Falcons: Perhaps our offensive SCHEME is the problem.

[ChrisD]

(10-14-2012 10:24 PM)AUTiger7222 Wrote:  It looked like HD was suppose to run a drag route across the middle of the field but he didn't cut his route sharp enough straight across and it made it easy for the defender to jump the route and get the interception.

HD ran a route where he kept giving ground and running away from Ryan, instead of cutting straight across and using his body to shield off the defender, like Tony Gonzalez does, which allowed the defender to jump the route.

Even if Douglas was suppose to run a drag route, it shouldn't matter because Ryan shouldn't have thrown that ball. Douglas was covered from the very snap of the ball and the defender had position on him the entire time. Let's not put the fact aside that Douglas has NEVER been the type of receiver to fight for position with defenders, I don't think he was even expecting that ball to come to him at that point based on how the corner was playing him. Just because the team runs a lot of timing based plays doesn't mean you just step back and heave. You have to be aware of where the defenders are and what type of receiver your throwing it to.

I'm not saying "Oh we are 6-0, BUT" I'm just saying maybe the manilla plays that are remaining in this offensive scheme can be partly blamed for a lot of the mistakes that we have seen up to this point. So don't take it the wrong way, I love that we are 6-0 and we are winning games, but I want to make sure the Falcons continue to win games and fix issues.

And yes, I do believe majority of the starter in the league at quarterback hold on to that ball when they are getting smashed. Yesterday, Matt Ryan had one of the finest Jay Cutler impressions I have ever seen.

[JDaveG]

I think there's a difference between the offensive playbook and the offensive scheme.

What they said remained 80% the same as under Mularkey is the playbook. And lets think about that for a minute -- 20% different plays is a lot. It's 1/5 of the plays that are available to the team being completely different. Add to that the fact that schematically, what a coach does with those plays can be completely different, and you end up with a bit larger difference than is being made out in this thread.

Koetter has been staying vanilla the past few weeks. Some shots downfield, stick with the run, hit the intermediate passes, etc. But even with that, I see us going over the deep middle more, especially on 3rd downs. I see us having more receivers out in space to stretch the field. We emphasize the pass more than the run. Etc. The offense looks much the same by formation, but what we're doing with the offense is significantly different. Whether that's good or bad remains to be seen. The first 2 weeks it looked fantastic. Now, it looks less so. We'll see.

[Beef]

I don't think we're staying vanilla. If not for those first 2 interceptions, those were pass attempts of 30 and 40 yards down field. There were also a couple drops on 20 or so yard pass attempts as well.

Matt could have easily had 350-400 yards passing yesterday.

The biggest difference with our offense, and how I know it's 1000x better and not really vanilla, is that I can't guess what we're going to do every down and get it right very often. Under MM, my 12 year old daughter was telling me the play we were going to run and she was correct about 80% of the time, which means we were crazy predictable. That's just not the case anymore.

The one big thing that bugs me most about or offense is the run game feels like we're just doing something wrong. It looks to me like we line our RB's up too far back. By the time they get the handoff and make it 7-8 yards to the line, any holes that were there in the instant after the snap are closed up.

It's a catch-22. Sometimes you have to give the OL time to open up holes and sometimes you give too much time and the holes close too soon. I'm noticing that the vast majority of the time, our OL opens up holes quickly and lets them close quickly, and our RB's are too far back to make it into the lanes before the holes close. I bet if Turner was lined up in the FB position more often, he would have a lot more success. He'd be into and through those holes while they're actually open.

[raysnill1]

(10-15-2012 01:49 PM)ChrisD Wrote:  Even if Douglas was suppose to run a drag route, it shouldn't matter because Ryan shouldn't have thrown that ball. Douglas was covered from the very snap of the ball and the defender had position on him the entire time. Let's not put the fact aside that Douglas has NEVER been the type of receiver to fight for position with defenders, I don't think he was even expecting that ball to come to him at that point based on how the corner was playing him. Just because the team runs a lot of timing based plays doesn't mean you just step back and heave. You have to be aware of where the defenders are and what type of receiver your throwing it to.

I'm not saying "Oh we are 6-0, BUT" I'm just saying maybe the manilla plays that are remaining in this offensive scheme can be partly blamed for a lot of the mistakes that we have seen up to this point. So don't take it the wrong way, I love that we are 6-0 and we are winning games, but I want to make sure the Falcons continue to win games and fix issues.

And yes, I do believe majority of the starter in the league at quarterback hold on to that ball when they are getting smashed. Yesterday, Matt Ryan had one of the finest Jay Cutler impressions I have ever seen.

that wasn't on Harry. instead of double pumping on the throw Ryan should have fired soon as HD came out of his break. matter of fact on every INT or almost INT Ryan threw yesterday he hesitated. go back and look again.

[ChrisD]

Did you read my post? I just said it was on Ryan. It was a terrible decision to throw that ball there. Read the post man.

[raysnill1]

(10-15-2012 06:38 PM)ChrisD Wrote:  Did you read my post? I just said it was on Ryan. It was a terrible decision to throw that ball there. Read the post man.

that wasn't supposed to go there. my bad man. there was one that said that it was on Harry, I agree with you though.

[JDaveG]

(10-15-2012 03:19 PM)Beef Wrote:  I don't think we're staying vanilla. If not for those first 2 interceptions, those were pass attempts of 30 and 40 yards down field. There were also a couple drops on 20 or so yard pass attempts as well.

Matt could have easily had 350-400 yards passing yesterday.

I don't mean we aren't taking shots. You can take shots from basic looks. I mean we aren't really doing a lot outside the box like we did the 1st 2 games.

Maybe it's just that when we do it isn't working (pass to Hawley, etc.), but in the first 2 games I recall more misdirection and more variety in formations. Lately it's looked like we're doing more max protect and passing from it (telegraphing your move), and when we do spread looks we're either straight passing or running draws instead of using the RB as a weapon in the pass game, etc.

[AUTiger7222]

I just got done watching Bengals game from 2010 and the offense that day was awesome. The Falcons racked up 39 points, 452 yards of offense and it was a very balanced attack. Ryan had 299 yards passing and the Falcons had 153 yards on the ground, 121 of those yards by Turner. There was 34 passing plays called and 29 rushing plays.

If the Falcons could get back to running the ball like they did that day with Koetter's influence in the passing game, and having Julio (who we didn't have yet in 2010) we could finally be a Super Bowl caliber offense.

[FullMetalFalcon23]

I agree. I really want balance. It may not ever truly arrive this year. In not giving up hope. But I know it will be there next season. We still want to be able run the ball. Our coaches are not that ignorant to what helps win football games.