NFL: GAME ONE, WEEK ONE---BRONCOS VS. RAVENS // MLB: NL WEST.

For more analysis, go to Mile High Sports Radio AM1510 or FM93.7, and to Denver’s best sports blogging team, milehighsports.com. SPORTS NOTEBOOK posts its columns Tuesday and Friday of each week. Ed. & Publ., Marvin Leibstone; Copy & Mng. Ed., Gail Kleiner. . . // NFL: DURING the NFL 2012 playoffs, the Baltimore Ravens began a Super Bowl journey by defeating the Denver Broncos in double-overtime, which ended the Broncos chances for SB eminence. Yesterday, NFL-2013 kicked in with a Ravens/Broncos match that did a lot more than produce a turnabout against the Ravens from a Broncos last minute game-saving play similar to that which unraveled the Denver team last season. Last night, the Ravens went down steadily starting in the game’s second quarter, this from the Broncos relentless offense and defense dominance, nearly all of it classic football, a conservative game actually, a lot of standard plays on both sides of the ball although with what could be called minimalism with respect to rushing aspects, Denver getting away with the process a lot more often than the Baltimore team . . . Highlights address the successful Denver war-footing, an overarching result being the 49 points lost by the Ravens to the Broncos, the most points lost by the Ravens to any football team in the team’s history. It thundered from seven touchdown passes thrown by Denver quarterback, Peyton Manning, tying an NFL record that appeared last in 1969, achieved by Minnesota Viking QB, Joe Knapp, coincidentally against the Ravens predecessor team, the Baltimore Colts. Manning’s achievement wasn’t solo, of course, the seven successful TD passes included timely receptions by Broncos tight end Julius Thomas and wide receivers Demaryius Thomas, Wes Welker and Andre Caldwell, and empowered by outstanding protection of Manning during the pass rush. Manning completed 27 of 42 passes for 462 yards, nearly 10 yards per pass play. Overshadowed by this is the contribution from rushes that helped to enable Denver’s 24 first downs within a much shorter ball possession time held by Denver---26 minutes vs. Baltimore’s 33 minutes, and which positioned Manning and his receivers for the accrued TD’s. Denver RB’s Monte Ball, Knowshon Moreno and Ronnie Hillman rushed for a total of 67 yards from 21 attempts. . . Yet the Ravens weren’t marshmallows. The Ravens were on top of the Broncos for half of the game if points ahead are the criteria for saying so. Like the Broncos, they achieved 24 first downs and they led at the half, 17-14, and they were 7-0 at the end of the first Q. Ravens QB Flacco completed 34 of 62 passes for 362 yards, no usual Manning-like performance but credible---he hadn’t the QB/WR connectivity patterns that Denver’s Manning had, though only up to a point, in that WR Eric Decker had dropped passes and Wes Welker had lost some. Noteworthy is that the Broncos reflected necessary depth for any team aspiring toward a better than, say, 9/7 end-of-season finish. Gone from the day’s roster were Broncos LB Von Miller, CB Champ Bailey and other preferred starters, their surrogates credible from start to completion of the game, to wit: Ravens QB Flacco being sacked four times for a loss of 27 yards, and two of his passes intercepted . . . Unless it’s to be during the 2013 playoffs, the Ravens and Broncos won’t be facing each other again this year, but each will be facing tough challenges before reaching respective Bye weeks, e.g., Ravens against the Houston Texans on September 22, and the Ravens vs. the Packers on October 13. The Broncos will face the N.Y. Giants on September 15, the Indianapolis Colts on October 20, the Washington Redskins, October 27. . . /// MLB: THE NATIONAL LEAGUE WEST stands out as one of Major League Baseball’s six divisions this year for several reasons. For example, the NL West is led by the L.A. Dodgers, a club that at the All Star break was among some of the NL’s lowest ranking teams. That sudden and steep rising up hasn’t occurred in the five other MLB divisions. Also, and except for the NL East’s Atlanta Braves 14-game lead over second place team, the Washington Nationals, the Dodgers also have an unusually large lead, 12 games over the NL West’s second place club, the Arizona Diamondbacks. Within the remaining four divisions, the first place clubs are no more than six games ahead of second place clubs. Too, the NL West’s second place club, the Diamondbacks, has the lowest number of wins among all other MLB second place clubs---70. Moreover, the NL West’s last place franchise was last year’s World Series winner, the San Francisco Giants. And, the S.F. Giants have the best record among the NL’s division last place teams, and second best among all last place teams within the American League, as well. In addition, the NL West’s differences in number of wins among its five teams is slightest within the NL---343 wins to date, and second lowest in the AL behind the AL West’s 333 wins, a difference being that the wins are spread out more closely within the NL West, therefore more justly. The most division wins achieved belong to the AL East, 375 as of today, but the disparity within the AL East is vast, leading club Boston Red Sox with 85 wins, the Toronto Blue Jays with 64. This information advises that the NL West is the MLB division that is more fair competitively, unlike the NL East, where the last place team, the Miami Marlins, has but 46 wins compared with the first place Braves having 80 wins, or the AL West’s Oakland Athletics in first place with 80 wins and the Houston Astros in last place with only 46 wins. But in the majors, divisions do not compete against one another as a totality for anything, so this information is only meaningful to baseball watchers who care about full division vs. full division stats. Still, of some importance for heightened competition and yet greater fairness is the lack of opportunity for clubs in divisions where the disparity between first and last is very wide, such as that within which the Marlins, the Astros, the Chicago Cubs and this year’s Chicago White Sox must compete. END/ml