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Falcons drop pre-season game #3  to Titans 24-17

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.

 
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