Like the rest of you, I’ve really struggled to accomplish everything I’ve needed to this year because I’ve just been so busy celebrating the 20th anniversary of the album “Finally Woken” by Jem. Yeah. Me too.
I obviously don’t need to tell you because we’ve all been experiencing the phenomenon together all year long, one anniversary celebration with your friends after another. But Jem (who did NOT travel with a band called The Holograms) was a talented British pop singer and this album produced the inescapable ear worm “Just A Ride.” (I think of it whenever I hear Maggie Rogers’ 2022 jam “That’s Where I Am” because it has such a similar foundation.)
Now you’re probably thinking to yourself, “I usually come to PressBoxOnline.com specifically for a breakdown of 2004 and 2022 female vocal pop songs so this is the exact content I want, but I’m worried Glenn might try to guide this toward football somehow.” And yes, I do have such a devious thought.
On my various shows, I’ve talked about how the Ravens’ season-opening trip to Kansas City this year was a joyless experience. That’s not hindsight because they lost. If Isaiah Likely had managed to get his toe down and Lamar Jackson had scampered in for a game-winning two-point conversion, it would have still been joyless. Not fully devoid of joy — the game was planned, and it would have been fun to win!
But by the time we got to Monday, the conversation would have shifted to, “That was cool, but what will they do in the playoffs?”
That’s the burden facing the 2024 Ravens. The John Harbaugh-Lamar Jackson duo has put together two of the greatest regular seasons in franchise history (2019 and 2023), nabbing two nearly unanimous NFL MVP honors in the process. But those two seasons combined to produce one playoff win and the AFC championship game disaster of this past January.
There is serious scarring for this fan base. This is an anxiety trip masquerading as a football season. Provided nothing goes wrong, it is a four-month prelude to the only part we’re actually concerned about. Everything is viewed through the prism of “will it be different this time in the postseason?”
In some strange way, it’s why it was hard for me to be worked up about the Week 1 loss. Yeah, it was a bummer that the Ravens came up short. But they played pretty well and, really, how much different were we going to feel had they won? There are tangible negatives, of course. The offensive line’s struggles were evident. The edge rush seemed to disappear and will be in even bigger trouble without Kyle Van Noy. Wasting two timeouts early in the second half is unforgivable. Justin Tucker might be human-ish. Plus, this particular loss could quite possibly be the difference in winning the division or getting the No. 1 seed or hosting the AFC championship game again.
Still, a Week 1 win against the Chiefs was not going to make any of us feel any more confident that the Ravens would definitely win when it mattered most. They had previously defeated the Chiefs in the regular season (seriously, it happened!) … only to lose to the Bills in the playoffs. It’s why John Harbaugh’s apparent decision to go for two when he thought his team had scored at the end of regulation made so much sense to me. The result itself didn’t matter that much. Just go ahead and get the game over with one way or the other.
(I don’t think that’s what Harbaugh was thinking. I think he just didn’t want Patrick Mahomes to get the ball again. But it’s what I was thinking.)
I’ve been brutally honest in my assessment of the value of this Ravens regular season in the conversations I’ve had with friends in and around the NFL. Most have understood and largely agreed with the assessment. But some have thought it a bit too dismissive. My friend Gregg Rosenthal (NFL Network, “NFL Daily”) was the one who got me to channel my inner Jem. He stopped me in my tracks as I described the feelings. “You have to enjoy the ride,” he said.
Ironically, Jem and co-writer Mike Caren took listeners on a bit of a ride themselves within the lyrics. That song (I know, who am I telling?) is really more about not being afraid of a proverbial journey. “It’s just a ride, it’s just a ride. No need to run, no need to hide.”
But that message changes within the coda. “Don’t be scared, now dry your eyes. It may feel so real inside, but don’t forget enjoy the ride.”
I know that great philosophical duo of Gregg Rosenthal and the British pop star Jem is right. I know it’s important that we don’t get so jaded that we lose the ability to enjoy the process. Watching Isaiah Likely and Trenton Simpson potentially break out as true stars should provide joy, even if it doesn’t guarantee anything will be different come January.
There is, of course, a scenario where nothing is given and simply getting to the playoffs ends up becoming more interesting than we expected, but that’s not a part of the ride any of us would particularly care to enjoy.
I think there will be plenty to enjoy. But even as we do, we’ll still have one eye toward what might happen in January. And that’s OK. Our reluctance to embrace the regular season is a testament to the success of the franchise and the standard the Ravens have set.