I got quite a few e-mails this week from Ravens fans who say they're worried about Sunday's game against the Indianapolis Colts.
My favorite was from someone we'll call Rick in Glen Burnie. Rick made the Colts sound like a team that, if not for a few bad breaks, should be playing in the Super Bowl. I could almost hear the poor guy hyperventilating over the keyboard.
Look how well the Colts played against New England last week, he wrote.
Look how they came back from being down 31-3 in the fourth quarter to make a game of it. Look at the game quarterback Dan Orlovsky had (30-for-37 passing for 353 yards and two touchdowns).
By the time Rick was through, I had to look up the NFL standings to make sure the Colts were still 0-12 and the front-runners for the Andrew Luck Sweepstakes.
"This is a trap game," Rick concluded. "If the Ravens can lose to Tennessee, Jacksonville and Seattle, they can lose to the Colts."
Rick, Rick, Rick — talk about a guy getting worked up for nothing.
Know the old saying about how on any given Sunday, any team can beat any other team?
Well, that doesn't apply to the Colts. At least not this year's Colts without Peyton Manning.
No, the old saying that applies to them now is: On any given Sunday, the Colts will look awful and you can pencil them in for an "L" right now.
Is that too harsh? Maybe. But unless the Ravens have 45 guys throw out their backs at game time, there's no way they lose to the Colts.
For one thing, unlike the Patriots, the Ravens have a great defense. They rank third in the league in overall "D." They rank fourth in points allowed per game (16.0). And they lead the league in sacks (41) and forced fumbles (16).
With or without linebacker Ray Lewis in the lineup — and there's no way he plays Sunday — the Ravens' defense still scares other teams.
It still pounds opponents into submission. If the Ravens' defenders get after Orlovsky the way they got after the Cleveland Browns' Colt McCoy last week, Orlovsky will have nightmares about this day for years.
Here's another reason the Ravens won't lose: They've always been tough down the stretch when they can smell the playoffs.
Since John Harbaugh took over as coach in 2008, they're an NFL-best 24-9 in November, December and January.
Oh, sure, there were days this week when the Ravens seemed bored and the locker room wasn't exactly crackling with intensity. You knew it wasn't Steelers week, that's for sure.
But when they come out of that tunnel Sunday and the crowd roars and the whistle blows, it'll be all business again for this team — the business of securing home-field advantage for the playoffs.
Which brings us to the third reason they won't lose: The game is here at the Bank. And the Ravens, to a man, get super jacked up to play in front of the home crowd.
"[The other team] can't hear, so whenever M&T is rocking, we have extra incentive," Ravens linebacker Terrell Suggs said the other day. "I've played in other stadiums, but our fans are like no other."
So all in all, it should be a long afternoon for the Colts, who come into the game 161/2-point underdogs.
Of course, in the time-honored tradition of heavy favorites everywhere, the Ravens spent the week talking up the Colts like they were the Green Bay Packers.
"We're not taking anything for granted," offensive coordinator Cam Cameron said. "When you just look at [the Colts'] roster, there are a lot of good players. We don't play the game on paper. I think our guys know that. You throw records out. It's one game."
OK, that might well be the world record for the most sports cliches in a single sound bite since the dawn of man.
But what else can Cameron say? We should crush this team? This team is a shell of itself without No. 18 under center?
No, no chance of that happening.
Which brings us to the final reason the Ravens should win: No one wants to be the chumps who lose to a winless team.
"Definitely," Suggs said. "You don't want to be the team that drops one. They are trying to get wins. Like I said, all of that plays into this game. But I think what's most important for us is … we have to win the football game to achieve what we want to do."
What they want is home-field advantage for the playoffs. And a shot at a Super Bowl ring.
That's why it'll be a long day for the Colts.
And why Rick from Glen Burnie can relax.
Listen to Kevin Cowherd at 7:20 a.m. Tuesdays on 105.7 The Fan's "Norris and Davis Show."