Breaking Record Won’t Be Easy for Ravens’ Lewis

The NFL’s top four running backs in the eyes of Eric Dickerson:

* Clinton Portis.

* LaDainian Tomlinson.

* Priest Holmes.

* Marshall Faulk.

And what about Baltimore’s Jamal Lewis, the man 154 yards away from breaking the single-season rushing record of 2,105 set by Dickerson 19 years ago?

“Oh, it’s funny you’d say that,” said a sincerely embarrassed Dickerson, sounding more like a sheep than a Ram. “I forgot all about him.”

Call that an “avoidian” slip, because ESPN booked Dickerson a flight to Baltimore to watch Lewis go for the record Sunday in the Ravens’ season finale against Pittsburgh. For a reminder of that hallowed record, Dickerson need only glance around the homes he keeps in Calabasas and Texas, sprawling spreads decorated with action shots, keepsake footballs, even a bronzed cleat from his 12-year career with the Los Angeles Rams, Indianapolis Colts, Los Angeles Raiders and Atlanta Falcons.

As millions of fans remember, Dickerson, a six-time Pro Bowl selection, had an upright running style that was so smooth and graceful it looked almost effortless. John Robinson, his coach with the Rams, fell prey to that optical illusion more than once. Early on, he told Dickerson he had to try to run a little faster in practice.

“I was like, ‘Coach, I am running fast,’ ” Dickerson said. “He told me to run the drill again faster. I said, ‘Tell you what, John. Get out here and try to catch me and you’ll see how fast I’m running.’ ”

A few weeks later, after Dickerson had left a fast New York Jet cornerback stumbling in his wake on a long touchdown run, an astounded Robinson congratulated him on the sideline.

“I guess you were running fast that day at practice,” the coach said.

In a wide-ranging interview this week, Dickerson talked about his days with the Rams; his belief he could have had another 2,000-yard season; how the Raiders dissed him and how Adidas dissed him more:

Question: Maybe the most impressive thing about your 1984 season is that you averaged 5.6 yards a carry in setting the record. Did you feel unstoppable?

Answer: When you’re having one of those kind of years, it almost feels like, “OK, they can stop me for so long but, sooner or later, I’m going to break on them.” You know you’re going to have some off games, but you also feel like, “If I do have an off game, I’ll make it up the next week.” That’s how I felt.

Q: You rushed for 100 yards a dozen times that season. Did 100-yard games feel like a big deal?

A: I always felt like if you got over 130 or 140, you were really having a good day.... A hundred yards, that ain’t a lot of yards to me. I think I just set that standard to myself. If you get 150, 160, 170, 200, then that’s when you’re really tearing it up. I think if you talk to most great players, that’s how they feel. Even guys who are sack leaders, Lawrence Taylor, Bruce Smith, Reggie White, those guys feel like if you get one or two sacks it’s OK, but it’s, “When I get to four or five, that’s a good day.”

Q: Does the same go for a 1,000-yard season?

A: That’s not a big deal. If you get the carries, 1,000 yards is no big feat. A below-average guy can get 1,000 yards. When you get around 1,400 or 1,500, that’s when you’re really having a great season. But 1,200, 1,300 -- eh, that’s all right. With the new wave of back, if he has 1,300 or 1,400, but then he has 700 yards receiving, then there’s a difference.

Q: There are eight running backs who could finish the season with at least 1,500 yards. Is it any easier for a guy to get yards now, especially with so many teams using two deep safeties rather than one?

A: That changes it a little bit because you’ve got a lot of field to work with. But the big thing now is, the offensive lines are really big. They’re big, they’re faster. You look at the Ravens’ offensive line and they’re very big and very physical.

The thing is, you’re taking pride in blocking for your running back. That was the thing with us with the Rams. They were taking pride in their blocking, holding their block and getting me past the line of scrimmage. I always just told them, “If I get past the line of scrimmage, I’ll do the rest.”

They’re not going to always make that great block, and I understand that. But if you get me to the line of scrimmage at full speed with nobody touching me, then I can cause some damage.

Q: Is Jamal Lewis that way?

A: Yeah. He’s bigger than me (Dickerson, 6 feet 3, played at about 220 pounds; Lewis is 5-11, 235). He’s a big, physical running back, almost like an Earl Campbell-type. And he has very good speed for a big guy. He can outrun a lot of guys.

Q: Brian Billick has said they’ll give Jamal the ball 50 times, if that’s what it takes to break the record. Will you be bummed if it falls?

A: No, I won’t be bummed. That’s a record that I always felt would be broken one day, for sure. The one that I know will last longer is my rookie rushing record. It’s just hard for a rookie to have 1,800 yards. I didn’t expect to have that kind of year.

I always felt like records are made to be broken. All of them. But the first thing you have to do is win the football game. If I’m a player for the Pittsburgh Steelers, I’m like, “He ain’t breaking no record on us. We ain’t going down in history.” When I played the Oilers, they said they felt the same way. But I broke the record on them instead of going into Week 16 to do it.

I think as a coach, Billick’s main objective is to win. If they’re close enough for him to try to break that record, sure. But I think it’s going to be very difficult.

Q: So you think the Steelers are too proud to let that happen, even though their season is essentially over?

A: Yeah, they have a lot of pride. They’ve always been known for defense. When I saw Cleveland play last week, I was like, “Man, they play more like the Cleveland Clowns.” You’re like, “OK, at least come up and tackle the guy.” It was sad. If you have a guy run for 295 in Week 2, and then you come back and let him run for 200 in Week 15, that’s embarrassing. And I just don’t believe that the Steelers are going to let that happen.

Q: Did you get a present from your sponsor for setting the single-season rushing record?

A: I got a carrot cake and nothing else. A carrot cake with some candles on it. That was my sponsor. I remember it because that was the same year Walter Payton was going for some record, and we broke a record the same year. Walter got a Lamborghini. For me, Adidas came out the same year with a carrot cake. I’m allergic to the nuts in carrot cake. We’re standing around and the linemen start laughing. I’m laughing too, thinking, “This is a bad joke.”

Q: Were you waiting for a car?

A: I’m like, “I know there’s a car.” I’m waiting for the wheels to pop out from under the cake, or there’s going to be a key in there or something. But the carrot cake was all I got. I was shocked. I was like, “So I guess getting 2,000 yards don’t mean nothing in this league no more.” That was a slap in the face.

Q: The Raiders consider you one of their Hall of Fame players, even though you only spent one season with them and rushed for 729 yards. What do you remember about playing for them?

A: Not playing very much. That’s what I remember about them. The funniest thing is, I’ve never been in a situation where you play a quarter or a half, and then they don’t play you after that. Almost like you did something wrong.

Q: Did you feel like Marcus Allen?

A: I felt like Marcus. That’s the best way to put it. I’d have 100 yards sometimes at halftime and that was it. You weren’t playing anymore. I’ve never seen anything like it in my life. It was almost a joke. It was hard for me to believe that they have a successful running game, because they don’t have a feature back.

If I was a running back coming out of college, that’s the last team I’d want to go to.

Q: Why do running backs seem to tail off when they turn 30?

A: Sometimes it’s the way the team feels like they want to go. They put that number in their head. It’s all about numbers. They throw a number out there, 30, because most backs out there aren’t 30 years old. And you’re getting up there for a running back because you’re taking a lot of hits, and it’s a physical game.

The thing is, as a 30-year-old running back, are you still getting the carries you did when you were younger? Or is it a new guy there that they drafted who’s taking 10 or 15 carries away from you?

Q: Could you have had 2,500 yards?

A: If I had stayed with the Rams, I could have had another 2,000-yard season. I believe that wholeheartedly. There was no doubt we could have done it again, if we had kept that team together. We had some 300-pounders on that line: Irv Pankey, Bill Bain, Jackie Slater. Those were all big guys.

I don’t know if I could have had 2,500, but I think I could have had at least 2,300, because even that year I had the 2,100 -- just like Jamal -- there were games that I came out of, games they wouldn’t let me play in anymore. I could think of one down in New Orleans where I had 175 yards and they took me out early. Atlanta. Even San Francisco the last game of the season.

Q: How could you tell when a defense was cracking?

A: What you’d have is, you’d have a team bickering. That’s when you knew you’d got them. You’d have them, “Why don’t you guys make a tackle up front!” Then, “Why don’t you make a tackle back in the back!”

Q: Any specific memories of that happening?

A: We played the Cowboys in the playoffs the year [1986] I had 248 in a playoff game. I never got along with [Dallas linebacker] Eugene Lockhart. We did not like each other. He went to Houston and I went to SMU. Houston didn’t like us; they said we were a bunch of spoiled kids. We were a bunch of poor kids going to a rich school.

I remember I had some big runs on the Cowboys. Running over them, running around them, running through them. And Lockhart tackled me and I said, “Let me tell you something, Eugene, it’s going to be like this all day on y’all.”

And I ran over him and broke his arm, broke his forearm. I could look at his face and tell he was hurt. I said, “You’re hurt, aren’t you?” Sure enough, he left the game with a cracked forearm.

Q: Is Ohio State’s Maurice Clarett walking into a buzz saw, trying to play in the NFL two years removed from high school?

A: A running back can’t do that. That is a position that’s very physical. You get hit a lot, and your body has to be developed enough to take the shots. And you have to be mentally strong. I don’t think my freshman or sophomore years, I was ready to play pro football. My junior year, I’m pretty sure I was ready to play. But as a kid coming out of high school? No way.

He has to understand he’s going to be playing against guys like the Ray Lewises, the Junior Seaus, the Julius Peppers of the Carolina Panthers, guys that are big-time defensive players. Guys that are going to talk to you, hit you, say stuff like, “Your momma ain’t coming out here. Don’t have that look on your face like you want your momma.”

Q: How are you going to feel if your record is still standing after the Baltimore game?

A: I’m going to put it like this: I put that record out there far enough that you’re going to have to go get it. Two thousand yards is hard enough, but when you get into the 2,100s -- I mean, you see he’s down to the last game to try to get there, and needs a big game.

If he gets it, he deserves it.