Sunday Night Football: Steelers vs. Ravens

Pittsburgh had 7 turnovers, the Ravens ran for 170 rushing yards, and Joe Flacco threw 3 touchdown passes and averaged over 7 yards a pass as Baltimore won 35-7.

Hit the skip ahead button, and now Pittsburgh is coming off its best performance of the year in controlling the game against New England, and Baltimore limps in after a disastrous loss to Jacksonville and a nearly titanic disaster at home against Arizona.

Does it matter that Baltimore handled Pittsburgh in the opener? Probably not.

Since 1990, when two division opponents who both eventually finish with a winning record had a 24+ point blowout in the first game, the team that was blown out won the rematch 15 of 22 times. They were 10-3 in avenging the earlier loss when the second game came at home, and still 5-4 when they had to go on the road after previously getting destroyed at home. This is cheating a little, because we assume that Pittsburgh and Baltimore both finish with winning records independent of these two games, and I suppose there may have been some cases where a team finished 8-8 because they did not get “revenge” in the second game.

That said, who knows what to expect. Momentum is the next day’s starting pitcher, and in a sport without them, the closest thing is the quarterback and offense swinging wildly. Baltimore has looked really bad until they rebounded for a big comeback against Arizona. They can play better. We just never know what we are going to get.

In this series though, it’s usually a slobber knocker. The last game was likely the aberration.

[photo via Getty]