A blast from the past: remember Chicago's 46 defense? It's back again--this time in Baltimore, where Ray Lewis is trying to make it hum.(DEFENSE RULES!)

Publication: Football Digest

Publication Date: 01-NOV-05

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COPYRIGHT 2005 Century Publishing

WHEN REX RYAN PHONED HIS father, Buddy, to let him know that the Baltimore Ravens were wiping the dust off his famed 46 defense, the retired coach got so excited he nearly jumped through the phone.

But nobody was more pumped than Ravens middle linebacker Ray Lewis. "I'm like a kid all over again," he says.

In the 46 defense, Lewis is no longer left unprotected to deal with 300-pound offensive linemen. The mammoth defense linemen screen him from blockers, leaving him free to roam from sideline to sideline and make plenty of his punishing open-field tackles.

Last season in the 3-4 alignment Baltimore employed, Lewis received no such help, and blockers were on him constantly. His numbers told the story. His tackles were down 10% to 147, and for the first time in his career, he did not. intercept a pass during a 16-game season.

"My dad told me he doesn't think [Lewis] will have to play nose guard this year," Rex Ryan says. "Playing in a true 34, a lot of times he would have to take on guards. He didn't get any help in that defense. Now, we're getting the bulls-eye off Ray Lewis. You don't have a blocker on Ray."

The 30-year-old Lewis wasn't particularly happy playing in the 34, and he...

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