FanHouse Baltimore Ravens

Face it, people. The only reason you don't want to believe this about the Minnesota Vikings is because of him. And honestly, that's fair. Brett Favre drives everybody crazy all summer with his anguished, will-he-or-won't-he retirement drama. There are and should be consequences for something like that. In this case, the consequence is that you won't let yourself believe the gray-haired Sears pitchman from Mississippi has his hands on the reins of the best team in the NFC.

But I'm sorry to report that Favre and the Vikings don't care what you think, because as of this morning they were 6-0. And regardless of how good the Saints looked against the Giants, Minnesota is the deserving favorite to represent the NFC in the Super Bowl.

BALTIMORE -- A linebacker who won a Super Bowl ring with the Baltimore Ravens has been called ''the strongest man in the building ... it's not even close'' by head coach John Harbaugh. He isn't talking about Ray Lewis.

O.J. Brigance hasn't worn a Ravens uniform in nine years, or been an active player in seven. The strength Harbaugh refers to has been on display for the last two years as Brigance has battled Lou Gehrig's disease, and as he has done so, he has united and inspired the Ravens in ways nobody else ever has.

Said Spencer Folau, one of Brigance's teammates on the 2000 Ravens team that won Super Bowl XXXV, ''What Ray does on the field, (O.J.) does off the field.''

SAN DIEGO -- Ray Lewis waited 59 1/2 minutes Sunday to make a spectacular play he had created in his mind's eye, a scene crafted through hours of film study dissecting the Chargers' prolific offense. But the play was no fluke: That same game film all but promised the Ravens linebacker that San Diego would give the ball to spark-plug running back Darren Sproles in a short-yardage situation.

And with the ballgame on the line.

The NFL season is less than five weeks away, and today FanHouse is at Ravens training camp -- Stop 2 and mile 270 of Dan Graziano's five-camp, 1,100-mile road trip.

WESTMINSTER, Md. -- Pressure? Nerves? Just because Tavares Gooden is expected to take over free-agent defector Bart Scott's spot at Ravens inside linebacker next to Ray Lewis? No way, says Gooden. Running with the first team in practice isn't about pressure or nerves. It's about great big holes to run through.

"You hear noises that make you think you're watching an army movie -- Haloti Ngata crashing into guys and stuff like that," Gooden said Sunday after the Ravens wrapped up their afternoon practice at McDaniel College. "And then you've got those holes and those openings, and you just fill them as a linebacker. I think that's the biggest part of being with the 'ones.' Everybody knows their assignments, and all you have to do is play off that D-line."

OWINGS MILLS, Md. -- Before Ravens head coach John Harbaugh immerses himself in Baltimore's training camp, and the rigorous NFL season, he's going to take a few days out to gain some perspective.

Harbaugh will join Tom Coughlin, Bill Cowher, Jeff Fisher and Jon Gruden on the inaugural NFL-USO Coaches Tour. The event will take the five current and former coaches to the Persian Gulf, where they will spend nearly a week visiting with U.S. troops.

"The Persian Gulf trip is going to be a great experience," Harbaugh said with an excited smile on his face after Baltimore's Tuesday OTA. The trip runs June 30-July 5, "so it will be over the Fourth of July, and I think that's going to be pretty amazing," he added.

OWINGS MILLS, Md. -- Time and time again during the Ravens' OTA on Tuesday, wide receiver Derrick Mason found himself wide open, an easy target for quarterbacks Joe Flacco and Troy Smith to pick out.

It's amazing how easy football can be when no one's allowed to touch you.

Just four months removed from surgery to repair his right shoulder, Mason has been forced to sport a red "no contact" jersey at Baltimore's offseason workouts. He's hopeful that he will be able to shed that apparel and don his pads when the Ravens open training camp in late July, but his recovery may linger later into the summer.

Well, not really, but it felt that way during a two-hour conference call that NFL.com draft guru Mike Mayock held with members of the media this afternoon. I'm pretty sure every NFL writer and every college writer in the country was on the call, and that everyone got to ask a question. Mayock is, I am 100 percent certain, either a computer or the 21st-century version of the robot 2XL (without, of course, the 8-track tapes). Only one time in the entire two hours did he fail to answer a question, and that was because somebody asked about a kicker, and he admitted he didn't really look at kickers in the draft.

Coming off a stellar 2008 season, Baltimore's Jason Brown wanted to be paid as if he was a top NFL center. The Ravens balked at that idea; St. Louis did not. So even though there were rumblings that Brown did not really want to be a Ram, he couldn't turn down a whopping five-year, $37.5 million contract when St. Louis put it on the table.

According to ESPN's John Clayton, Baltimore topped out its offer to Brown at about $6 million a year -- a number that St. Louis flew past. Of Brown's new contract, $20 million will be guaranteed.