Falcons Take Care Of Rams

I was in attendance for today’s loss to the Falcons, and overall I thought the team played fairly well considering they were defeated by a score of 34-17. I’ll get deeper into the game tomorrow, but my first thought was that the better team won today. The Rams certainly proved they can play with anyone (at least at home), but Atlanta was just a deeper, more balanced squad.

I had a couple of issues with the game, first of which was the play-calling. It did look like the team made an effort to throw the ball downfield more today, which I liked, but Steven Jackson did not touch the ball nearly enough. Also, I’d like to know why Mardy Gilyard got little or no action on offense. Hopefully I can find out tomorrow, but I don’t remember him being on the field for any offensive snaps. He played on special teams, so hopefully I can get more info on that before tomorrow’s post.

Finally, and probably most important, the pass-rush was practically nonexistent. The team didn’t get any pressure on Matt Ryan, and when they did blitz, he picked us apart with his hot reads. To tie into that point, the third down defense is becoming a major issue. There was a 3rd-and-13 in the first half that was converted and a 3rd-and-14 in the second half, and both drives ended in touchdowns. That’s two weeks in a row that the inability to get off the field on third-and-long killed us. It needs to be fixed.

Injury Report: Rodger Saffold will have an MRI on his shoulder in the next few days, as he suffered an injury late in the game. There were several instances of cramping, but other than that the team came out of this one relativly unscathed.