NEW YORK — So this is how it ends. It ends on a sunny afternoon at Yankee Stadium, the outcome long expected yet finally here. It ends with offseason plans and vows for improvement and a bitterness that must linger within the minds of the Orioles.

For the past two seasons, Game 162 was just the start. As it turned out, Baltimore didn’t do much in the postseason, but there was at least something to look forward to at the end of September.

This year, there are no tears. This has been coming for far too long for that vibrant an emotional release. There is instead the dull ache of shortcomings from almost everyone involved in the organization, and the finale to this season comes in the form of a series sweep at the hands of the New York Yankees.

To get to this point, much had to go wrong. It did. And the slog of the final few months finally gives way to the winter after Baltimore’s 3-2 loss to the New York Yankees on Sunday.

“Losing is really miserable and really hard to go through,” interim manager Tony Mansolino said. “I don’t think, when you feel miserable and you’re unhappy with how you’re playing, things go by quickly. I think it’s quite the opposite. I do think it slows to a crawl in a lot of ways.”

The loss encapsulated some of the problems for the Orioles over the course of the season. Even with a solid pitching effort, the bats weren’t lively enough.

Baltimore finishes the year 75-87 and enters a pivotal offseason full of questions. Those questions start internally, infielder Jordan Westburg said.

“I think there needs to be a reflection from everybody in this clubhouse, on a big scale and on a small scale,” Westburg said. “What did every individual do or did not do to add to this or to make us where we are? And then, kind of, what can we do to change things?”

In Sarasota, Florida, during spring training, the Orioles spoke of World Series aspirations. The drop from there was stark, and much of it was due to the dreadful beginning to the season. The upturn in late May, which left the Orioles with a winning record over the final 112 games, was a positive. But it did little to change the outcome of the year.

“I felt like we showed a lot of fight these last few weeks,” right-hander Kyle Bradish said. “We started playing good ball. Unfortunately, we dug ourselves in a bigger hole to start the year, but I think the focus of this offseason and next year is just coming out, working on everything we need to do to not have that happen next year.”

The swings from Gunnar Henderson and Westburg in the fourth inning are part of the reason there is still promise surrounding this club. They lifted back-to-back homers — creating a three-way tie with Jackson Holliday for the team lead with 17 — against right-hander Luis Gil to briefly gave Baltimore a lead.

For Henderson, that was his first homer since Aug. 24. The power drop-off was one of the more noticeable regressions among Orioles players, but he is far from alone in underperforming. The offense at large scuffled for much of the second half.

That lead evaporated rapidly, too. Bradish allowed the game-tying run in the bottom half of the fourth, and he finished his short season with two runs in four innings. Bradish largely impressed in his return from elbow surgery. He completed only 32 innings but had a 2.53 ERA.

And now he heads into the winter as one of Baltimore’s top returning starters.

“I think the biggest thing is being healthy,” Bradish said. “I haven’t had a normal offseason for two years, so it’ll be nice to do a lot of things and work on a lot of stuff.”

After Bradish, right-hander Dean Kremer closed his account with 1 1/3 scoreless innings out of the bullpen. He finished one inning shy of his career high, and his 4.19 ERA was another positive pitching development as he looks set to be a back-end rotation option next year, too.

The Yankees broke through against right-hander Rico Garcia, though. Ben Rice, who homered against Bradish in the first inning, launched his second long ball of the game in the eighth.

Even with the win, New York finished second in the American League East behind the Toronto Blue Jays. The tight division battle came down to the final day, and the Orioles would’ve made Toronto’s job easier had they won. But, with a tiebreaker in favor of the Blue Jays, their own win against the Tampa Bay Rays finished a strong season with a title.

Three American League East teams will head to the postseason: the Blue Jays, Yankees and Boston Red Sox. The Orioles looked up at them for most of the season, and that’s where they ended, in last place in the division.

“You take away that April and May, and if you strip those two months out right there, we would have been playing very important games here in September, and likely with a different roster in a lot of ways,” Mansolino said. “Proud of the guys, regardless of how those first two months went. But, yeah, it was a long year.”

From here, the Orioles will disperse for the winter. They will reflect on all that went wrong, and that reflection may point the finger multiple ways. There were injuries and underperformances. There were firings and a trade deadline sell-off. All of that led to Sunday, which brought about another loss.

So here it is, the offseason. It will be a critical one for all involved, even if the lasting emotion mirrors that of previous endings.

“Making it to playoffs, not making the playoffs, either way, you’re going home angry,” Kremer said.

This article has been updated.