FLOWERY BRANCH — The Falcons’ passing attack did not flourish in the season-opening 18-10 loss to the Steelers on Sunday.
Only six teams passed for fewer yards in Week 1.
Before facing the Eagles at 8:15 p.m. Monday on “Monday Night Football” at Lincoln Financial Field, the Falcons plan to figure out how to turn up the volume on their passing attack.
“It wasn’t a great day for us on the passing attack, when talking about those things and how you want to execute,” Falcons coach Raheem Morris said. “How you want to get those things off. When you talk about the second half, I mean, third-and-12, third-and-whatever they were, those are all tough downs. Those are going to be tough downs every single week if you put yourself in those things.”
Quarterback Kirk Cousins completed passes to six different receivers for 155 yards. But with the two sack for minus-18 yards, the Falcons finished with a net 137 yards, which tied for 25th in the NFL with the Browns.
Only the Panthers (135), Steelers (133), Broncos (132), Patriots (120), Titans (104) and Bears (64) passed for fewer yards. Cousins and Jacoby Brissett were the only veteran quarterbacks in the group, which included Bryce Young (second season), Justin Fields (backup), Bo Nix (rookie), Will Levis (second season) and Caleb Williams (rookie).
With the passing attack off-line, the Falcons converted only two of their nine third-down plays (22.2%).
The Falcons’ leading pass-catcher the past two seasons was wide receiver Drake London, who was targeted only three times and had two catches for 15 yards in the loss to the Steelers.
“We are still growing, trying to figure it out,” said London.
Wide receiver Ray-Ray McCloud had seven targets and made four catches for a team-leading 52 yards. Running back Bijan Robinson caught all five targets for 43 yards. Tight end Kyle Pitts caught all three targets for 26 yards and a 12-yard touchdown.
McCloud had the longest reception of the game. He soared between three defenders to haul down a 20-yarder.
“I was just locked in,” McCloud said. “I felt like the quarterback could get it to me. I was in a good situation … the ball was in the air, and it was anybody’s ball. I’d rather me get it instead of them getting it. That was that.”
Part of the issue was that it was the first time that the offense played together in a live game.
“It’s a good feeling, we go out there every day,” McCloud said. “We practice hard. (Exhibition games) didn’t have (anything) to do with it. It’s just more so coming together and loving the process. It’s the NFL.”
Things started off good in the opening drive for the Falcons.
Cousins completed passes of 15 yards to Mooney and 8 yards to London to help the Falcons drive to the Steelers’ 10-yard line.
Pittsburgh’s T.J. Watt dropped Robinson for a 3-yard loss. On third-and-goal from the 13, Cousins tossed a nice screen pass to Robinson, who picked up 7 yards and nearly scored.
“We hit a screen to Bijan, a little extra shove there on the push, and you potentially walk into a touchdown, right?” Morris said. “So, that’s what it’s supposed to look like, what that first drive looked like.”
Morris also pointed to the Falcons’ lone touchdown drive. Cousins completed 7 of 7 passes for 84 yards in the nine-play, 90-yard touchdown drive, which was capped by the touchdown pass to Pitts.
“That’s what it’s supposed to look like,” Morris said.
Eventually, Watt took over in the pass rush, and that also helped to derail the passing attack.
“We had a lot of things in our game plan that we wished we could have executed a little bit better,” backup quarterback Michael Penix Jr. said. “We left a lot of things out there, but we did execute a lot of things as well.”
Penix was not surprised that McCloud led the team in targets.
“Ray-Ray comes out there and works his tail off,” Penix said. “Kirk loved him every since, I remember early on in camp, he was like, “Ray-Ray has it. He comes out and catches the ball in practice and sprints 30 yards after the catch. He just comes out with that energy each and every day. When you do that and you’re consistent with it, the ball is going to find you.”
Cousins, playing his first game on his surgically repaired ruptured right Achilles tendon, kept his cool.
“Kirk was calm and collected the whole game,” Penix said. “He never got rattled in any situation. … This is his 13th season. He’s seen it all. … He’s been through a lot of different situations. He’s calm because he knows the player that he is. He knows he can go out there, if he has another opportunity, he’ll be able to make the next play.”
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