Just Call It Camp Perfect for Defending Champs

The television series starring the Ravens is on the wrong cable channel. It belongs on the Disney Channel more than HBO.

No, the language and subject matter isn’t Mickey’s, but otherwise, the Ravens’ training camp resembles one of those Disney perfect-world theme parks. No one has any problems. Everyone is happy.

It’s Camp Perfect.

“I don’t want to talk about it, don’t want to jinx it,” team president David Modell said Thursday when it was suggested all was almost frighteningly right in the Ravens’ world.

If HBO was looking for a good dose of the angst, edge and controversy so prevalent in today’s NFL, it picked the wrong camp.

There are no players holding out in Westminster.

No agents screeching in the paper.

No players whining about the unfairness of having to fight for a job.

No off-field distractions such as, say, a protracted legal “situation” involving a key player.

“The vast majority of the team is happy,” veteran safety Rod Woodson said after Thursday’s morning practice. “We’ve got the whole team in camp, just a few new guys to work in, and the inner core of the family is intact (open bracket)from a year ago(close bracket) and satisfied with what’s going on right now. That doesn’t happen too often.”

Significant injuries or positive drug tests? None yet.

Major holes to fill? Not with 19 of 22 starters back from a team that won the Super Bowl by four touchdowns.

The much-debated transition from Trent Dilfer to Elvis Grbac at quarterback? The early returns are extremely positive.

It’s a camp of players with Super Bowl rings on their fingers and utter confidence in their abilities, a camp without any obvious, looming issues to mine for headlines.

Camp Perfect, where the sky is always blue.

“Honestly, I’m not going to talk about it,” Modell said with a smile. “Everyone in this business has something to worry about, and even if there’s nothing, I worry anyway.”

That’s wise. This is the NFL, the world’s most outlandish sporting circus. Every team runs an unending gantlet of headaches every year, some crazier than others, some that don’t even make the papers. No team can avoid them, at least not for too long.

But at this point, the Ravens can get along just fine, thank you, without filling a prescription for headache medicine.

Backup defensive back James Trapp has an injured shoulder. Cornerback Chris McAlister will have to deal with getting arrested at an airport after arguing with a flight attendant in June. That’s about it.

That’s peanuts compared with prior years, when a camera crew at the Ravens’ camp could have given the world a glimpse of holdout crises involving Duane Starks and Peter Boulware, two-a-day miseries under former Coach Ted Marchibroda’s old-school regime and of course, the many and varied trials of Bam Morris, the Human Headache himself.

Sigh, those were the days when the Ravens’ camp was what it’s supposed to be--a gritty, snarling festival of bad moods.

This year, well, can a team peak in August?

You really have to try hard to find anyone at Western Maryland College with anything to complain about.

The players? They’re thrilled about Coach Brian Billick’s idea of spending less than a month dealing with this drudgery--”easily the shortest camp any of us have ever been through,” said Woodson, a 15-year veteran.

Remembering the six-week abyss he endured under Chuck Noll with the Steelers in the ‘80s, Woodson refers to Billick’s camp as “Club Med.”

Ravens management has nothing to complain about, either, not with all players safely in camp and the franchise’s esteem at an all-time high in the wake of the Super Bowl triumph.

“There hasn’t been much contract stuff,” Woodson said. “Ozzie (Newsome) and all the front-office personnel, including Brian, have done an outstanding job of getting people in here. It makes a difference. You’ll see us start to jell earlier.”

Even the fans driving to Carroll County to attend the workouts are plainly and profoundly happy. The crowds have doubled in size from past years, at the very least, and to say the people are more into it is an understatement. Big hits and big plays now draw roars, and the wails of post-practice autograph hunters have reached new pitches.

You can all but hear the fans saying, well, it’s good to be king.

Nothing in the NFL stays the same for long, of course. The Ravens’ abrupt transformation from losers to winners is an example of that. That’s why no one is getting too excited about Camp Perfect. It’s early. Something is bound to happen. An injury. Some whining. An agent butting in. A loss.

But given the Ravens’ current run of good news and good fortune, hey, it’s possible nothing will happen.

“If you talk about it, you’re putting the malarkey on your head and asking for trouble,” Modell said, putting an index finger to his lips and asking for silence.

The normally voluble son of Ravens Owner Art Modell is feeling superstitious on the matter of Camp Perfect.

“Art will be amazed,” David said, “but I’m speechless.”