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Expert's eye Veteran player evaluator Wiggin dissects title game
Paul Wiggin, the Minnesota Vikings' director of pro personnel, has spent more than 40 years in the NFL. He is responsible for league-wide player evaluation and advance scouting of opponents. Wiggin breaks down Super Bowl XXXV for CNNSI.com: The Ravens will beat the Giants if ... they win it the way they win every game, and that’s with the game’s most intimidating defense. They’re probably going to have to generate some points once again on defense, because Trent Dilfer certainly hasn’t been very productive in their three playoff wins. Their blueprint for victory probably again calls for him to complete eight to 10 passes and for that defense to try to hold the other team to seven points. You can’t say anything negative about Dilfer because he’s 10-1 as a starter, but he’s going to get as much pressure in this game as probably any he’s played all season. He’s going to have people in his face; he’s going to have to deal with that. The pressure’s going to be coming from everywhere, more so than it was against either Denver, Tennessee or Oakland. The Giants defense is noted more for its pass pressure than the Ravens are. Just look at what they did to Minnesota. They had Daunte Culpepper looking skittish for the first time really all season. I think Jamal Lewis has a chance to have a pretty decent game. I’d be willing to bet that he’s the leading ground gainer for both teams on the day. The Ravens might be able to run a fair amount against New York. But with these two defenses, I can’t imagine this being anything but a very low-scoring football game. I don’t see how it could be anything else. As a purist, this matchup is great. If you want to sit back and watch home runs, you’re going to be disappointed. This will be a game where you just have to fight and strategize and just keep working the whole game. It’s one good defense against another. And I have to give that edge to Baltimore. Jim Fassel was on my staff at Stanford and he’s a dear friend. I worked with Brian Billick here, and I played for Art Modell. They’re all good friends. But based on being the best defense, I like the Ravens by a nose. The Giants will beat the Ravens if ... their quarterback, Kerry Collins, gets comfortable in the pocket again like he did in the NFC title game against the Vikings. He can put the ball where he wants to put it. They’ll try to intimidate his receivers, but I really believe that the Ravens have only the second best pass rush in this game. So if the Giants offensive line, which is pretty darn good, lets Collins be comfortable in the pocket, this guy can really throw the football -- as Minnesota found out. Now, he’s not going to be as comfortable as he was against the Vikings. He’s not going to go into this game with a sense of comfort that he evidently went into our game with. He has to be thinking about some other things when facing Baltimore’s great defense. But he can still get it going again if he has time to work. He can drop the deep stuff right where it has to be, and he made some throws across his body rolling left against Minnesota that were just great throws. This guy is capable of special things if he has the opportunity. Collins has to be the key because I just don’t see New York running against the heart of that Ravens defense. They want you to run at them, but you can’t. Defensive tackles Tony Siragusa and Sam Adams are as formidable a tandem of run-stuffers as there is in the league. Those guys are dominating. You just don’t get movement, and that allows their fast, athletic linebackers to flow to the ball, which they do very, very well. Defensively, the Giants just have to avoid giving Dilfer that one big play he has been able to generate of late, usually to the tight end, Shannon Sharpe. That’s really all they’ve made per game on offense. If they can eliminate that, the Giants might be able to win even though they won’t be able to drive the ball up and down the field like they did against Minnesota.
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