HEY, RAVENS: BILL MURRAY FIGURED IT OUT, AND YOU HAD BETTER DO IT, TOO


EDITOR’S NOTE: The NFL Draft is this week. With that, then, we’re sending a letter — some advice — to each of the four teams in the AFC North. This one goes out to the Baltimore Ravens.

Dear Ravens:

You guys are the NFL’s version of that funny, well-loved and iconic movie, “ Groundhog Day,” in that each season is the same. You don’t get any better, and you don’t get any worse, from the previous year. You just stay the same, stuck in neutral, with the car spinning its wheels a bit shy of the Super Bowl. You can see the Kansas City Chiefs and Buffalo Bills ahead of you. Try as you might, you can’t get past them both — possibly one at times, but never both.

During the regular season, you and your quarterback, Lamar Jackson, look like world-beaters. In the playoffs, though, you both find ways to beat yourself.

This window of opportunity isn’t going to stay open forever. At some point, much sooner rather than later because the clock is running, you have to figure out how to get to the next step. For Bill Murray, he moved on by being virtuous, kind, helpful, selfless and generous. Whatever it is that you’re lacking, you have to fill that void. And if you don’t, then you are always going to be looked at as wannabes, on the outside looking in. Some may be so brash as to term you failures, because it’s all about not just getting to the Super Bowl, but  also winning it. There are no awards or rewards, no prizes, no satisfaction, no nothin’ for what you do in the regular season. It’s like what the NIT is to The Big Dance.

The answer may be someone in this year’s NFL Draft. Look hard for him. He may change how history views you.

Sincerely,
Steve King