Kearse still remembers 'stolen' season in 2000

The defensive linemen of the Tennessee Titans have photos of animals taped on the nameplates of their lockers, sort of as a descriptive depiction of their character or a particular look.

Perhaps defensive end Jevon Kearse should have an elephant as his designated animal, because Kearse hasn’t forgotten what happened to the Titans courtesy of the Baltimore Ravens in the 2000 playoffs.

“It definitely was stolen, because those guys went ahead and won the Super Bowl that year,” Kearse said of the Ravens’ 24-10 victory over the top-seeded Titans that day.

Kearse, one of three current Titans to have played in that game along with punter Craig Hentrich and linebacker Keith Bulluck, admits a little payback this time around would be nice.

“You could look at it as payback. I’m not going to lie. In the back of my mind, I’m looking at it as payback, because so many things that we had going that year, and we did have the best defense that year,” he said.

The Titans were ranked No. 1 statistically on defense that year, but like so many other things, that fact went by the boards that day.

Cornerback Samari Rolle, then a Titan, now a Raven, and still Kearse’s close friend, remembered it too.

“It hurt more than losing the Super Bowl the year before that, just because we knew whoever won that game would probably win the Super Bowl,” Rolle said.

Now, as the Titans are again a top seed and welcoming the Ravens into Nashville again eight years later, Kearse understands the fears that come with that, but also has a message for anyone else who remembers that game.

“With the media bringing it all up, and the city also remembers, but it’s like half and half. Half of it is afraid, and the other half says it’s time for payback,” Kearse said. “I tell the half that are afraid, ‘Chill out. We got it. We’re ready for it. We’ve had a week off. We’ve got a lot of guys back that were nicked up at the end of the season.’ It’s all about what happens now and not what happened in the past.”

And to that end, Kearse tries to remind everyone about exactly how long ago that game was.

“Everybody is talking about the ghosts of the past and everything that happened in 2000, but that’s in the past,” Kearse said. “Like with our young defensive linemen, William Hayes and Jason Jones might have been in the eighth or ninth grade at that time. They don’t know anything like that. They’re just all about what kind of memories we’re going to make now. We’re going to go out and let it all hang out on Saturday.”

Bulluck was around then, but he was a mere rookie playing mostly on special teams and in certain sub-packages. Now, he is one of the vocal leaders of the defense, and he prefers to talk about the Titans’ victory in Baltimore three years later.

But he did recall the hurt he saw on the faces of Steve McNair, Eddie George and other veteran players.

“I know what happened to the team in 2000 that I was a part of, but I didn’t really play in that game,” Bulluck said. “My memories of that are how Eddie and Steve and Blaine [Bishop] and Marcus [Robertson] and all those guys felt after the game. I didn’t really play much of a role in that. I remember when we beat them up there in 2003.”

While Kearse certainly recalls how he felt after that stunning loss, he says he won’t dwell on it this week, and he won’t necessarily remind his younger teammates of it. Instead, he hopes to point out the lessons learned from it and move forward.

“We do a good job of that every day. The regular season is out of the way now. Now, we have one-game seasons,” he said. “Hopefully, we’ll have three one-game seasons and just leave it all out on the field and don’t be at the end of the game, ‘Man, I wish I would have done this.’ Just go out there and do it.”

For their part, the Ravens aren’t living in the past either, says their emotional leader, linebacker Ray Lewis.

“Totally different, totally different. I don’t know who’s stuck back there. I can’t be, definitely this team can’t be stuck back there,” Lewis said. “We have to really prepare this week. We know this team is playing at a very, very high level. They were undefeated for however long and came in here and beat us. So, the bottom line is we’ve got to do the things we’ve been doing all week, just take our time. Practice what we’ve been practicing and go up there ready.”