Falcons coach Mike Smith was encouraged by his team’s pass rush against the Cardinals in Week 13 because though it didn’t sack Drew Stanton it generated pressure and hit Stanton 11 times by his count.
But the pass rush regressed in the 43-37 loss to the Packers on Monday night. The Falcons had one sack and three hits in 36 drop-backs by Green Bay’s elusive quarterback, Aaron Rodgers.
The Falcons will face a similarly slippery quarterback, Pittsburgh’s Ben Roethlisberger, on Sunday at the Georgia Dome. While Rodgers extends plays by getting outside of the pocket, Roethlisberger slides in the pocket and sheds would-be tacklers from his 6-foot-5, 240-pound frame or makes throws with defenders latched to him.
The Falcons’ pass rushers have struggled at times this season with getting sacks when in position to do so.
“(Roethlisberger) doesn’t move like the quarterback we played this past week, but he does extend plays, so there’s going to be some things we definitely have to be better at in this ball game this week than we were last night,” Smith said.
Smith said he counted 13 plays in which Rodgers slipped out of the pocket to extend plays.
“All 13 of them weren’t successful and efficient plays but a number of them were,” Smith said. “He did a very good job avoiding the rush. We had some opportunities. We only had one sack, so I would say the pass rush did take a step back. (Rodgers) is a very hard guy to get on the ground. He has a knack for stepping away from pressure and extending plays and he did an outstanding job.”
