the game. Still, there was plenty of work to be done—in Baltimore and elsewhere.

  Midway thr
ough the third quarter, the defense set up another touchdown. Ed Reed made his league-leading eighth interception of the season and almost produced his third touchdown, picking the ball off at the Miami 43 and weaving through traffic before finally being tripped up on the 2-yard line. Jamal Lewis scored on the next play and it was 27-7. But before everyone could start to relax, the special teams fell asleep at the wheel and Wes Welker took the ensuing kickoff back 95 yards to cut the margin to 27-14. All of a sudden, the Dolphins had life when they should have been thinking about the flight home. The offense did nothing, and the Dolphins promptly marched 90 yards for a touchdown that cut the lead to 27-21 with more than a quarter still left.

  Clearly, the aura of invincibility wasn’t what it had once been, especially with Lewis and Sanders in the role of cheerleaders.

  The offense came back to produce a field goal as the third quarter ended to make the margin two scores again, at 30-21. The Dolphins, suddenly full of confidence, quickly moved right back down the field to the Ravens’ 1-yard line. But on third down, Weaver picked off a Rosenfels pass in the flat, preventing the Dolphins from even getting a field goal that would have cut the margin to less than a touchdown.

  A moment later came a play that was, in many ways, symbolic of the Ravens’ season. A year earlier, backed up on their 3-yard line, there would have been little doubt about what was going to happen next. The quarterback—Boller or Anthony Wright—would have handed the ball to Jamal Lewis, the offensive line would have opened holes, and Lewis would have rammed the Ravens out of trouble. Now, though, the offensive line was a shadow of its former self and Lewis had heard the PA announcer congratulate him in the third quarter for going over 1,000 yards for the season—meaning he was exactly 1,000 yards shy of where he had been a year earlier. On first down, Boller handed the ball to Lewis, who tried to follow Jonathan Ogden and Rabach through a small hole on the left side. Fighting to pick up an extra yard or two, Lewis fumbled. The ball went flying backward toward the end zone, and a mad scramble ensued. If the Dolphins recovered for a touchdown, the lead would be down to 30-28 with more than ten minutes left and visions of the Cincinnati game would be dancing in everyone’s head.

  It seemed as if everyone in uniform was in the pile fighting for the ball. When the officials finally pulled everyone up from the ground, Kyle Boller was lying on top of it. He had dove backward the instant he saw Lewis lose control and had somehow beaten everyone to the ball and then hung on to it for dear life. It may have been Boller’s most heroic play of the season. He had bailed out Lewis, he had bailed out the defense, he had bailed out his team when it was on the verge of a collapse against a 4-11 opponent that would have been humiliating—regardless of any playoff implications.

  Instead of a touchdown, the Dolphins settled for a safety and the lead was 30-23. The defense found a second wind after that, not allowing the Dolphins inside the 40-yard line again. The offense took over with 3:29 left and, even with the Dolphins using their time-outs, managed to hold the ball until there were just forty-two seconds left. The Dolphins took possession for the final time on their own 28 with no time-outs left. On the last play of the season, Rosenfels completed a short pass to Bryan Gilmore, who lateraled to Chambers, trying to keep the ball alive. Chambers managed to get across the 40, but Chris McAlister came up to bring him down at the 44 before he could try to lateral again.

  It was over: 30-23. It hadn’t been easy and it hadn’t exactly been the three hours of joy Billick had talked about—more like three hours and ten minutes in the dentist’s chair without Novocain. But they had done their job for the day. With two minutes left in the game, Kevin Byrne had made the decision to let everyone know that the Steelers were about to beat the Bills, 29-24. That had elicited a cheer from the stands but little reaction on the sideline: most of the players already knew the score from the BlackBerry brigade.

  Billick gathered them, full of life again, in the locker room one more time: “Two down, two to go,” he said, referencing the Ravens’ victory and the Bills’ defeat, with the Broncos and Jaguars still to play. That drew a cheer. “Having fun yet?” he added.

  “We’ll meet at one o’clock tomorrow, regardless of what happens the next few hours. We’ll either start to get ready for Indy [the Colts would be the opponent if the Ravens survived] or we’ll deal with exit physicals and everything else that will need to be taken care of. For now, go home, turn on the TV, enjoy what you accomplished today, and dog-cuss those other teams.”

  Billick repeated that line a few minutes later to the media, saying he was going to pick up some Chinese food on the way home and spend a couple of hours being the biggest fan the Colts and Oakland Raiders had ever had. He had a big smile on his face when he walked back into his office. When he glanced up at the TV screen, the smile disappeared. The Broncos-Colts game was on and the first thing Billick saw was Jim Sorgi standing behind center for the Colts. Tony Dungy had talked about resting Peyton Manning in the game, which meant nothing to his team, but Billick had hoped he would play at least a half. The game was still in the first quarter and Sorgi was playing quarterback.

  Billick sank into his chair, the smile gone.

  “We’re done,” he said quietly.

  Maybe Sorgi could produce enough points to win the game on a bad weather day in Denver?

  “Nope,” Billick said. “Mike [Shanahan] is not losing at home to Jim Sorgi with a playoff bid at stake.”

  Billick knew what he was talking about. The Broncos took control of the game in the second quarter and never looked back. Billick didn’t even bother dog-cussing very much. It wasn’t worth the effort. At 7:21 P.M. it became official: Broncos 33, Colts 14.

  The Ravens were the last team officially eliminated from the playoffs. Twelve would move on. Twenty would begin thinking about next season on the next morning.

  None of those twenty was more crushed than the Ravens. Their season was over. That was the last—and the most painful—brutal fact.

  Epilogue

  THINGS HAPPEN VERY FAST at the end of a football season, whether a team has just won the Super Bowl or has won the right to pick first in the draft. The Ravens had finished tied for tenth place overall in a thirty-two-team league, hardly a humiliating performance, especially given their injuries and their schedule, but none of that really mattered. Change would come swiftly.

  “Injuries are a fact of life in football,” Brian Billick said. “You can’t use them as an excuse.”

  Billick made no excuses in his wrap-up press conference the day after the season ended. He readily called the season a disappointment without ifs, ands, or buts. They had started out with lofty goals, perhaps, in retrospect, goals that were a bit too lofty. Regardless, they had fallen well short. Now, he said, they would begin the self-examination that he hoped would lead to meeting some of those goals next season.

  In truth, the self-examination had been under way for a month. By the time Billick met with the media on that Monday, Matt Cavanaugh was already cleaning out his office. There had been one glitch that morning when Billick and Cavanaugh sat down to talk. Billick didn’t want to fire Cavanaugh because he didn’t like the way it sounded, especially since he considered Cavanaugh a friend. Cavanaugh didn’t want to resign. There was still enough of Youngstown in him that he didn’t want anyone to think he had quit anything. They had finally agreed to “mutually agree” that Cavanaugh would leave. That done, they talked for another thirty minutes about both the past and the future. Billick was in an emotional mood when he met with his coaches soon after he finished talking to Cavanaugh.

  He wasn’t finished making changes. He had decided during the self-examination that the team needed a new offensive line coach. Like Cavanaugh, Jim Colletto had been with Billick since the beginning in Baltimore. There was no doubting his understanding of the game in general or offensive line play in particular. His players, who affectionately called him Crazy Jim because of his penchant for outbursts in the meeting room, liked him. But Billick believed tha
t not getting any consideration for a coordinator job had soured Colletto. He had been a big-time college head coach (at Purdue) and now, at sixty, he understood that he wasn’t likely to get a call when coordinator jobs opened. He talked about it often—too often, in Billick’s mind. He knew that Chris Foerster, who had been the Dolphins’ offensive coordinator, was looking for work. To him, that represented an opportunity: Foerster was younger, had coordinated, and would be a fresh voice for a line that would be rebuilt for 2005.

  Cavanaugh knew what was coming. Billick had hoped Colletto might be offered a job someplace else, so he held off for a week before telling him he was making a change. Like all coaches, Colletto understood the nature of his profession. Even so, as he cleaned out his office, he said to a number of people: “Somedays this business isn’t very fair.”

  No one would argue.

  The first two weeks of the off-season were a whirlwind at 1 Winning Drive. Fassel’s rumor about the Browns job had been wrong. Phil Savage interviewed with them on Monday, and on Thursday he was introduced as the new general manager. Everyone associated with the team was thrilled for him and believed the time had come for him to run his own ship. Ozzie Newsome and Savage had been together for fourteen years, and there was no doubt that life would be different without Savage walking the halls with his easy smile, his remarkable store of knowledge, and his soft Alabama accent. But front offices in football are like the teams themselves. Eric DeCosta and George Kokinis would each take over some of Savage’s responsibilities. The Ravens would move on. Next Man Up applied to scouts, too.