[News] Late For Work 12/21: Eric Weddle's Perfect Reaction To Pro Bowl Robbery

[BR News]

To guarantee playoff spot, Ravens need to accomplish something they haven’t done since September. Careful with vetoing power. Joe Flacco nearing 4,000-yard mark. Top-10 Steelers that Ravens fans love to hate.

View the full article

[Bat-mite]

I would have put Harrison at #3.

[kmspears65]

Eric's response is perfect - shows what kind of player he truly is. Focus on the next game and onto the championship !!

[whobilly]

Why talk about an exhibition fiasco. The "REAL" game is coming up this Sunday.

[budman]

I would have put Lamar Woodley on the list before Jeff Reed. Who remembers that Woodley was asked if the Ravens could win a Super Bowl with Flacco and he answered "Not in my lifetime! Then Flacco and the Ravens went out and DID IT!. Priceless.

[potomacpitbulls]

Given how anemic this offense has been vertically, and all the check down plays for no gain. It is perplexing to me that Joe could finally reach 4,000 yards for the first time in his 9 year career. This conundrum does explain why Juice made the Pro Bowl. He has been on the business end off most of those check downs.

[btfan2]

Steelers HATE list for me:
#1 Tiny Ben, just because he is a whiner and always hurt (wink, wink)
#2 Hines Ward, because he's a jerk and a dirty player

The rest of the Steelers are just guys playing a game. Not wishing Tomlin was my new BFF, who is?

[Raven1995]

Harbaugh hasn't even used the Veto Power yet and they want him to stop? He needs to get in Marty's ear and tell him to run at certain moments. Early in the game to keep the play action in use, and late in the game to milk the clock. Kubiak was great at that with Forsett.

[dirtybird66]

i thought HARBAUGH would of learned that lesson when trestman blew the game by not running the ball against the SKINS,could of been talking about another loss to a nfc east team.

[Ravensfansince03]

Guys I hate (from the bitter rivarly)
Hines Ward
Mike Tomlin
Ike Taylor
Joey Porter (who is a complete doosh bag)
James harrison

[dirtybird66]

FLACCOS 4000 yard season means nothing when you look at his td/interception ratio,plus his horrible turnover ratio.

[dirtybird66]

when ZORN was here FLACCO also had his best season,then abrupty fired by HARBAUGH.

[Ravensfansince03]

Oddly, I never hated Big Ben. Over the long years, he has always been a class act player when playing against us. Unlike Tom Brady who yells at referees to throw a flag at us. Big Ben had his nose broken against us, and never cried about it. Just kept playing.

[dirtybird66]

if harbaugh doesn't start vetoing offensive calls,it could cost him his job.

[dirtybird66]

either the ravens get hot and win out or they don't,if they do they belong there if they don't,then they don't.

[fusuymada]

We have to find a way to sign Brandon Williams. Certainly not like Ngata who was up in years and missing more and more games each year. Williams is in his prime and is a key part to that brick wall that is the Ravens front 7.

Alot more can be said but I think it would detract from what I think is the most important, get Williams back. We have Wagner and a few others up for resigning but none more important that B Will.

[ravenwildman]

Ward is No. 1 without a doubt, but I would put Rothlisberger at 2, then Troy P. at 3. The rest would follow pretty much in the order they are. Pomalu Was a frustratingly great player that caused great anger, but generally he was a classy competitor in my opinion. GO RAVENS! CB 25

[eze17]

Yeah, Hines Ward is easily the worst Squeeler...Porter should be second. He was a dirty player who would intentionally try to hurt our players. Polamalu beat us a lot, but I had some respect for him because he just played hard against us. Ward and Porter were simply nasty dudes who hated the Ravens. No respect or love for either of them.

[ravenwildman]

BTW Weddle's snub is typical for Ravens, seems that an effort is made to dis the deserving players every year. Until some "old haters" are gone, this will unfortunately be par for the course.

[Bat-mite]

No offense to Mosley, but I think he got in due to his overall notoriety from his phenomenal rookie season.  ProBowl is a popularity contest, and most fans don't sit and look at the stats before casting votes.

[ryananth]

Ward, Mitchell and Porter are the only guys I hate because I have no respect for them or the way they play(ed). Guys like Clark, Harrison, Polamalu, Tomlin and Big Ben are guys you just despise because they cause us problems but I do have a lot of respect for them (and even secretly wish they'd been Ravens)

[ryananth]

Weddle wouldn't be able to go to the Pro Bowl anyway since he'll be playing in the Super Bowl

[rossihunter2]

after hines ward, troy palomalu and james harrison i dont really care

i hate how big ben whines too much about injuries but i respect that he still plays anyway (even if he exaggerates them a bit) and doesnt really make complaints on the field - i remember the courtney upshaw hit that got flagged and ben was as surprised as everyone else

[DaRupp]

Oddly, I never hated Big Ben. Over the long years, he has always been a class act player when playing against us. Unlike Tom Brady who yells at referees to throw a flag at us. Big Ben had his nose broken against us, and never cried about it. Just kept playing.

that's a main source of the different relationships with the pats and steelers.

I view the steelers as a brother that you don't get along with. You fight them ruthlessly, get insanely mad and want to hurt them, but when it's all said and done, you check if they're ok.

With the pats, they're that kid up the street that abuses animals. You just want to hurt them.

[rmcjacket23]

We have to find a way to sign Brandon Williams. Certainly not like Ngata who was up in years and missing more and more games each year. Williams is in his prime and is a key part to that brick wall that is the Ravens front 7.

Alot more can be said but I think it would detract from what I think is the most important, get Williams back. We have Wagner and a few others up for resigning but none more important that B Will.

Will obviously depend on price tag. There's only so much you can spend on a defensive player who's only playing about half of the defensive snaps and doesn't rush the passer...

[bioLarzen]

Actually, I'm always quite baffled at how a lot of people take the Pro Bowl so seriously. Where the "best" players are supposed to be honoured in a sport that has tons of exact and correct stats to measure performance - and the "best ones" are still determined by voting... It's like determining the talles guy from a given set by, instead of comparing their actual heights, having others vote about who's the tallest...
IMHO it's rather hard to take it any kind of seriously...

[bioLarzen]

Oddly, I never hated Big Ben. Over the long years, he has always been a class act player when playing against us. Unlike Tom Brady who yells at referees to throw a flag at us. Big Ben had his nose broken against us, and never cried about it. Just kept playing.

I don't think that's so odd. In fact, I've never hated him either. Sure, it's always good to see him on his back, and that time his cleats' sole saw the sun courtesy of Bart Scott is always heart-warming to watch... but that's not hatred, that's rivalry.
And it's a classic rivalry, that may seem to be full of hatred on the surface and at the fan-base level, but has always been really based on a tremendous amount of mutual respect. Like any real rivalry.

[bioLarzen]

if harbaugh doesn't start vetoing offensive calls,it could cost him his job.

On the other hand, if he starts vetiong the OC's calls, not many really good OC's will be willing to come to Baltimore...

You see, there's always a tradeoff...

[RavensBaltimore]

FLACCOS 4000 yard season means nothing when you look at his td/interception ratio,plus his horrible turnover ratio.

In the second half of the season(since week 9), Flacco has 13 TDs and 6 ints, and he's completing nearly 70% of his passes. His bad stats came from the first half, when all the skill players were coming back from injury and the line was decimated by injuries, giving him absolutely no pass protection.

[huntrgathrr]

The Ravens 5-1 record against the Steelers over the last 3 years emphasizes a very important point. This is a TEAM game.
The Steelers have 3 great players..Ben, Brown and Bell. They are arguably the best in the league at their positions. But the Steelers have less than average offensive and defensive lineman. The Ravens have routinely turned these superstars into less than average players because they dominate the line of scrimmage on both sides of the ball.
Closer inspection shows that all the hype about the Steelers is unwarranted....they have only won ONE playoff game in the last 5 years. Without Ben, Brown is barely an average receiver. They need everything to go right for their stars to shine. They have trouble with hard nose teams that can physically dominate them...i.e. the Ravens. Good examples this year were the Dolphins and the Eagles, both of which the Ravens beat because they were physically able to match up.
Unless the game is fixed, the Ravens will put a physical beating on the Steelers which should result in an easy win.