By Don Stone - Football
Atlanta
You could say that, in the Falcons third preseason game, the starters won
17-10. And the backups lost 14-0. That's pretty much what happened. But, its
a four quarter game. And, add it all together, you come up with a 24-17
loss.
Normally, the third game of the preseason is the time when you dig
a little deeper into the talent pool of a team to see what parts are worth
keeping and which ones don't quite measure up.
But, in this one there seemed to be a bit more urgency involved.
Game one saw Atlanta win their first preseason game since 2012. But, they
took a major step back by getting shellacked 32-7 in Houston by the team
with the worst record in the NFL last year. When the HBO cameras catching
every move and conversation at Flowery Branch for this season's edition of
"Hard Knocks," they're even more under the microscope.
The Falcons desperately want to show the football world that last
year's 4-12 record was a blip on the screen and not what their talent is
capable of. A few injuries in camp have slowed things down some with the two
most significant seeing Steven Jackson
missing time with another hamstring and LT Sam Baker
out for the season after suffering a knee
injury in Houston.
That move in particular creates an opportunity for first round draft
choice Jake Matthews as he shifts from
right to left tackle. Lamar Holmes and
Ryan Schraeder are battling it out to
fill the vacated RT spot.
The nickel back spot will be worth keeping an eye on with Robert
McClain, Javier Arenas and Josh Wilson
trying to make a good impression there.
A player I have enjoyed watching has been rookie Prince Shembo.
He has been getting more reps in practice with the A team and will be
pushing last year's starter Joplo Bartu.
The starters saw more playing time than normal for a game three as they
tried to get a lead before turning over the keys to the a lot of guys who
may not even be wearing Falcon uniforms in two weeks.
Going in, this one looked like a potential
for lots of points since both teams rank among the last in the NFL in
defense.
In two weeks, the rival Saints will be here when it counts. But for now,
it was the Titans when some things counted more than others.
But, its how your starters play that counts the most. And, in this one,
they took charge, staying in for the whole first half giving the team a
17-10 lead.
"One of the
things we talked about during the week is that we wanted to start fast, "
said quarterback Matt Ryan. "I thought
tonight we did a great job of that offensively."
In their first drive, Devin Hester
exploded with a catch at the Tennessee 31 and sprinted to the end zone to
make it 7-0.
The Falcons struck quickly in
their next drive with an exciting 52 yard pass to Julio Jones
that went the distance putting them up 14-3.
Their last two drives of the half reminded us of previous inefficiencies
in short yardage situations. The first began well as a 23 yard interference
penalty on CB Tommie Campbell put
Atlanta at the Tennessee 26. The flag happy officials gave them the
ball on the 11 with still another call, this time on CB Blidi Wreh-Wilson.
Harry Douglas caught one on the four but
that's all they got, settling for a 22 yard Matt Bryant
field goal, putting them up 17-3. Given the number of free yards they were
given, they should have put more on the board.
The Falcons would move to the Titan 39 but would hit a wall when a 4th
and one was stopped keeping the score at 17-10 going into the locker room.
Both starting quarterbacks performed well with each leaving after one
series in the third quarter. Ryan went 18 of 23 for 224 yards and two
touchdowns while Locker hit 12 of his 17 passes for 188 yards and one 63
yard bomb to Nate Washington.
Once they and most of the starters took to the sidelines, it was
Tennessee's game to dominate. With T.J Yates
and Sean Renfree at the helm, Atlanta
was shutout, giving the Titans the open door to make up the seven point
deficit, which they did, adding another TD for good measure and a 24-17 win.
"We did not execute at all in the second half of the ball game," said
head coach Mike Smith.
But, even with the loss, the Falcons could walk away with some
satisfaction on how the starters played. But, as with the previous loss in
Houston, the lack of depth came across. The concern is, if any of the
primary players can't perform, plugging in many of the backups may create
problems.
Another area of concern is the amount of yardage that is being lost to
penalties. Smith has been emphasizing to the team in practice about the
potential yardage that was getting called back with useless penalties,
especially on some explosive plays. The head coach apparently will have more
speeches to give as penalty after penalty either slowed down or stopped
promising drives.
Penalties were the dominant plays on many drives. Early on,
Jacquizz Rodgers got Atlanta into enemy
territory with a pair of nice runs for 9 and 15 yards. But a pair of
offensive pass interference calls on Roddy White
along with an off sides penalty moved them back to where they started. The
drive ended there when a scuffle broke out with offsetting calls.
"We had way too many penalties," Smith said. "I think we had 10 accepted
penalties (for 97 yards), and there were probably four or five where
there were penalties called, and the ball was completed and they were not
accepted."
Later in the first quarter, CB Robert Alford
was called for pass interference on a third down play, giving the Titans new
life and moving the ball 17 yards to the AF 34.
Another drive would have gone nowhere but was extended with another call
on Alford at the 15.
The coach continued.
"That’s an area of concern; it has been all preseason, not only for the
Atlanta Falcons, but for the entire National Football League. Hopefully, we
will all get this figured out before the start of the regular season.”
Time is running out to do that. One more game on Thursday night in
Jacksonville and that start will be here. |