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Sunday, December 10, 2006
Falcons flawed, but in the hunt for playoffs
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
Tampa – There is little we know about the Falcons’ future, except for maybe this: In three weeks, there will be no need to ask the question, “Will 6-10 get them in?”
Conclusions? Don’t even try. The Falcons played the kind of first half Sunday that gets coaches fired and player drop-kicked. They played the kind of second half that only in this most bizarre of NFL seasons keeps a team sitting in a lifeboat, waiting for the Coast Guard.
Conclusions? It’s too late for that. Or too early. They have consecutive wins over two bad teams (Washington and Tampa Bay). It’s better, but is it more clarifying than consecutive losses to two bad teams (Detroit and Cleveland)? The same defense that a few weeks ago made Charlie Frye look like Y.A. Tittle on Sunday made Bruce Gradkowski look like, well, Bruce Gradkowski.
The Falcons defeated Tampa Bay, 17-6. They, if you’re into weekly parades, go for it.
“I can’t figure it out myself,” DeAngelo Hall said.
If nothing else, the Falcons have shown resolve the last two weeks. They had lost four straight and trailed at Washington, 14-0. But they won. They trailed at Tampa, 6-0, and somehow were making that smallish deficit look insurmountable. (It’s never good when your kickoff returner, Allen Rossum, drops the opening kickoff, then fumbles it moments later when somebody actually hits him.) But they won.
They are flawed. But they are here.
They are 7-6, but remain central to wild-card scenarios. They lost two running backs, Warrick Dunn and Jerious Norwood, in the same series. But fullback Justin Griffith followed with the first rushing touchdown of his career.
Start 5-2. Lose four straight. Win two in a row.
Throw a ping-pong ball into a windstorm. Which way do they go next?
“We can’t relapse now,” Lawyer Milloy said. “We’ve been given a shot. We were given a chance in the middle of the season because nobody really took off. We have a heartbeat.”
That puts you ahead of most in the NFC.
If the Falcons are serious about this, we’ll know next week. The next game is against Dallas. Atlanta has only one win this season against a team that possessed a winning record the week the Falcons played them (Cincinnati was 4-2). But they lost to Baltimore. They lost to the Saints twice. Their other wins are over the Panthers, Bucs (twice), Cardinals, Steelers and Redskins.
If style points don’t amount to much in the BCS, they mean even less in the NFL.
“There are teams that get into the playoffs that bump their way in, no matter what their record is,” Milloy said. “There are some teams that are a force going in. There are teams that are getting stronger as they’re going in. That’s the potential of this team.
“We’re in this situation because we put ourselves in this position. Things are starting to come together. If we do achieve our ultimate goal, it’ll just be that much sweeter.”
Flawed. But here.
In Tampa, the Falcons beat a 3-10 team with the worst offense in the NFL. Their own offense managed one touchdown. But they’re not in a position to be choosy.
A year ago in this stadium, they watched their already fractured playoff hopes collapse. They lost to the Buccaneers, 27-24, in overtime. Their coach, Jim Mora, lost his head in a radio interview and spiked his headset. He was fined $25,000 for using a cellphone during the game to check on tiebreaker scenarios. To close the season, the Falcons threw themselves in front of a bus, losing at home to Carolina, 44-11.
We don’t know how this season will end. But it now appears likely the Falcons’ final game at Philadelphia will mean something, especially given the Eagles are clinging to the side of the same mountain as the Falcons.
“Everything keeps falling into place,” Hall said. “If somebody wants to give it to us, OK. We’re still not making as many plays as we need to. But we’re making more plays than we were six weeks ago, when we started losing four in a row.”
Three more wins and they finish 10-6.
Three more losses and they finish 7-9.
You can get roughly the same odds on either scenario.
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