Atlanta Falcons head coach Dan Quinn said after a Week 9 loss that he has confidence in his team's offense, but he elected not to trust the unit to get 2 yards on a fourth-and-goal situation. Instead, Quinn decided to kick a field goal that was the worst decision possible, mathematically.
Falcons need offensive turnaround to keep playoff hopes alive
After starting 5-0, the Falcons have lost three out of four and have some serious problems to fix on offense.
The 17-16 loss to the San Francisco 49ers was the worst offensive performance of the year for the Falcons and the third loss in the last four weeks for a team that started 5-0 while averaging more than 400 yards per game.
Week 10 will give the Falcons the bye to regroup, which the team so desperately needs. But if Week 9 wasn’t rock bottom for the Atlanta offense and the downward spiral continues into Week 11, the Falcons could jeopardize their seemingly easy path to the postseason.
“I’ll get right to the start of it, the sequencing at the end of the game, the fourth down play, I chose to kick it there,” Quinn explained after the game. “Thought we were getting the stops defensively, we’d get the kick, get stops, use our timeouts and then go attack on offense. We’re a really good two-minute team on offense. So, that was the reasoning for it.”
Confidence in the two-minute offense is one thing, but Quinn didn't count on Ryan or running back Devonta Freeman to get the 2 yards the team needed and instead relied on the team's defense to get a stop. Unfortunately, the defense couldn't pull it off.
Julio Jones is back, but it's not helping
The star wide receiver started the season in the most electrifying way possible, racking up 34 receptions for 440 yards and four touchdowns in just three games. Then, just like that, he was gone. In the next four games, he managed just 24 receptions for 290 yards and one touchdown.
It didn’t matter too much because the Falcons won three of those four games, but his resurgence in the last two weeks (22 receptions for 299 yards and a touchdown) hasn’t led to wins.
The problem isn't really Jones, but that the Falcons haven't been able to balance his success with a decent rushing attack. Only once has Jones finished with more than 100 receiving yards when the Falcons offense has tallied more than 120 rushing yards. It was a 39-28 win over the Cowboys.
Otherwise, his big days haven’t coincided with much success on the ground.
Where has the running game gone?
Matt Ryan, for all his faults, has been as consistent as any quarterback in the NFL this season. He's always good for at least 250 yards, but has yet to eclipse 400 or even throw three touchdowns in a game. His passer rating has been between 90 and 113 in all but two games.
What hasn’t been consistent is Atlanta’s commitment to running the ball. Against the 49ers on Sunday, the Falcons gained just 17 rushing yards on 14 attempts. Before Week 9, San Francisco allowed 123.8 rushing yards per game.
After beginning the season with rookie Tevin Coleman as the starting running back, Freeman has since taken over the duties and emerged as one of the NFL's leading running backs. Freeman scored nine rushing touchdowns over a five-game span earlier in the season and is second in the NFL in rushing yards, behind only Adrian Peterson.
But the Falcons haven’t committed themselves to running the ball on a consistent basis. In games when the Falcons attempted more than 30 rushes, the team has a 5-0 record and an average of 29.6 points per game. In the four games with fewer than 30 rushing attempts, the Falcons are 1-3 with 20.3 points per game.
Of course, being behind in games leads to more passing, and banging your head against a wall when the running game isn’t working can be frustrating. But it was never more clear than on Sunday that when the rushing game isn’t there for the Falcons offense, the team struggles to score points.
Frustration is building on offense
The Falcons averaged 32.4 points during the 5-0 start, but have just 16.8 points per game since. And it’s not as though the team faced the defensive juggernauts of the NFL in the last four weeks either.
Atlanta managed just 21 points against the No. 31 defense of the Saints, who have allowed an average of 30.9 points in their other eight games. The Buccaneers are No. 29 in the NFL in points allowed and the 49ers are No. 27 in total yards allowed. Only the Tennessee Titans are above the league average in total defense and points allowed, but the Falcons are the only team in 2015 that couldn’t even score two touchdowns against them.
“We’ve been on film for the last several weeks now.” Falcons wide receiver Roddy White told D. Orlando Ledbetter of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “We’ve got to mix it up. Find other ways to clean up formations, motion guys and Texas (no huddle) and stuff like that. Everybody is running the same plays in the NFL.”
Matt Ryan was quick to defend Quinn’s decision to kick a field goal and offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan’s play-calling on Sunday, but White’s comments and criticisms from Julio Jones about the amount of time spent in the huddle, suggest some of the team’s stars on offense aren’t thrilled with the way things are being handled and want to see some adjustments made.
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The slide for the Falcons has far from removed them from the postseason picture. Six teams get to go to the playoffs from the NFC and only six teams in the conference have winning records. While the Carolina Panthers continue to pull away in the NFC South, the Falcons are well in control of a wild card spot at 6-3.
But the team already has a loss to the New Orleans Saints, who sit two games behind the Falcons at 4-5, and the two teams are slated to face each other again in Week 17.
Ahead of the Saints in the NFC Wild Card race are the St. Louis Rams, Seattle Seahawks and Philadelphia Eagles who all sit at 4-4, although the Falcons beat the Eagles in Week 1.
Five of the last seven opponents for the Falcons are a combined 19-23, so the back half of the schedule isn’t brutal, but that doesn’t include two games in a three-week span against the 8-0 Carolina Panthers.
If the Falcons can’t figure things out offensively soon, at least one lurking NFC contender could come for the postseason slot that looked like it was securely Atlanta’s at the end of October.
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