The Falcoholic
Jones put on a valiant performance in one of his last 100-yard games as a Falcon to lead them to an upset win over the eventual NFC Conference Champions in San Francisco.
As proven during the 2013-2014 and 2018-2019 seasons, Julio Jones still shone bright even during the gloomiest of times. 2019 was the second consecutive lost year, where the primes of Jones and Matt Ryan were wasted due to poor front office decisions, questionable coaching, and young players not developing into dependable starters. At one point, Dan Quinn was on the verge of being fired. Jones went out to publicly defend the embattled head coach following a disastrous 1-7 start.
Jones took the initiative to help bring some respectability back to an organization that was losing its way. Winning three of five games going into a matchup against a terrific San Francisco team injected some spirit into a dejected Falcons’ locker room.
It was going to be a daunting challenge to beat San Francisco, especially with Calvin Ridley injured and Mohamed Sanu traded to New England. A once high-powered offense was left with Jones, an emerging Austin Hooper, and Russell Gage in his second year.
With the 49ers having one of their vintage, vicious defenses and Atlanta struggling to run the ball, this had all the makings of being a one-sided game. Jones was going to do everything he could to make it competitive.
The box score tells the story of how much the offense depended on its superstar wide receiver. Ryan completed 25 of 39 passes for 210 yards and two touchdowns. Jones caught 13 passes on 20 targets for 134 yards and two touchdowns. It was one of those classic games in which the game plan was built on throwing the ball to number 11, getting the ball to number 11, and forgetting anything that didn’t count on number 11 making a play.
San Francisco wasn’t altering its coverage to prevent him from receiving the ball. They trusted their pass rush to rattle Ryan, with its physical secondary doing its part to disrupt the passing game’s rhythm. The quickness with which Ryan got the ball out to Jones caught them off guard. Jones had only one reception over 20+ air yards, which came on his first catch of the game off a go route. Besides that, it was a methodical approach led by the 2019 second-team All-Pro wide receiver to be efficient against a top-tier defense.
They targeted him often on shallow crosses and quick outs to keep the chains moving. Without being able to run the ball effectively, Dirk Koetter did what he could to avoid third-and-long situations by designing plays to get the ball to Jones early and often. That limited San Francisco’s ferocious pass rush to only two sacks and eight hits on 41 drop-backs.
Providing Ryan some much-needed relief with a well-structured game plan allowed Jones the platform to carry the offense like he’s proven he can do numerous times...
