Defensive woes become obvious

BALTIMORE — In the depressing minutes following the rout, Jay Ajayi’s inclination was to sweep the Dolphins’ 38-6 loss to the Baltimore Ravens under a rug. It’s understandable, since nothing about this one will go in their scrapbooks.

But they need to stash this one away. In their memory banks.

Sunday afternoon was a lesson in what happens when one team sniffffs a playoffff berth and one upstart team only thinks it does. It was a lesson in cranking up the intensity, dominating in every sense and never letting an opponent believe any of its usual comeback magic was even remotely possible.

It was, in short, an example of how one team acts when it has been through this before.

And how another team acts when this meaningful-December-business is all new.

“We didn’t execute, and they pounced all over it,” Dolphins coach Adam Gase said. “That’s what they do. There’s a reason why they’ve won divisions, they’ve won playoffff games, they’ve won Super Bowls — because they understand, Patriots 26, Rams 10 Raiders 38, Bills 24 Steelers 24, Giants 14 Chiefs 29, Falcons 28 Lions 28, Saints 13 Broncos 20, Jaguars 10 Packers 21, Texans 13 Bengals 32, Eagles 14 Bears 26, 49ers 6 Cardinals 31, Redskins 23 Buccaneers 28, Chargers 21 Seahawks 40, Panthers 7 Colts at Jets, 8:30 p.m., ESPN

Brady becomes winningest quarterback in NFL history,

Cowboys become the fifirst team to clinch a playoffff spot,

Dolphins don’t get too many passing grades in defeat, Find a complete recap of Sunday’s games in NFL Scoreboard, a digital section for Post subscribers. BALTIMORE — There was this moment in Miami’s 38-6 lopsided loss to the Ravens on Sunday when John Harbaugh faced a 4th-and-2 at the Dolphins’ 43-yard line.

The Ravens were already leading 14-0 and it was only the second quarter and perhaps the coach was simply trying to draw Miami offffffffffffside.

Instead, Joe Flacco dropped back to pass and hit Steve Smith for an easy 8-yard gain.

“They’ve got faith in their offffffffffffense,” Dolphins defensive end Andre Branch said of the play after the game. “And we’ve got faith in our defense.” But that faith should be wavering. For Harbaugh and the Ravens felt no fear Joe Schad

GAIL BURTON / ASSOCIATED PRESS Ravens outside linebacker Terrell Suggs lost his helmet but still put a hit on Dolphins quarterback Ryan Tannehill. The Ravens sacked Tannehill twice and intercepted him three times in beating the Dolphins 38-6.