Dearest Uncle Jim:

First of all, let me say that while I do love your weekly e-mails, your opinions look even better when they are presented on your blog at SportsFanLive.com! You may know him as mild-mannered James Reich, but online he's transformed into his alter-ego, "Steel City Jim." I recommend that everyone check out his excellent posts in two places:

http://www.sportsfanlive.com/steelcityjim

http://blogblitz.nfl.com/pittsburgh-steelers

In addition, when you go to Steel City Jim's blog on SportsFanLive, I recommend that you sign up in the orange box for our daily morning e-mail where we send you all the important articles for all of your favorite teams from more than 5,000 sources. Think of it as your own personalized sports page (apologies for the shameless self-promotion).

NOW, Jim, your legend of a towel you call terrible is an interesting fable. But perhaps you were watching a different program yesterday on television. The classic "Wizard of Oz" was on yesterday too, and I realize that it can be confusing keeping all of that yellow straight - was it the yellow hankie or the yellow brick road?

We all know the story of the young girl DoRoethlisberger and her faithful dog SanToto Holmes. Our characters are led to believe that there is a magical wizard (or towel) that can make their wishes come true. But there is no magic... Toto exposes the great and powerful wizard as a fraud; they find an ordinary man hiding behind a curtain operating a giant console which contains a group of buttons and levers.

So I ask you, was it magic or was it the Zebra Striped Wizards who were pulling the levers on Sunday? There were 113 penalty yards for the Ravens and just 20 for the Black and Gold. Two touchdowns and one INT reversed. A conveniently missed PI call in the end zone. Just sayin', as the phrase goes, I guess "There's No Place Like Home."

Even with the wizard, we were all treated to a deliciously suspenseful game that has set up exactly what the NFL wanted - seven AFC teams going into the final weekend playing meaningful games for a chance at the wild card.

So here's where we stand:

- A Raven win and they are in (and a loss to Oakland would mean that they do not deserve to play in the postseason).

- I am also picking a Jets loss to the Bungles even though the Bengals may rest some players, a Steelers win, and yes, the Steelers will make the playoffs to play New England in the opening round.

Can't wait for Sunday. Happy New Year everyone. --- DAVID KATZ.