What is the Falcons Offensive Identity?

[Peyton]

Just curious about everyone's perspective on the Falcons offense last year and what you expect to see this year. Do you think the offense in 2009 was smashmouth, balanced, or pass happy?

By comparison, what about the Saints offensive identity?

Edited May 24, 2010 by Peyton

[The Great American]

Until Turner was injured, we were something between smashmouth and balanced.

Saints - pass happy and why not? They have Drew Brees!

[bossFALCON™]

last year balanced for the most part. i think we will be a pretty balanced O as long as mularkey is here.

the saints i would say are a pass happy team, but if you look at their 09 stats offensively they were really balanced.

[atljbo]

I think we will be balance... I do see Mularkey giving Matt Ryan the chance to do his thing more...

[CHOCTHEFALCONFAN™]

Balanced for me too!

[Jaymadd]

Balanced IMO, with a good amount of playaction when Turner was in. I went backed and watched the Chicago game and I am realizing that having Norwood out really hurt us as far as our offense.

[Peyton]

Ok, so one more question, and don't look it up OK, just answer it from your gut.

Out of 32 teams, where do you think the Falcons and Saints ranked in number of passing attempts last year? How about rushing attempts?

Please don't ruin the fun and look it up, I'm trying to make a point about perceptions here.

Edited May 24, 2010 by Peyton

[innovativefx]

Falcons were below average for pass attempts - probably right at #17.

Saints in 08 were top passing attempts but last year really started to get a run game. Probably #6

[Jaymadd]

Ok, so one more question, and don't look it up OK, just answer it from your gut.

Out of 32 teams, where do you think the Falcons and Saints ranked in number of passing attempts last year? How about rushing attempts?

Please don't ruin the fun and look it up, I'm trying to make a point about perceptions here.

What is the prize?

Passing

Falcons 16

Saints 7

Rushing

Falcons 12

Saints 15 ( I actually think that Saints ran the ball alot compared to last year)

[innovativefx]

Just looked it up... ha not what I thought

[atljbo]

IDK but the way you guys sound... We pass more then we run

Last year.. I think it was 60-40 passing.... With Turner hurt... I think we passed more.

[Peyton]

What is the prize?

Passing

Falcons 16

Saints 7

Rushing

Falcons 12

Saints 15 ( I actually think that Saints ran the ball alot compared to last year)

The prize is scintillating dialogue with myslef lol.

So what you guess, that is probably about what I would have guessed. The actual answers are that in passing attempts, the Falcons were 7th with 570, and the Saints were 15th, with 544.

In rushing attempts, the Saints were 7th with 468, and the Falcons were 11th with 451.

Wierd huh? The Falcons passed the ball more than the Saints last year and ran less.

[Grrrillapmpn Inc.®]

Smashmouth, balanced, or pass happy? None of the above.

I think we were a Run 1st team with the capability to do all of those other three things well. If that makes any sense at all.

[Dog River]

The prize is scintillating dialogue with myslef lol.

So what you guess, that is probably about what I would have guessed. The actual answers are that in passing attempts, the Falcons were 7th with 570, and the Saints were 15th, with 544.

In rushing attempts, the Saints were 7th with 468, and the Falcons were 11th with 451.

Wierd huh? The Falcons passed the ball more than the Saints last year and ran less.

IMO...This was dictated by the type of fronts each offense faced more in 1st down situations.

The saints, whose strength was the pass...saw more 6 and 7 man fronts.

The falcons, whose strength is running the ball, saw a lot of 8 man fronts.

[cooperbh]

I think the team wanted to be a smashmouth offense in '09, but Turner's early ineffectiveness followed by his subsequent injury, along with the defense's inability to stop passing teams from scoring in bunches, forced them all too often to deviate from their gameplan and turn to the pass more than they probably wanted to. The contest against Washington is likely the model for what the coaching staff generally wanted to do in every game last season, but couldn't.

[Misznay-Schardin]

Number of attempts isn't all there is to being "pass happy" or "smash mouth".

We look to the run first and we played from behind at times so we had to throw more. This is why we passed so much more than we ran.

[FalconMama]

The Saints are a balanced football team... That's imo why their offense is so dangerous. When they have both elements working (the run and the pass), they're hard to stop. Definitely the most fun offense in the league to watch.

[kibitzer]

Maybe I don't remember it correctly, but seems I remember being frustrated in watching a lot of games, w/incompletions. Def big play stuff to Jenkins was disappointing. I'm thinking we were higher in pass attempts than we shoulda been maybe. Especially w/Snelling in. Falcons, maybe 12-13ish, Saints around 8-9ish.

Now I need to know where to find out if I was anywhere close. Seems like they were trying to see if they could get the passing game going, especially when we were back on our heels in games, which seemed like that happened a good bit. Norwood wasn't doing much when Turner was injured, or got injured himself and had to come out of games. Snelling did a great job filling in, but couldn't do it all on his own. I DO remember that TG caught what I thought was an unusually high number of passes to go to a tight end, perhaps by necessity, perhaps by design... really don't know on that one.

Edit: lol... stepped away from the PC for a while, and left it in this thread before many of the comments above. Good to see my observations were at least close.

Edited May 24, 2010 by kibitzer

[Peyton]

Now, for my own theories on why the Falcons actually pass the ball more than the Saints and run the ball less (at least in 2009).

The first reason is that the Saints had such a startling completion percentage. They completed 46 more passes than Atlanta, even though they threw it 26 fewer times than Atlanta.

The second thing is, because Mularkey was so intent on running the ball early in games and on 1st down last year, and teams were so intent on stopping Atlanta from running, Mularkey pretty much gave up on the run after the team fell behind in games. Even when the Falcons did throw on 1st down, they weren't taking many shots down the field, so they didn't really give safeties anything to fear.

My personal opinion is that if Mularkey would be more aggresive on 1st down and early in games, then the running game will flow much easier. I actually think that is more the personality the offense had in 08.

Becuase if you start the game trying to cram the ball down the other team's throat and you get nothing, you become pass happy, whether you like it or not.

[Peyton]

IMO...This was dictated by the type of fronts each offense faced more in 1st down situations.

The saints, whose strength was the pass...saw more 6 and 7 man fronts.

The falcons, whose strength is running the ball, saw a lot of 8 man fronts.

I pretty much agree with you. The biggest problem with Atlanta was that lots of times, Mularkey would try and run the ball down the throat of the team showing the 8 man front, instead of trying to punish them with something deep. Eventualy, in several of the games the Falcons lost, they had to pretty much abandon the run altogether.

[kibitzer]

Becuase if you start the game trying to cram the ball down the other team's throat and you get nothing, you become pass happy, whether you like it or not.

That's the gist of it. I would love to see improvement in both completions and YAC (which many deem to be a meaningless statistic, but it doesn't seem that way to me). That's why I like Snelling out there in some situations. He catches better, and then he can bulldoze for a few more.

[Chris D]

To me, being Pass Happy, Balanced, or Smashmouth pertains nothing to how much you run certain types of plays. It pertains to how well the team performs on those certain types of plays. The Saints excel at both running and passing plays, the Falcons are starting to now get there, and are leaning away from the running game, more towards balanced.

[Peyton]

To me, being Pass Happy, Balanced, or Smashmouth pertains nothing to how much you run certain types of plays. It pertains to how well the team performs on those certain types of plays. The Saints excel at both running and passing plays, the Falcons are starting to now get there, and are leaning away from the running game, more towards balanced.

I actually agree with you. I think the Falcons fancy themselves as a "Smash Mouth" football team and the Sean Payton actually loves to pass the ball.

In the end, the Falcons passed so often last year because they had to. I just think if they would have thrown more on 1st down early in games, they might have been able to run the ball more in the 3rd and 4th.

I have to say though, part of the problem, for whatever reason, the Falcons offense never seemed completely in sync, except for the Niners game and parts of a couple of other games.

Edited May 24, 2010 by Peyton

[Chris D]

I actually agree with you. I think the Falconcs fancy themselves as a "Smash Mouth" football team and the Sean Payton actually loves to pass the ball.

In the end, the Falcons passed so often last year because they had to. I just think if they would have thrown more on 1st down early in games, they might have been able to run the ball more in the 3rd and 4th.

I have to say though, part of the problem, for whatever reason, the Falcons offense never seemed completely in sync, except for the Niners game and parts of a couple of other games.

I'm just going to blame injuries for them not being in sync with each other. :P

[Dog River]

I pretty much agree with you. The biggest problem with Atlanta was that lots of times, Mularkey would try and run the ball down the throat of the team showing the 8 man front, instead of trying to punish them with something deep. Eventualy, in several of the games the Falcons lost, they had to pretty much abandon the run altogether.

To add to your point, there were times Mularkey gave up on the run much earlier than he should've imo.

One game where he stuck to his guns was the jets game. He ran the ball 28 times against the best run defense in the NFL.

IMO...With Ryan and this offense going into their 3rd season together, I think there will be distinct improvement in the middle to deep passing game, the one thing missing from this offense so far.