They’ll take it. This year, the Falcons will take anything, even if it means the game ends with their finger tips dug into the side of a building.
The running game wasn’t great. The special teams were just this side of a dumpster fire. There was a costly dumb penalty late, and several blown double-digit leads, and it was starting to get to the point that one wondered if naming rights should be sold for this season. Something along the lines of, “Tums presents: The 2017 Falcons.”
“A lot of guys have been working really hard but we were losing games early on,” Julio Jones said late Monday night. “Maybe some guys were thinking, ‘What if I change this or that?’ But we’re getting the outcome we want now. Winning will breed more swagger and more confidence.”
The team that had become known for too many fizzles actually closed one out Monday. Barely. One week after dumping Dallas 27-7, the Falcons blew leads of 14-0, 21-7 and 34-23, but hung on to defeat Seattle 34-31 after a missed Blair Walsh field-goal attempt in the final seconds.
They are 6-4 now. Somehow. The football gods figured, “That’s enough torture for a little while, Atlanta.”
They were 6-4 a year ago at this time. Then they went on a roll, winning five of six and taking that momentum to the Super Bowl. Could this great escape be the start of something? Their next three games are at home.
“Find ways to win,” Matt Ryan said. “Getting back home will be huge for us. I saw we have a little more space on one side of Mercedes Benz Stadium. I saw the (Georgia) Dome go down.”
The Falcons nearly replicated that implosion.
Russell “Crazy Legs” Wilson led a 49-second touchdown drive in the final minutes. His 29-yard strike to Doug Baldwin with three minutes left, followed by a pass to Jimmy Graham for a two-point conversion, cut the Falcons’ lead to 34-31.
The previous possession, the Falcons seemingly had taken a two-touchdown lead, when Tevin Coleman sneaked under pile into the end zone from five yards out. But on replay, Coleman was viewed down just outside the goal line. So the Falcons had to settle for a field goal, and Seattle had the crack in the window it needed.
The Falcons, short on offensive possessions all night because of turnovers, went three-and-out with a three-point lead and killed only 1:18. Apparent Atlanta doom returned.
Seattle got the ball back with 1:46 left, but no timeouts. No problem for Wilson (who was the game’s leading rusher with 86 yards and a touchdown). He drove the Seahawks 41 yards in nine plays to the Falcons’ 34. Walsh, a former Georgia Bulldog who doesn’t miss a lot, lined up for a 52-yard field goal try to tie the score. The kick was straight but short.
“I just stood on the sideline praying,” rookie Takk McKinley said. “Prayer answered.”
At 5-5, the Falcons’ playoff lives would’ve been borderline comatose. They realistically would’ve needed to win five of six to make it. At 6-4, they’re in a decent position, albeit still two games behind New Orleans (8-2) and one behind Carolina (7-3).
Is this what it will take to get them going?
“I don’t care what the win was like -- at the end of the day, it’s a win,” safety Ricardo Allen said. “We lost those early games, and people were like, ‘You’re not supposed to lose.’ Everybody was asking us: ‘Why isn’t there any panic?’ We knew once we started playing good football things would be OK.”
They did do a lot of things well. The defense lost containment on Wilson too many times, but that just puts the Falcons in the majority. The offense converted third downs on the first five chances and nine of 14 overall. It scored points on five of the first seven possessions of the game, including touchdowns on the first two drives -- the first time that had happened since 2016.
A break in the cloud cover over Steve Sarkisian? Ryan credited the offensive coordinator for a key third-and-6 pass to Julio Jones down the right sideline (setting up a field goal) and a 25-yard touchdown pass to a wide-open Levine Toilolo in the the third.
There were mistakes. Kickoff coverage was dreadful. Andre Roberts muffed a kickoff return to set up Seattle’s second touchdown. Pass protection broke down at key moments. The running game struggled without Devonta Freeman (concussion). Keanu Neal had a foolish unnecessary-roughness penalty that figured prominently on the Seahawks’ last touchdown drive.
But they held on. It was a big win against a good team, in a difficult stadium. That counts for something. A lot, actually.
At 14-0, it looked like the Falcons were on their way to a blowout win. But -- yeah, not this year. Fourteen-zip became 21-17, Then 31-20 became 34-31.
Betcha Seattle coach Pete Carroll would’ve liked to have that fake field-goal decision back, when he suffered a brain cramp late in the first half. He called the fake on fourth-and-1 from the Falcons’ 17. There were only seven seconds left on the clock. In other words, even if the fake worked, unless it resulted in a touchdown, the Seahawks would still have to attempt a kick. The play failed. The Falcons took a 24-17 lead into the locker room.
Strange night. The Falcons’ offense had the ball only five times because of the turnovers. They scored on four of them (three touchdowns, one field goal). Seattle had the ball eight times to that point (two TDs, three field goals, two turnovers and dumb fake).
The Falcons will take it. They don’t look like a team that will go 5-1 down the stretch like last season, but stranger things have happened. Strange things seem to happen every week with this team.
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