Prime

The Baltimore Ravens will probably never be "America's Team," as the Dallas Cowboys came to be known in the 1970s, thanks to their frequent appearances in nationally televised games. But with the Ravens appearing in prime-time matchups three of the first four weeks of the NFL season - starting with tonight's season opener of ESPN's "Monday Night Football" - no team will have a higher national profile during the first month of NFL play. What makes that all the more remarkable is that the defending AFC North champs are a small-market franchise in a world where media market size largely determines which teams are featured in night-time, national TV games.

The return of crisp, cool autumn air beckons the past. It conjures feelings of nostalgia, a need for something warm, familiar and classic. The simple, smoky Manhattan represents this return to the season. The good Manhattan's fragrance connects to the world of Don Draper or, even further back, to Prohibition-era glamour. To me, the setting for enjoying a good Manhattan only contributes to the lore of the cocktail - and nowhere embodies the sophistication of the drink more than the Prime Rib in Mount Vernon.

Canton's Plug Ugly's Publick House picked a prime spot in O'Donnell Square. It falls in between Looney's Pub and Claddagh Pub, two well-established Irish haunts where most Baltimoreans know what to expect: cheap beer, Top 40 hits ad nauseam and hordes of young professionals. Replacing the old Helen's Garden restaurant with a shiny two-level bar would seem like a great way to make a splash. Yet every time I've visited Plug Ugly's since its March grand opening - 10 or more, at least - I've been consistently underwhelmed.

Barry Levinson and Tom Fontana, the executive producers of "Homicide: Life on the Street," return to prime time tonight on BBC America with "Copper," starring Tom Weston-Jones. (That's Weston-Jones sitting with them in the picture above, taken in California where they were promoting the series.) Set in 1864 in New York, the series is cop drama meets frontier saga, and I like it. I loved "Homicide," "Oz" and Levinson's last TV effort, "You Don't Know Jack," a docu-drama look at Dr. Jack Kevorkian, starring Al Pacino, for HBO. But I hated "The Jury," a series the duo did for Fox. They've had some failed projects since "Homicide" and "Oz," but I think "Copper" could be a winner.

Mitt Romney's campaign got its shot at introducing Paul Ryan to America Saturday morning in front of the USS Wisconsin in Norfolk, Va. But the more important introduction in terms of mainstream America came Sunday night courtesy of '60 Minutes,' which scored the first sit-down TV interview with the Republican team. I'm glad Schieffer and '60 Minutes'  were the ones the Romney campaign chose to talk to. The veteran Washington journalist and the production team from the most successful news show in the history of the medium handled the conversation as well as it could be handled.

Ravens outside linebacker Albert McClellan looped around the Atlanta Falcons' offensive line Thursday night, powerfully redirecting his charge to crash into quarterback John Parker Wilson. It was one of only two sacks for the entire defense during the Ravens' 31-17 preseason victory at the Georgia Dome, and McClellan was the lone member of the front seven to record one. With Terrell Suggs out for at least the majority of the season because of a partially torn right Achilles tendon, the emergence of McClellan on defense is well-timed.

Does it feel as if NBC and its affiliates are getting a little greedy with its London coverage? As one who has defended the network's right to try and make as much money as it can off the games in hopes of offsetting the $1.18 billion it paid for rights, I have to admit even I have been getting a little queasy as to the way  that long-held patterns of network prime-time programming and affiliate news are being bent in pursuit of extra profits....

NBC will air a one-hour look at the career of Michael Phelps at 7 tonight, the network announced late Saturday night. "Michael Phelps: America's Golden Champion" will feature what the NBC Sports is calling an "exclusive" interview by Bob Costas done with the Phelps at the end of his final day of competition Saturday. "America's greatest interviewer sitting down with the world's greatest Olympic champion makes for an inspiring piece of television," NBC Olympics executive producer Jim Bell said in a statement announcing the prime-time special.

Maybe the best way to cut through all the spin and counterspin on the Olympics is this: Last week, NBC was saying it would lose money on the Olympics. Yesterday, it said it might break even. Today, the network is saying it could turn a profit on the $1.18 billion investment. "Yeah, we think there's a small chance, a chance we could make a little bit of money over the next couple of weeks," Mark Lazarus, chairman of the NBC Sports Group, said in a conference call from London Thursday when asked if the network might turn a profit on the games.

Say this for Baltimore Gas & Electric Co., they have a curious sense of timing. Six years ago, they sought a 72 percent rate increase at the same time that their parent company was seeking approval for a merger - and in the middle of a gubernatorial election. That didn't go so well. Now the company is seeking a rate increase - albeit a much more modest one - just after hundreds of thousands of its customers were without power, some of them for more than a week, raising the ire of residents and politicians alike.