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Monday, November 14, 2005
Wake-up calls have to be heard
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
There is a difference between being good enough to win and just being really good. There is a difference between players who tell you, “I’m trying,” and those who look across the line and think, “This guy is going down.”
The first group wins games. The second group wins championships.
The Falcons — first group.
They started 6-2. When that happens, it’s easy to get fooled into thinking all is well. But Sunday’s loss to Green Bay wasn’t a step backward as much as it was an illustration of what often has seemed wrong with this team.
They opened the season by smacking the Philadelphia Eagles. I haven’t heard a smack since.
Jim Mora disputes that. He sees passion, he sees effort, he sees focus. He believes what the Falcons have accomplished this season largely has gone unappreciated.
“There seems to be a negative vibe,” he said.
Well, yes. But it all goes to expectations. It’s not up to fans or media to change that. It’s up to the team. It’s up to Mora and his coaching staff to wake somebody up.
Six wins, right? OK. Let’s look at that. Philadelphia was a .500 team heading into Monday’s game at Dallas. The other five victories have come over teams that currently have losing records and are a combined 15-30.
Maybe you can’t criticize a team for winning those games. But neither can you make any grand proclamations.
There are seven games remaining: Two against Tampa Bay (6-3), two against Carolina (7-2), and one against Chicago (6-3), Detroit (4-5, but 10-5 on Thanksgiving since 1990) and New Orleans (2-7, but one loss was a 34-31 Falcon escape).
The Falcons missed blocks and tackles against Green Bay Sunday. They fumbled six times. That’s not physical, that’s mental. That’s a lack of focus at the least, and emotion at the worst.
The Packers, down to their fourth-string running back, rushed for more than 100 yards for only the second time all season. They didn’t have any back go for more than 58 yards until Samkon Gado created wonderful memories for his family with 103. Brett Favre is a Hall of Famer. But it took a nonexistent Falcon pass rush to make him look like a threat again.
In short, the Falcons have looked like a team that has settled. Mora discounted the possibility that a 6-2 start might have created too much of a comfort level. During his Monday news conference, he said he didn’t sense any complacency or lack of focus in practice. But off stage, he couldn’t ignore the evidence.
“Certainly, the results of the game would indicate differently,” he said. “If you’re going to put it in the context that dropping the ball, fumbling the ball, missing tackles, getting lined up wrong is a lack of focus — I couldn’t argue with you. I told the guys after the game. I said, ‘You know what? Maybe I screwed up. Maybe I missed something.’ But I didn’t see that coming.”
Fast starts can cloud reality. If the Falcons are as tough as they think they are, or as they say they are — better show it now.
We learned something about their resiliency last season when they rebounded from lopsided losses to Kansas City and Tampa Bay. They have lost consecutive games only once in the Mora regime — that to end the season after the standings had rendered the outcomes meaningless.
Nothing is locked up now. Three teams are within a game of each other in the NFC South. Last season, the Falcons started 7-2 and had a three-game lead.
Mora is still learning what emotional buttons need to be pushed, but it’s often easier to motivate in year one than year two. In the beginning, players are more likely to be worried about impressing the coach. They’re more worried about their job. They’re more likely to play a little scared — in a good way.
What happened to that edge?
“If that was the case, then this certainly was a good wake-up call,” Mora said. “It came at the right time because we have the most important stretch of the season coming up. Thank God we put ourselves in position to have an important stretch of the season.”
Just so long as they all realize that stretch exists.
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