Ravens have a nice rebound

As Miami Dolphins fans know, the path to recovery in the parity-loving NFL can be amazingly brisk, but still, really now, Baltimore?

The Ravens didn’t go 1-15 last year as did the Dolphins (who are 8-5), but they did go 5-11, got their Super Bowl-winning long-time coach fired, saw the quarterback’s shoulder tear before this season started and began the season with a rookie coach (John Harbaugh) on the sideline and a rookie quarterback from Delaware familiar only to savants (Joe Flacco) on the field.

No less an authority than Boomer Esiason proclaimed Baltimore’s season a “disaster” before it even started, but Sunday, Pittsburgh travels to Baltimore with the forecast calling for a fracas.

The Steelers stand 10-3, the Ravens stand 9-4 and the NFL stands as the land in which crazy daydreams after a 5-11 season just aren’t all that crazy.

Also Sunday, Dallas (8-5) tries to avoid another December fade against the visiting New York Giants (11-2), and the mighty NFC South roars with Tampa Bay (9-4) at Atlanta (8-5), Carolina (10-3) welcoming Denver (8-5) and, on Thursday night, New Orleans (7-6) trying to stay afloat against a fellow water-treader in Chicago (7-6).

Still, nothing will crash any louder than Pittsburgh and Baltimore, with the Steelers’ defense having intercepted Dallas on Sunday and the Ravens’ defense coming off a streak where it didn’t let anybody score a touchdown for 46 possessions.

That ended when they finally let the chronic disappointment known as the Washington Redskins into the end zone late Sunday night, the mighty drive having covered . . . 30 yards.

The defense compensated for this unpardonable sin in a 24-10 win with two interceptions and a fumble return for a touchdown from one of the more remarkable football players living or deceased, safety Ed Reed.

Seven years, 39 interceptions, five for touchdowns (including returns of 108 and 106 yards), plus three other touchdowns (punt return, returned fumbles), and they’re putting “Reed” into the same sentence as “MVP” in Baltimore.

Defensive lineman Trevor Pryce called Reed “one of the most spectacular players in the NFL.”

Receiver Derrick Mason said: “I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone in the last 10 years, since I’ve been in the league, that plays the position the way Ed plays it. The guy roams the field like a hawk. . . . I think he has four or five arms.”

Nobody has beaten Baltimore in the last eight games save for the Giants in New Jersey, and the Ravens seem to qualify as one of those occasional teams on which the players seem to be having a good time as well as a good record.

“I enjoy the record, yes, but I enjoy more the attitude we have,” Mason said.

Mason said he knew from early on that it could be a heady year in Baltimore, even if he couldn’t have known that the first two quarterbacks (Kyle Boller, Troy Smith) would vanish before the season started (shoulder, tonsil infection) and leave in charge Flacco, the 18th pick in the 2008 draft known as “Joe Cool” in his Delaware days.

Well, Flacco has proved better than adequate, especially granted that defense and a 260-pound Alabamian running back -- Le’Ron McClain -- who threatens the bones of defenders and helps with clinching fourth-quarter drives that chew up 7:47 and feature 11 runs in 12 plays, as happened Sunday night.

All that, plus a bunched-together league where even in duress it doesn’t take all that much audacity to hope.