New Orleans Report: Controversy in Atlanta

Tweet Week 10 was by no means the most exciting week of football this season. Last Sunday saw blowout after blowout, but not all of the games last week sucked. Cincy vs Blitzburgh was close the whole way and San Fran vs NYG was a lot of fun, but hands down, the best game of the week was the Saints vs the Falcons. I briefly talked about the big matchup in last week’s article, highlighting that the winner would take the lead in the NFC South. Just as we all suspected, the game was extremely close throughout and for the 4th time in a row, the winner of this division matchup was decided by a field goal.

Drew Brees and Matt Ryan are 2 of the best QBs in the league, and both showcased their skill sets last weekend. They combined for almost 700 yards, 4 TDs and only 1 INT. The Saints offence was efficient as always, but the Atlanta D refused to allow the game to turn into a blowout. New Orleans put up 23 points in 60 minutes, which for their high caliber offence is actually pretty pedestrian. Brees spread the ball to 9 different players including 3 running backs and 1 random fullback named Jed Collins. Drew Brees continued both of his streaks of consecutive games with 20+ completions and 1 TD: SWAG. As good as Brees played, Atlanta’s “Matty Ice” had a great game of his own. Ryan threw the only INT of the game, but refused to lose. Matt Ryan never gave up on his team and led a very impressive comeback to tie the game in the final minutes and force a very controversial overtime.

People have been talking about the NO-ATL game all week, but for the wrong reason. In OT, Atlanta’s coach decided to go for broke on 4th and inches from his own 30 yard line. This is one thing I don’t like about NFL “Experts” and the media: if the Falcons convert on 4th down and go on to win the game, Mike Smith gets nominated for coach of the year and everyone talks about how gigantic his balls are, but if they don’t make it, he looks like an idiot and gets crucified for not having any faith in his team. On 4th and inches, Atlanta lined up in their “Big” formation and everyone knew it was going to be a power run up the middle. Many people have a problem with the obvious play call and I would usually agree that you can’t pick such an obvious play, but in this situation, I agreed with Mike Smith and his call. The Falcons running back, Michael Turner, went to the Pro Bowl last year and has been having a good year so far. He weighs 245 lbs and has thighs larger than my torso. WHY WOULD YOU NOT RUN UP THE MIDDLE WITH HIM!?!?!? If the Saints tried to jam it up the gut with 180 lb Darren Sproles, that would be a terrible play call, but to try and get 3 or 4 inches by pounding it up the middle with a small truck is the right decision. The Saints D really stepped it up and managed to stuff the play in the backfield, effectively winning the game. Mike Smith has been blamed all week for making a “bonehead” decision, but 80% of coaches would have made the exact same call.

The 2 main things that people are upset about are the play call and the decision to go for it. First off, any coach who doesn’t believe his 5-3 team can get 3 or 4 inches doesn’t deserve to coach in the NFL and should consider a career in synchronized swimming or some other soft shit. Why would you punt the ball to one of the elite QBs in the league and let him embarrass your team in OT? Smith made the right decision to go for it on 4th down, no doubt. The better argument people have been making is that the play call set the offense up for failure before they even snapped the ball. I’m not even going to waste time explaining why throwing the ball or trying a misdirection play wouldn’t have worked in this situation, so lets talk about the only option that was better than Michael Turner up the middle: Matty Ice calling his own number and QB sneaking. Had Ryan ran the sneak, there’s probably an 80% chance he gets the first down, so why wouldn’t coach Mike Smith call that play? Think about the procedure of a QB sneak: the QB has to dive over the linemen head first against guys who HEAVILY outweigh him looking to knock his head off. Like I said, the chances that Ryan converts on 4th and inches is probably 80%, but the chance that he suffers a concussion (or worse) on a play where the entire D is crashing the middle trying to clog those gaps is far too high for the play to pay off. For anyone who’s thinking, “No, that’s stupid. This is the NFL, no one’s that much of a bitch,” think about this: the QB has the right to audible any call he wants. If Ryan thought that sneaking was going to get them the first down and wasn’t aware of the dangers of the play, why didn’t he audible to call his own number and dive for the first?

The point of my rant is that Mike Smith made the right decision. If you can’t get 3 or 4 inches on 4th down, you really don’t even deserve to win the game. Also, the decision to pound it up the middle with Turner was the right call, because it carried the least amount of risk of a horrible play or injury to your franchise player.

Next week the Saints have a bye, so I won’t be writing about New Orleans. However, I’ve been thinking about next week’s article and I must say, it’s gonna be a good one. Some things to look forward to: Texans’ bad luck, WTF Ravens, Aaron Rodgers and his inflated stats, and the Rookies of the Year.

Week 2: Eagles

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Why am I posting this early Thursday morning? A full 3 days after the game itself? The same reason i ripped off my retro Reggie White jersey in frustration sometime Sunday night after the Philadelphia Eagles blew a practically won road game against the Atlanta Falcons 35-31 (might have something to do with the fact that my work ethic has been Eddy Curry-like this week). Having to remember aspects of this game was about as appealing as apologizing to Floyd Mayweather (It was a sucker punch. Definitely legal and arguably deserved but still a sucker punch). I haven't watched an Eagles game in a while where so many things go wrong at inopportune times giving the opponent a chance to stay in the game. A prime example of this was the fumble the Eagles had right before the half on the Atlanta four yard line that was returned for 64 yards and led to a Falcons touchdown. A 14-point swing on a play where the offensive line for the Eagles seemingly forgot to block one of the Falcons' defenders.

The second half did not start off better as Vick did his patented "I'm getting blitzed so instead of throwing the ball out of bounds I'll just throw it into an area with a 2% chance of a completion" that led to another Falcons TD on the next possession giving them a 21-10 lead. Even at this point my optimism was high as I felt that we had played a better game then them to that point. I ended up being right as Philly scored two touchdowns on their two next possessions taking a 24-21 lead. During this stretch Asante Samuel had a terrific interception and the defense looked great (every time a ball is thrown in the direction of Asomugha, I don't expect the other team to make a play. It's a great feeling). As we were marching down the field into Atlanta territory for our third straight drive, Vick got hit and somehow happened to collide into Todd Herremans' (his own lineman) shoulder with his head sidelining him for the rest of the game with a concussion. It was at this point that Mike Kafka got inserted into the game causing all Eagles fans including myself to think "who the fuck is Mike Kafka?"(here are some other thoughts that all Philly fans had during the game: Can someone tell Tony Gonzalez it's not fucking 2004 anymore?, Dunta Robinson is a fucking (insert any swear word you like), Is Reid trying to set the record for most end around/reverse plays that don't work in one game? Do we even have linebackers?).

Kafka ended up doing a great job as a replacement and the Eagles ended up scoring off a LaSean McCoy run. This is the point where I feared for the worst because it had not been a good sports day up to this point (Earlier in the day, Chelsea had lost to Man U 3-1 after outplaying them for 90 minutes, the game featured Fernando Torres missing a scoring chance that Professor X would have put away.) and I wasn't feeling lucky. The Falcons started running a no-huddle offense and scored two touchdowns on a defense that wasn't able to get its 3 fantastic cornerbacks on the field (Rodgers-Cromartie got practically no playing time this game) at the same time because of the formation Atlanta was calling plays from. They started using their tight ends more once they realized the Eagles' linebackers are average at best. Even with all of this Philadelphia was on the Atlanta 21 with 2 minutes left when Jeremy Maclin (who up to that point had played a very good game) dropped a pass on 4th and 3.

Tough defeat for Philadelphia and next week won't get any easier when they take on the Giants at home. With Michael Vick I think this would be an easy win over New York since their defense is banged up past recognition. With Kafka it will not be an easy game and a team that could have easily started 3-0 might end next Sunday at 1-2. Not the best week for Philadelphia Eagles fans but we still have 15 weeks to go.

Until next time,

Luka Milanovic
@Luka_M91 on twitter