The Falcoholic
Rather than focus on how snaps counts have been divvied up, which is pretty standard at this point in the season, I’d rather focus on some personnel issues that cropped up in this game in part because of who was playing and why.
Kirk Cousins: 69
Jake Matthews: 69
Matthew Bergeron: 69
Ryan Neuzil: 69
Chris Lindstrom: 69
Elijah Wilkinson: 69
Darnell Mooney: 66
Kyle Pitts: 63
Bijan Robinson: 60
David Sills: 58
Charlie Woerner: 43
Dylan Drummond: 21
Deven Thompkins: 9
Teagan Quitoriano: 6
Feleipe Franks: 1
Jovaughn Gwyn: 1
Deadening stuff. The Falcons largely abandoned the three tight end formations that helped them a week ago, returning to rolling out three wide receivers, and to the enormous credit of Sills, Pitts, and Woerner, they managed to run effectively. The problem was that the passing game, which was better than it had any right to be, still had massive problems largely caused by the receivers.
Sills had his best game yet, but also a costly late drop. Mooney is the team’s de facto #1 receiver but is playing like another practice squad elevation outside of last week’s big effort; he had multiple drops and was barely a factor out there. The actual practice squad players, either current or former, had more grabs combined than Mooney easily, and that was with Drummond only catching one of three passes thrown his way. Hell, Thompkins looked interesting!
The team’s extremely limited receiving options are forcing Robinson to dig into a bag that seems deeper than it once was, but is still prone to uselessness on third down. The direness of the personnel situation has Robinson leaning heavily on trickery, be it a short yardage toss or a 3rd and 8 screen, in the hopes of defeating Atlanta’s innate lack of options. I’d argue the Falcons have shown just enough to try to win matchups straight up in those situations, given that the alternative has been putrid, but it’s obvious the Falcons have outsized trust in Sills and virtually none in anybody else not named Pitts or Bijan.
This is a mess, in other words, one that Drake London’s return will only partially fix. I’m simultaneously sympathetic to the Falcons and Robinson for having to muddle through with this many losses and angry that their planning has been poor enough to put themselves in this situation in the first place.
Kaden Elliss: 66
Divine Deablo: 66
A.J. Terrell: 66
Xavier Watts: 66
Jessie Bates: 66
Mike Hughes: 66
Dee Alford: 42
Ruke Orhorhoro: 40
Brandon Dorlus: 37
Jalon Walker: 34
David Onyemata: 33
James Pearce Jr.: 33
Leonard Floyd: 33
Kentavius Street: 22
Ronnie Harrison: 21
LaCale London: 19
Arnold Ebiketie: 16
Tyrod Taylor completed 19 passes on the day, and five of them went for a combined 13 yards working against Kaden Elliss (1 for -5), A.J. Terrell (1 for 3), Xavier Watts (1 for 4), and Jessie Bates (2 for 11). That means that his...
