CHARLOTTE, N.C. - Nineteen months after hoisting the Super Bowl trophy, it's time to pick up the pieces.
Having seen their championship team leveled by the salary-cap wrecking ball, the Ravens kick off the season and their monumental rebuilding project today against the Carolina Panthers, a team that set an NFL record for bottoming out.
For the Ravens, this new era starts with different faces and different expectations.
It's the first chance for 12 new starters to form an identity. It's the best chance for the remaining 10 Super Bowl starters to lay down a new foundation.
The Ravens march into Ericsson Stadium with a sense of urgency, knowing the consequences of falling to a Carolina team that hasn't won a regular-season game in 364 days.
"This is a game that we need to win if we want to consider ourselves in the running for anything this year," left tackle Jonathan Ogden said. "You don't want to put that much pressure on the first game of the year, but if you win the first game of the year, that's a huge step. We need to do that."
Most of the Ravens believe that first step will turn into a cakewalk over the Panthers, the first NFL team to lose its last 15 games in a season.
They joke about Carolina's 36-year-old quarterback, Rodney Peete, being over the hill. They roll their eyes when watching film of Carolina running back Lamar Smith. And they don't think the Panthers can do anything to stop running back Jamal Lewis.
"There's nothing changed about our team," inside linebacker Ray Lewis said. "Yeah, we lost some guys, but we're always going to carry the attitude and the swagger."
Lewis is trying to continue the tradition of the defense setting the tone. Despite the change to the 3-4 scheme and six defenders starting their first NFL game, the Ravens intend on holding their season-opening opponent without a touchdown for a third straight year, and they don't feel Peete will be able to break that streak.
The Panthers abruptly named Peete their starter just six days before the season opener. Peete hasn't thrown a pass in a regular-season game since 1999 and hasn't started a season opener since President Clinton's first year in office (1993).
"I don't think I have ever faced Rodney Peete," Lewis said. "I was probably too young when Rodney Peete was playing. Rodney Peete, in my opinion, is on the downside of things."
That line of thinking extends to Smith. In last year's playoff win at Miami, the Ravens limited Smith to 6 yards on six carries.
