5 things we learned from Falcons’ loss to Buccaneers

FLOWERY BRANCH — It was no surprise that the Falcons — after skipping the exhibition games — would put forth another disjointed effort in the season opener against the Bucs.

There’s a long list of things that could have been ironed out before losing the opener 23-20 to the Bucs on Sunday at a festive Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

The list:

--Bijan Robinson bobbled a couple of balls.

--Drake London didn’t make some of the contested catches he usually makes.

--The timing was off on Michael Penix Jr.’s potential game-winning TD pass to KhaDarel Hodge.

--All of the procedural penalties, including Elijah Wilkinson’s two false starts.

--Cornerback Mike Hughes could have gotten some extra work on his man-to-man coverage skills.

Then there’s the philosophical issue of not playing power football at power football time. The shotgun should be banned on fourth down-and-1.

Here’s the football theory. You need 1 yard. But in the shotgun, you send the ball backward 5 yards away from the required yardage. Now, you need at least 6 yards. It’s simple. Do the math.

Here are five things we learned from the loss to the Buccaneers:

Dustin Hopkins, Greg “The Leg” Zuerlein, Eddy Pineiro, Michael Badgley, Matt McCrane, Greg Joseph, Austin Seibert, Zane Gonzalez and Cade York are some of the kickers available on the free agent market, according to overthecap.com.

Also, there are kickers, including Lenny Krieg, on practice squads around the league.

The Falcons will host workouts for Koo on Tuesday. He’ll have to compete for his job this week after making 90% of his kicks in training camp.

The Falcons went after cornerback Jaire Alexander before he signed with Baltimore.

Watts had six tackles and two pass breakups. He could have had two interceptions. Bowman generally didn’t get lost in coverage. He had six tackles, half a sack and one quarterback hit.

“It’s the first game,” Watts said. “I feel like I did some good things, did some bad things. Just continuing to improve each week. Got my feet wet, so just ready to see the improvement.”

Bowman believes the unit will improve.

“I would say keeping the quarterback in the pocket,” Bowman said. “Baker (Mayfield) was using his legs to get out of there. Containing the quarterback. Just for myself, getting tighter in coverage down the field.”

Leonard Floyd, Jalon Walker and James Pearce Jr. were added to improve the pass rush. Linebacker Divine Deablo and Bowman were used as blitzers.

The Falcons were one of the five teams that generated pressure on 40% of their opponents’ dropbacks in week one (excluding the Sunday and Monday Night games), according to The33rdteam.com.

The Steelers were the highest at 44%. The Falcons were fourth at 40.5%. The Falcons finished with one sack and three quarterback hits.

When they needed a stop on their last drive, they couldn’t get Mayfield on the ground.

The Sack-o-Meter: Falcons are on pace for 17 sacks.

The running backs combined for 48 yards on 22 carries. Penix added six carries for 21 yards.