The Ravens could not overcome a dysfunctional first half and sketchy officiating, losing 27-22 to the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday and imperiling their playoff chances. Here are five things we learned from the game.

It’s time to stop talking about the Ravens as a team of endless possibility

To a man, they framed their position the same way. Yes, the Ravens were disgusted with their 32-14 loss to the Bengals on Thanksgiving night. But everything they wanted to accomplish was “still in front of us.”

They insisted there was time for them to become the all-phases monster many of us had forecast coming into the season, even though their first dozen games screamed otherwise.

Sunday was their time to put up or shut up, pitted against their eternal rival from Pittsburgh with first place in the AFC North on the line.

They did not fold as neatly as they had against Cincinnati, rushing for 144 yards after halftime and coming within an overturned touchdown of taking the lead late in the fourth quarter. Stripped of context, it was another wild Ravens-Steelers affair that hung in the balance until the final play.

But we can’t strip away all that came before — the early defeats, the debilitating injuries, the offensive futility of recent weeks. A gutsy loss wasn’t good enough for a team that had backed itself deep into a corner.

The Ravens again failed to meet their self-professed standard of excellence, combining a daft interception by Lamar Jackson with backbreaking coverage lapses, special teams follies and confused two-minute execution. Again, they could not get all systems humming at the same time, and we’ve reached the point when they can no longer get away with it.

The Ravens had reasons to be angry at the game officials.

They thought Isaiah Likely had caught a touchdown to put them up 28-27, only to learn he needed to take three, not two, steps with the ball in his grasp.

They thought linebacker Teddye Buchanan had ripped a deflected ball away from Steelers quarterback Aaron Rodgers, only to be told Rodgers had possessed the ball with two knees on the ground.

They could not understand how defensive tackle Travis Jones was charged with unnecessary roughness for running over Pittsburgh’s long snapper on a play that ultimately turned a field goal into a touchdown.

It’s never easy to overcome calls that directly swing scoring plays. Were the Ravens done wrong or simply unlucky on a succession of razor-thin turning points?

The truth is it doesn’t matter. Their hopes were decimated by those calls because they left themselves no room for error. They paid the price for inadequate execution in all aspects of football.

The Ravens have earned their 6-7 record and their fading playoff chances. They have earned the mistrust of a fan base that left thousands of seats open and cheered tepidly at kickoff of a do-or-die game against the hated Steelers.

The players knew how much was at stake, knew they were running out of chances to back their hopeful talk with muscle and precision.

“I feel like we haven’t really played great, right-above-good football [with] all three units throughout this entire season,” cornerback Marlon Humphrey said four days before the showdown. “I think it’s time to show it. We’ve talked all throughout the year. But now it’s time to come together, have your brother’s back, make sure your brother knows what he’s doing so we can go out here, be on the same page and execute.”

They clearly cared Sunday, clawing back from a 14-point deficit, at times looking like the team they imagine themselves to be.

When it was over, however, they were left to make the same well-intentioned, hollow statements about how they still have time to unlock their potential.

“The talent is there, but it’s not about the talent,” linebacker Roquan Smith said, echoing Humphrey’s earlier sentiment.

It’s true they’re not cooked, in theory. The Steelers are only one game up in the division and eminently capable of going 1-3 to close out the season. Could the Ravens go 9-8 and scrape into the playoffs? It’s not impossible.

Even if they pull off the improbable, however, they have given us no reason to believe they would be dangerous in January. The time to talk about what the Ravens could be is over. What they are is a mediocre team with major flaws and a franchise player who’s not at his best. Their last, best chance to change that narrative has passed.

Even on a day when it did plenty right, the offensive line was back in the crosshairs

Even if Alex Highsmith had not enveloped Jackson for a game-ending sack, a win was improbable. The Ravens had goofed away too much time in the early stages of a potential go-ahead drive that began with almost two minutes on the clock.

But it felt narratively appropriate for the Steelers to seal their victory with a winning rep against the Ravens’ most beleaguered unit. In this case, Highsmith whipped around left tackle Ronnie Stanley’s outside shoulder.

Jackson felt him bearing down but said he didn’t have time to let his receivers reach the end zone so he could unleash a last, desperate throw.

“I have no idea what happened on the interior,” Stanley said afterward. “I know my guy ran pretty wide up the edge. I don’t know; we’ve got to look at the film.”

Earlier in the game, Daniel Faalele — easily fans’ favorite punching bag — could not impede Steelers cornerback Brandin Echols, who blitzed past the mammoth right guard to drop Jackson to force a punt.

Those were the only two sacks Jackson took all afternoon, but they were two more memorable plays that will be held against a unit still searching for its collective footing.

“I think we’re doing a lot of good things,” Stanley said. “There are things that definitely need to get fixed, especially to play at the level we need to play at to get to our goal. But I do think we’re doing a lot of good things, playing physical, giving effort.”

It’s a fair take given that the Ravens ran for 217 yards and generally did not let Pittsburgh’s star pass rushers wreck Jackson’s game. But it’s not a take that will sway fans who watched another loss end with the franchise quarterback being flung to the ground.

General manager Eric DeCosta bet that the Ravens could get away with starting three cheap, developing players around Stanley and center Tyler Linderbaum. It hasn’t worked, with Jackson taking a beating and the Ravens failing to match their 2024 offensive efficiency in every meaningful way.

Lamar Jackson moved more dynamically, but his puzzling throws persist

Early in the second quarter, Jackson, scrambling toward the sideline with a first down in sight, tried to float a touch pass to Rasheen Ali. Instead, he dumped it right into the arms of Pittsburgh cornerback James Pierre.

That turnover led directly to a Steelers touchdown, and it was a telling snapshot of how Jackson has lost the extraordinary feel that made him arguably the best quarterback in the world in 2023 and 2024.

It was the giveaway he could not afford against a rival that doesn’t win when it doesn’t create turnovers.

“I tried to throw it to Rasheen, but I threw it too light,” Jackson said. “He just made a good play on it with a one-handed interception.”

The next time the Ravens had the ball, Jackson led an open Zay Flowers out of bounds to squander a potential chunk gain. Two plays later, Flowers dropped Jackson’s short, quick third-down pass. Another punt and more evidence of how not crisp the Ravens’ offense has become.

Three consecutive empty drives gave Pittsburgh all the runway it needed to build a 14-point lead.

Even when the Ravens gained momentum in the second half, with Jackson running more aggressively and connecting on downfield throws, he undercut their progress with puzzling lapses. He short-armed an elementary swing pass to Derrick Henry, wasting a potential big play. He gave DeAndre Hopkins no shot on a deep pass that drifted out of bonds.

Jackson posted his highest rushing total since September. He broke his streak of three straight games without a rushing or passing touchdown. He said he felt good after again appearing on the injury report (with a sore ankle) during the week. But the precise, deadly passer we took for granted last season is still missing.

“Through the roof,” he said when asked to rate his frustration level after another loss.

Coach John Harbaugh sat beside Jackson for several minutes in the postgame locker room, trying to nurture his superstar’s confidence.

“’We still have four games,’” Jackson said when asked what Harbaugh told him. “Basically, he was saying to just stay locked in.”

Unspoken but understood is that, unless he recaptures his brilliance, the Ravens have little chance to save their season.

The Steelers seized the initiative with an unexpectedly bold attack

We assumed the Pittsburgh offense would be the same low-ambition outfit that has Steelers fans calling for an end to the Mike Tomlin era. But Rodgers spit in the eye of expectations, dropping a 52-yard bomb to DK Metcalf, who had dusted Marlon Humphrey, on his first snap of the game. Rodgers finished the drive by rope-a-doping the Baltimore defense with the longest fake you ever saw, then ambling into the end zone, fractured left wrist be damned.

The Steelers were here to fight.

Early in the second quarter, Rodgers evaded a potential sack by outside linebacker Mike Green and found Metcalf streaking downfield for 28 yards. That scrambling strike set up a field goal. Rodgers did not look like a 42-year-old with a bulky cast on his wrist. For a half at least, he clearly outplayed Jackson.

He gouged the Ravens one last time in the third quarter, reading their simulated pressure and flicking the ball to running back Jaylen Warren, who sprinted 38 yards untouched to put the Steelers up 27-16.

“Yes, there were a lot of breakdowns, a lot of misunderstandings,” Harbaugh said when asked how coverage disintegrated on that decisive score. “We weren’t on the same page with assignments and things like that. That was one of our worst plays that we had.”

A defense that had carried the Ravens through much of October and November was caught flat-footed by an over-the-hill quarterback who’d attempted precious few deep throws all season. Give Rodgers and Metcalf credit for seizing an upper hand that the Steelers never relinquished.

The Ravens stopped Pittsburgh on three straight drives to end the game. Smith played an excellent game on a day when the Ravens celebrated Ray Lewis and their 2000 Super Bowl champions. But it was too little, too late.

“I thought it was some really good balls out there,” Smith said. “He made some really good catches and some perfect placements on the ball. So I think it was just hats off to those guys for making those completions, and it was what it was.”

If we’re talking all three phases, the Ravens also let down on special teams

Rookie kicker Tyler Loop delivered his worst performance of the season, missing an extra point at the end of the first half and starting the second by pushing his kickoff out of bounds. That set the Steelers up at their 40-yard line, and they drove 50 yards for an easy field goal.

Two other poorly struck kickoffs allowed the Steelers to start at their 35-yard line (that drive ended with a touchdown) and their 41-yard line (the Ravens stopped them that time).

We won’t remember any of those as plays that turned the game, but the Ravens aren’t good enough to concede 10- and 15-yard margins with failures in basic execution.

Loop wasn’t the only offender. Keondre Jackson’s holding penalty on a punt return moved the Ravens from their own 36 to the 26 at the start of their final, failed drive.