To state the obvious controlling the ball and keeping the offense on the field gives the other team less chances. I'm not saying the D shouldn't have done better, but this was another game where we were on the wrong end of the TOP.
So in my opinion, in the Lions game, it had nothing to do with the offense. Long term, what's becoming clear is that this offense is more of a "big play" offense than it may ever has been, which means explosive plays usually lead to scoring quicker with less TOP. So the defense will likely need to adjust to that.
In the Lions game, I don't really see the "tired" defense issue.:
First drive of the game the Lions went 67 yards on 11 plays for a TD.
Second TD was off a 18 play, 98 yard drive that lasted nearly 11 minutes. This was early second quarter, and the Lions had the ball for about 8 minutes in the first quarter, so they weren't "tired".
Third TD drive was a 7 play, 60 yard drive, mid-third quarter, in which the Ravens had a long, lengthy drive for a TD before that. Essentially the defense hadn't played a snap in like over 30 minutes of "real time" when they gave up that drive.
You could argue the 4th TD in early 4th quarter could be due to "fatigue", considering we went 3 and out right before, but the 3rd and 4th TD drives for the Lions lasted last than 4 minutes each. They were explosive play, big yardage drives.
I fully think the final TD drive to go up 38-24 was fatigue driven, but that's sort of game over already. Wasn't needed.
Bottom line for me... there was at least three, long TD drives the defense gave up that had nothing to do with what the offense did before them. They couldn't argue fatigue. They just get bullied.