Speaking honestly, Joe Flacco says Monday night’s harsh loss will be in the back of his mind until beating the next opponent.
But the front of his brain tells him that he’s got to move on.
“You get sick to your stomach when you play games like that, and you can’t move the ball and things don’t work out your way,” Flacco said. “But, that’s part of being an NFL football player, is moving on to the next week.”
While fans and the media can talk about the nature of Monday’s loss until they’re blue in the face, the Ravens are now engaged in their weekly routine, which helps distract the mind.
Players were given the day off on Tuesday to rest up from a late game. They returned to the Owings Mills training facility Wednesday for a 12:45 p.m. team meeting, and by 1 p.m. were in the film room watching tape of the Arizona Cardinals.
“Today was a great day because you know what? Last week’s done,” running back Ray Rice said.
“It felt good to get out there, run around and get a sweat. I would be worried if this was Week 14 in the season and we dropped a game. We’re 4-2 with the whole season ahead of us.”
Flacco said “good teams” forget about losses very quickly. While he doesn’t often say much, Flacco and a couple other offensive players talked about getting back to having fun during the trials of Monday night’s game.
While Flacco has grown into more of a leadership role as one of the more experienced players on the offense, Baltimore has many vets to turn to.
“I think the greatest leaders come out in times of adversity,” linebacker Ray Lewis said.
“The thing that I’ve tried to tell the guys this week is the season is so long, the journey is so long. Stop putting all your eggs in one basket. We’ve never been the team that put all our eggs in one basket. You have one bad game? Brush it off.”
What makes it easier for the Ravens, at least from a mental standpoint, is that there’s no time to dwell on the loss with a short week before facing the Arizona Cardinals, who like the Jaguars, will also enter the game riding a five-game losing streak.
Under Head Coach John Harbaugh, the Ravens have shown their propensity to rebound from their losses. They haven’t had a losing streak since 2009, when they lost three straight from Weeks 4-6, and have won nine straight games following a loss since then.
After a 26-13 defeat in Tennessee in Week 2, the Ravens responded with a 37-7 pounding of the St. Louis Rams.
Harbaugh was asked whether the team gets a mental “bump” from taking a loss.
“It’s probably natural to have some of that; it gets your attention,” Harbaugh said. “If it is a harsh reminder, then so be it – it’s probably good for everybody. You can’t afford to let games slip between your fingers.
“By the same token, everybody gets beat in this league. We’ll see if anybody is undefeated. Everybody gets humiliated, everybody gets the snot kicked out of them at one time or another in life and in football. So, you have to get back up and go to work.”
