The history between the St. Louis Rams and the Baltimore Ravens is rather shallow and consists of only three meetings, the first in Baltimore and the other two in St. Louis.
The Ravens beat the Rams in Baltimore during their inaugural season in 1996. In a contest that went into overtime, Vinny Testaverde pass to Michael Jackson in the corner of the end zone at the open end of Memorial Stadium secured a 37-31 walk off win for the Ravens.
In 1999 the teams squared off again in Brian Billlick’s first game as head coach of the Ravens. The home team Rams beat the Ravens 27-10 that day, led by an unknown Arena League quarterback named Kurt Warner making his first NFL start. That began the best year in Rams history as they ended up winning Super Bowl XXXIV.
In the rubber matc between the franchises which took place during the 2003 campaign, the Rams won 33-22 thanks in part to the struggles and charitable contributions by the Kyle Boller led offense.
The Rams played in Los Angeles from 1946 to 1994 before moving to St. Louis in 1995. Prior to that, they called Cleveland home from 1937 to 1945. By the end of 1965 the Rams had fallen on hard times. They had not played in a post season game since 1955. Their record from 1959 to 1965 was 25-65-4 and they looked to a new coach to help change their misfortunes. The man they called upon was Chicago Bears’ defensive coordinator George Allen.
With young talent such as Roman Gabriel at quarterback and Deacon Jones and Merlin Olsen on the defensive line the Rams turned things around. They were 8-6 in 1966 finishing third in the NFL Western Division behind the Champion Packers and the Baltimore Colts. They were ready to make a championship run in 1967.
The Colts led by John Unitas and an always tough defense were contenders every year. By trading with the expansion New Orleans Saints for the first overall draft pick and selecting all world defensive end Bubba Smith the Colts were also in position to dethrone the aging defending champion Packers in 1967.
With the NFL’s addition of the Falcons in 1966 and the Saints in 1967, divisional realignment became necessary. The league grew from 2 divisions to 4. The Eastern Conference had the Capitol and Century Division, the Western Conference had the Central and Coastal Divisions. The winners of each division would play in the post season. The 2 Eastern Conference division winners would play each other as would the 2 Western division winners. The winners of those games would meet for the 1967 NFL championship and the right to represent the NFL in Super Bowl II.
Eastern Conference
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Capitol Division
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Century Division
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Dallas Cowboys
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Cleveland Browns
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Philadelphia Eagles
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N.Y. Giants
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Washington Redskins
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St. Louis Cardinals
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New Orleans Saints
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Pittsburgh Steelers
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Western Conference
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Central Division
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Coastal Division
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Green Bay Packers
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Atlanta Falcons
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Chicago Bears
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Baltimore Colts
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Minnesota Vikings
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Los Angeles Rams
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Detroit Lions
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San Francisco 49ers
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The new divisional format made life easy on the Packers since the Bears, Lions, and Vikings were not contenders. On the other hand the 2 teams that presented the largest threat to the Packers in the West, the Colts and Rams had to go through each other just to make the post season. Second place would not get it done – the words wild card were not part of football vocabulary in 1967.
Both the Colts and Rams played in 1967 and as expected after 4 games the Colts were 4-0 thanks in large part to John Unitas’ 7 touchdown passes. The Rams were 3-1, led by Gabriel and wide receiver Jack Snow on offense and a defensive line named the “Fearsome Foursome†that had registered 17 sacks.
Week 4 the Rams came to Baltimore to face the Colts. Roman Gabriel threw 2 long touchdown passes to Jack Snow, the Colts countered with 2 touchdown passes by Unitas and a Lenny Moore scoring run. With less than 2 minutes remaining the Colts led 24-17.
Gabriel playing for the Rams since 1963 was playing in the first important game of his career. He brought the Rams back with a 16 yard touchdown pass to wide receiver Bernie Casey (who later became an actor, most notably playing the national president of Lambda, Lambda, Lambda, in the movie Revenge of the Nerds). The Colts and Rams tied 24-24. They would not meet again to the final game of the season, week 14.
The Colts tied again the next week against the Vikings but won their remaining games. Their biggest win was 13-10 victory over the champion Packers. Unitas threw 2 touchdown passes in the final 2 minutes to win the game.
After the Colts game the Rams tied one game and won the rest of their games including a victory over the Packers in week thirteen 27-24, winning in the final moments on a blocked punt and another Casey touchdown catch. Had the Rams lost that game the Colts would have won the Coastal Division. With their win over the Packers, the Rams entered the week 14 game with the Colts 10-1-2; the Colts came in unbeaten at. 11-0-2.
The winner would win the division title, the loser, the distinction of having the best record in NFL history and not making the post season.
JohnUnitas won his third MVP award in 1967, but had to watch the NFL playoffs on television after playing in what he called the worst game he played in his career.
Unitas threw a touchdown pass to wide receiver Willie Richardson in the second quarter to give the Colts a 7-3 lead. After that the “Fearsome Foursome†with Deacon Jones, Merlin Olsen, Roger Brown, and Lamar Lundy spent the day in the Colts’ back field. Gabriel threw three touchdown passes, one each to Snow, Casey, and TE Billy Truax as the Rams handed the Colts their first loss of the season 34-10. Both the Rams and Colts finished 11-1-2. The Rams won the division based on the tie breaking system used then, point differential in head to head games.
The next week the Rams were crushed by the Packers in the Western Conference championship, 28-7. The Packers would go on to represent the NFL in Super Bowl II after defeating the Cowboys in the ’67 NFL Championship (aka “The Ice Bowlâ€) by the score of 21-17. Two weeks later the Packers easily beat the Raiders in Super Bowl II 33-14, in Vince Lombardi’s last game as Packer head coach.
An era also ended for the Colts as Raymond Berry, Jim Parker, and Lenny Moore all retired following the season. The frustrated Colts had to watch teams with weaker records play for the championship that year. Better times were waiting for them though as they went 13-1 in 1968, winning the NFL championship only to have that ended by the Jets in Super Bowl III. It would take another 2 years before the Colts could try to erase the memory of 1967 and 1968 with a victory in Super Bowl V.
Because a team with just one loss was left out of the playoffs, the NFL rules committee in early 1968 adopted a new rule that would take effect with NFL-AFL merger in 1970. They would add the best second place team to the playoffs, known as the “Baltimore Rule†when it was first crafted. Today it is known as the Wild Card.
The 1980 Raiders, 2000 Ravens, and the 2005 Steelers the three teams to have won a Super Bowl as a wild card all owe thanks to the 1967 Rams and Baltimore Colts who inspired the rule change.
