After a midweek OTA — an organized team activity that looks like a practice —Falcons coach Mike Smith made an OTR (on the record) declaration: “We want to be a bigger and stronger team.”
This prompted a visitor to ask: If being bigger and stronger represents a departure, when had the Falcons made the corporate decision to get smaller and weaker? Smith laughed and said they hadn’t. “You’re always addressing and building your team, and sometimes you can’t address everything.”
Whatever the intent, the Falcons had tacked more toward speed and precision than strength and force. “I don’t think we have become a finesse team,” Smith said, quibbling, but in the history of football no coach has ever said, “We’re a finesse team.” Because football is supposedly a game for the big and strong, nobody wants to seem puny.
But diminishing numbers tell the tale. In 2008, the Falcons’ first season under Smith, they ranked second among 32 NFL teams in yards rushing; in 2013, they ranked 32nd. In 2009, 2010 and 2011, the Falcons ranked among the top 10 in rushing yards yielded; in 2013, they ranked 31st. Smith arrived from Jacksonville saying, “We want to run the ball and stop the run.” By last season, in which his Falcons went 4-12, they could do neither.
Hence the re-emphasis on heft. The Falcons signed two offensive linemen and two defensive linemen as free agents; they drafted an offensive lineman in Round 1 and a defensive lineman in Round 2. They will be bigger in 2014. At issue is whether bigger, in the neo-NFL, will mean better.
The observation that the Falcons had become a finesse team wasn’t a singular indictment. Most teams had come to err on the side of fancy-schmancy. In a league where everything revolves around the quarterback, winning the line of scrimmage became less essential. The Denver Broncos reached the recent Super Bowl with the NFL’s 15th-best rushing offense. Two years ago, the Baltimore Ravens won the Super Bowl with the 20th-best rushing defense.
That, however, could be changing. Seattle and San Francisco, the NFC’s two best teams, both had top-10 rushing offenses and rushing defenses last season. Neither would ever be mistaken for a finesse team. To win a championship, the Falcons could be required to beat one if not both. (They went 1-1 against the two in the playoffs two Januarys ago, falling 10 yards short of the Super Bowl. In both games they were overpowered in the second half.)
The Falcons tried to get bigger along the offensive line last season, but the draftees promoted to replace Todd McClure and Tyson Clabo weren’t ready or weren’t good enough. The reconfigured O-line couldn’t block for the run and couldn’t shield Matt Ryan, resulting in what online folks like to call an “epic fail.” The upshot was that line coach Pat Hill, who lasted only two years after being hired to replace the fired Paul Boudreau, was himself given the gate.
The new O-line coach is Mike Tice, once the Minnesota Vikings’ head coach and long ago a tight end when tight ends were asked to block. His voice is almost a blunt instrument, but he’s not immune to the charms of a pretty metaphor.
“I’ve looked at the offense as a fancy sports car,” Tice said. “You have your spokes — your rims; they tell me don’t say ‘spokes’ — and your fancy paint jobs and your tinted windshields. And then you have your engine. The offensive line has to be the engine that lets the fancy rims and the paint job look good. If the engine’s not working, the paint job looks like (expletive). … We’re the engine, and we have to fuel all those great players we have in the skill positions because we have a bunch.”
Tice seconds Smith’s desire for size, but cautions that size shouldn’t be mistaken for tenacity.“If you’re blocking on a nose tackle or a 3-technique,” Tice said, “you can’t be leaning on him. You’ve got to be beating him down with body blows that show up in the fourth quarter.”
Then: “People who say you can’t be physical in pass (blocking) don’t know what they’re talking about. We’ve got to change some mindsets around here. We’re trying to change the mindsets of the guys up front; if there’s a 60-play game, you’re in 60 boxing matches.”
Then: “Being strong is putting in time in the weight room. Being able to finish is what builds intensity and toughness. People think toughness is kicking a guy or punching somebody. That’s not toughness — that’s stupidity. Toughness is being able to finish a play.”
Over time, the Falcons have finished fewer plays. If they’re going to get back to being really good, they’ll need to return to core principles. “Everybody talks about this being a quarterback-driven league,” Smith said, “and there’s no doubt about it. But to be effective, you have to be able to run the football when you need to run the football, and they know you want to run it. We want to be able to do that on both sides of the ball.”
It will help if the Falcons’ defensive front is improved, which is another matter for another day. But there’s no greater football determinant than the performance of the offensive line. I asked Tice a question I’ve asked others: Have you ever seen a bad team with a good O-line?
His answer: “Not really. Not unless your defense is a sieve.”
Then: “If three of your linemen grade out as playing winning football, you’re probably going to win the game. If four of them do, you’re not going to lose many, if any.”
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