Ray Rice Made The Most Of His Effort

With a career-best three touchdowns in Sunday's thrilling 30-27 comeback victory over the Arizona Cardinals, Ray Rice certainly was the model of efficiency for the Baltimore Ravens. Rice carried the ball 18 times, but only gained 63 yards on the ground. He did add seven receptions for 36 yards, but it was his ground game that showed his best effectiveness despite averaging only 3.5 yards per carry.

However, that 3.5 yards per carry was good enough, if not more than he needed on all three of his short TD runs. Each time the Ravens found themselves within sight of the goal line, they gave the ball to the diminutive running back and despite his relatively small size, Rice still found his way into the end zone for six points.

Even though his TD runs were nothing special, it was good to see the Ravens use a "ground-and-pound" approach to scoring as opposed to trying some fancy passing play and end up settling for a field goal when they absolutely need the touchdowns to facilitate their amazing comeback.

Not only were the runs nothing special, they did not make the mistakes they have regularly made by way of penalties or fumbles to drive them out of scoring range and kick the field goal as they have all too often had to do. The focus on doing what they do best and make no bones about it the Ravens offensive line is a lot better at run blocking than they are at pass protection, it shows they know the best way to score once they get a sniff of the goal line is to stuff the ball into the gut of your best player and in turn stuff it down the throat of your opponent.

Hopefully, the Steelers will get the same treatment by the offensive line and specifically, from Ray Rice.