Titans’ loss to Bengals was a bitter dose of Ryan Tannehill reality – The

Derrick Henry said it.

“I’m shocked I’m talking to y’all about this right now.”

Mike Vrabel said it.

“You don’t show up to the stadium planning postgame conversations with your team about losing and about having the finality of the season and about when you’re going to meet and all those things.”

And Jeffery Simmons: “We were supposed to have been taking care of this game.”

And Taylor Lewan: “None of us expected this. I don’t think any of you guys expected this.”

And the silence in Nissan Stadium early Saturday evening, as Evan McPherson’s 52-yard field goal cut through the uprights to give the Cincinnati Bengals a 19-16 divisional-round upset of the Tennessee Titans, spoke for Nashville.

All could agree that this sudden finish to the Titans’ season, this squandering of the AFC’s No. 1 seed and return of Henry and healthiest roster all season and best home atmosphere in many of them, was unexpected. Regrettable. Painful. Unacceptable.

Here’s where they differ, what no one who took part in this game would dare say aloud but what everyone who watches this team closely will think and say on a loop: “I can’t believe Tannehill played like that.”

The worst part about this loss for the Titans is it affirmed all the fears about