The Atlanta Falcons were literally and figuratively in a fog Sunday night.
I sat down to watch what surely would be a great football game when Atlanta visited New England for the kind of game the media loves to dub a “Super Bowl rematch.” Since both teams now have players who did not participate in that epic comeback/collapse in Houston, that statement doesn’t exactly apply.
Lost in the fog and struggling to hold the ball, what were the Falcons doing in a game you at least expected them to play with froth hanging from their face masks? The still-talented dirty birds did next to nothing moving the chains against the Patriots’ resurgent defense, and reigning MVP Matt Ryan played like the fog that engulfed Foxboro as the night wore on was clouding his mind as well as his vision.
As for coach Dan Quinn? What was he thinking when he twice went for fourth and long near the 50, risking handing the ball to Tom Brady with a short field? Perhaps the site of all those mocking “28-3” signs – the score when the Patriots began their amazing rally in Super Bowl 51 – made Quinn decompose.
Ryan bailed him out on the first fourth down by scrambling past the chains. But the second with two minutes to play in the first half failed, and Brady predictably drove his team to a touchdown and 17-0 lead with 21 ticks left. As they say is Boston, GAME OVA! The second half was the Fog Bowl, as refs called only one penalty after flinging flags galore in the first half. But the Falcons were clearly cooked anyway.
Former offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan, now head coach of the 49ers, got all kinds of heat for not taking two knees and kicking a field goal that would have won the Super Bowl. But these Falcons sure need some of what Shanahan did right. They have play-makers but couldn’t find a way to unleash them against a defense that had been presenting as one of the worst in the NFL.
The sad thing about a good team like the 2016 Falcons having a great season and almost winning a Super Bowl is after that last game, it’s all too easy to wonder if and when they would ever get back there. So much changes from season to season in pro football that one such trip does not guarantee or beget another. While losing to a team that obviously knows how to do it, the latest Falcons played as if they don’t.
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