Baltimore Ravens

At the end of a relationship, it’s typical for one or both parties to take stock, to dust oneself off, as it were, and try to figure out what went wrong towards a goal of making things better the next time.

In some cases, with the passage of time, you might even consider the wisdom of patching things up and trying again.

If you think of the end of an athletic season in the same way you would a relationship, then, in the wake of Saturday’s desultory 17-3 loss to Buffalo in the AFC playoffs, the Ravens are doing a “where did it all fall apart” assessment of the situation.

Was Alfred Lord Tennyson right nearly two centuries ago when he queried if it’s better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all?

Or, posited in a 21st century NFL context, was the joy of the Ravens’ 14-2 season – the best in franchise history – worth the anguish that settled over Baltimore late Saturday night in the wake of the 28-12 loss to the Tennessee Titans in the divisional playoffs?