Amon-Ra St. Brown and the Detroit Lions saw their impressive season end abruptly last Saturday night when they were defeated at home by the Washington Commanders, 45-31, in the divisional round.

This was the biggest surprise of this year’s NFL playoffs, as Detroit was the No. 1 seed in the NFC and had just come off a bye week. Their high-powered offense appeared set to carry the team to its first Super Bowl appearance, but now they are left watching the rest of the playoffs from the sidelines, pondering what might have been.

St. Brown was asked on his podcast this week which playoff loss was more painful—this year’s loss to Washington or last year’s defeat to the San Francisco 49ers in the NFC championship game, where they held a 24-7 lead at halftime before falling 34-31.

“Last year,” St. Brown replied. “The only reason I say that is because this year was more of a shock, but last year hurt more because we were so close. Even at halftime, we thought, ‘We’re going to the Super Bowl, just have to finish this second half.’

“This year we didn’t even make it to the NFC championship. It was almost a first-round exit. Both losses hurt, but last year stung a little more.”

After defeating Detroit, Jayden Daniels and the Commanders will head to Philadelphia this Sunday to face the Eagles in the NFC title game.