The Tennessee Titans fell to the New York Giants 12-7 in Week 3, and there is plenty to talk about from this slopfest.

This was an infuriating loss for a Titans team that continues to beat itself in ways that are difficult to watch. Two winners and five losers from Sunday’s game tell the story of a team that can’t get out of its own way:

Loser: Starting slow (again)

For the third straight game, the Titans looked downright terrible in the first half. This team doesn’t come alive until after halftime, and even then the second halves have been better but not better enough to overcome what is an ultimately losing effort.

Tennessee has to do a better job coming out looking like the tougher, more physical, more hungry team. Because so far this year, they haven’t once.

The defense struggles to get off the field. The offense struggles to stay on the field. They get bodied in the time of possession battle on a consistent basis, usually on the order of 1.5-to-2 times the amount of possession for the opposing team. That’s a losing recipe, and it puts them in a hole they wait too long to dig out of.

Winner: Finishing strong

The corresponding winner is finishing strong, because for the second straight week, the Titans have come out of halftime and played better football. Robert Saleh said in Week 1, where he went into the half against the Jets, that he was willing to bet everything his family has on this team coming out looking better in the second half. They have, for the past two games, done exactly that.

Has it been enough? No, it has not! I appreciate that this team has some fight in them. They’ve shown it for two weeks now. They don’t just roll over after terrible first halves. But this is a backhanded winner, as all winners may be in a losing effort like this. They are finishing strong, but not strong enough to win these games.

Loser: Cam Ward’s promising second half

Cam Ward is going to be the subject of discussion in this game because he had two brutal plays during the Titans’ comeback effort in the second half that really flipped the game’s trajectory.

The first was a wide-open look for wide receiver Carnell Tate on what would have been a touchdown to get the Titans on the board in the middle of the second half. It was the first of three nice drives Tennessee had on offense moving the ball into the red zone, and they only capitalized on one.

Ward didn’t just miss Tate. It would be one thing if he missed because he was dealing with traffic in the pocket, or was off balance because of crashing defenders, or just barely missed and the ball went off the receiver’s fingertips. That would be frustrating, but not confusing.

This kind of miss is confounding. It’s one of those confounding Cam Ward misses we’ve seen too many of this year, because the ball wasn’t even in the same area code as his intended receiver. Not even close!

The other play was the final offensive snap of the game. Ward threw an interception during a scramble drill with time remaining on the clock, something on the order of 15 to 20 seconds, with two timeouts remaining. They had time to try again. Instead, while scrambling to his left, he tried to force the ball into Elic Ayomanor in the back of the end zone and threw it directly to an underneath defender.

Here’s what is truly maddening: besides those two plays, I thought Cam Ward showed me things I’m wanting to see from him! Those three drives where Tennessee moved the ball well weren’t just on the back of the run game. I thought Ward got into a rhythm. His ball placement, which I’d talked a lot about in the first two weeks as being a real concern, was a lot better. His pocket management, which I talked about as a big concern, was a lot better. He looked like a guy who was confident and willing to push the ball down the field.

Even the near-interception in the red zone on the same trip where he missed Tate, that was clearly a miscommunication. It’s Week 3, and he and his receiver need to get on the same page. But that wasn’t a ball placement issue or a recklessness issue in my eyes. That was a miscommunication issue. I thought Ward did some genuinely defensible things in the second half of this game. But those two nuclear bad plays make it impossible to talk about anything else. Ward’s promising second half is a loser because two big plays made it impossible to discuss the progress.

Winner: Titans in the trenches

The Titans pass rush showed up in this game. Defensive tackle Jeffrey Simmons continues to float above all of the nonsense going on with Tennessee right now. He has looked like the best defensive tackle in football through his first three games. It’s not a slow start. There’s no inconsistency. He’s just really freaking good. Rookie edge rusher Keldrick Faulk got his first sack. Defensive end John Franklin-Myers batted down a ball on a key play. The pass rush did a lot of nice things in this one.

On the other side of the ball, the Titans offensive line looked quite good, especially after losing a starter early. Rookie right guard Fernando Carmona went down on the first play of offense for Tennessee. Jackson Slater stepped in, and the offensive line as a whole did well on the day. We’ll see the advanced metrics and the tape on Monday, but the early returns and the eye test suggest a solid performance up front.

The Titans in the trenches were promising, and it did not matter. It did not matter in the rain and with the deficiencies of the rest of the team.

Loser: Wan’Dale Robinson’s painful drops

Wan’Dale Robinson got into a rhythm and was a bigger part of the receiving game in a way we were expecting to see from him in a lot of Titans games this year as a volume receiver. He had 11 targets, caught seven balls for 57 yards and a touchdown. But twice he really sold Cam Ward on passes that hit him in the hands that he has to catch.

Early in the game, when things were lifeless in that first half, those two drops made it difficult for the Titans to get the ball rolling. Tennessee is paying him too much for him to be dropping those balls. I understand that it was raining, but that makes this even more brutal. Robinson’s drops are a loser in this one.

Loser: Missed turnover opportunities

At the very beginning of the game, an opportunity existed for the tide to turn way earlier. On the opening kickoff, Titans return man Chim Dike fumbled for the second time on kickoff return this year. He is not starting this year as the All-Pro rookie return man we saw him be last season. I wonder if there’s an element of pressing going on. Maybe it’s just reversion to the mean with some bad luck. Whatever it is, he has not picked up where he left off, and that’s disappointing.

Then a little later in the first half, safety Amani Hooker jumped a pass from quarterback Jameis Winston that he could have intercepted and potentially taken a long way to set the Titans up in excellent field position, if not scored outright. He jumped it and the ball just bounced off his hands. Those are the kinds of plays that flip games for the Titans, and they didn’t come to pass.