Kyle Shanahan: "I blew it."

[JARROD]

Yes you did-- that is all.


Sent from my iPhone using CarolinaHuddle

[outlaw4]

Nah, Kyle. You did a great job. Way to give the Falcons hope only to have them crushed before leaving to San Francisco.

[pstall]

6 minutes ago, thomas96 said:

I don't agree with this at all but at least he's taking the blame for his part in it. Hindsight is 20/20. People here rip on Ron for the running the ball instead of going for the throat in situations like that. Fact of the matter is the run game was being bottled up at that point. They had just rushed for a loss of a yard. He called a passing play in order to try to get more yards and possibly first down to seal it, because the running game was no different than kneeling it.

The problem was not calling a passing play there, it was Matt Ryan taking the sack. In that situation you have to understand what the hell can happen on the play and what you can't allow happen and Ryan had a fair amount of time to get rid of the ball (more than Cam had on any single play in SB 50) and he took a sack. Not just a sack but a 10 yard sack. After that sack you needed yardage to get in field goal range again and running it wouldn't do it. Hardly Shanahan's fault that Jake Matthews held on the play. The loss is due to many different factors and Shanahan's style of offense is part of it (big plays, not being able to sustain drives keeping their D on the field) but he was not the biggest reason. Matt Ryan was a bigger reason for the loss than him. And Freeman whiffing on Hightowers' blitz on the strip sack was not on Shanahan. That's on Ryan not seeing that on the field and switching up protections and on Freeman for getting wrecked.

You run to at least make the Pats burn a timeout.  At worse you have a 39 yd fg and NE is down to 1 to. At least a min maybe 2 goes by and its 2 mins left with an 11 pt lead.

[t96]

1 minute ago, pstall said:

You run to at least make the Pats burn a timeout.  At worse you have a 39 yd fg and NE is down to 1 to. At least a min maybe 2 goes by and its 2 mins left with an 11 pt lead.

They complete a lot of short passes using the passing game basically as a running game, kind of similar to the Pats, and Ryan's completion % was very high, it seemed pretty likely he could complete a short one better than they could run for a loss of a couple. And yardage was more important than time there in my opinion. There was plenty of time.

[t96]

10 minutes ago, GoobyPls said:

Him and Ryan share blame. They only ran it 5 times in the 4th quarter even though they were averaging over 5 ypc

That average is inflated by the long run in the first quarter. The run game was getting bottled up by the Pats as the game went on.

[bLACKpANTHER]

falcon fans be like:

 

[pstall]

4 minutes ago, thomas96 said:

They complete a lot of short passes using the passing game basically as a running game, kind of similar to the Pats, and Ryan's completion % was very high, it seemed pretty likely he could complete a short one better than they could run for a loss of a couple. And yardage was more important than time there in my opinion. There was plenty of time.

Which is why you run. Let that clock roll and make NE use a timeout.  Make them do what they don't.  Even if no gain and no timeout is used, the clock goes down.  All the upside for Atl points to running. 

 

[Fox007]

yea he gets my respect for owning it and here is what's even more important than him owning it...

It's the fact that he REALIZES what he did wrong.

Our dumb fug OC can't/doesn't even realize what he's doing wrong LOL...Rivera/Shula damn sure aren't going to own it or take blame....so he's a bigger man for sure....and smarter.

[GoobyPls]

24 minutes ago, thomas96 said:

That average is inflated by the long run in the first quarter. The run game was getting bottled up by the Pats as the game went on.

Every ypc is inflated due to long runs.....

 That doesn't change the fact they abandoned run almost every series after first down. All they needed was a FG. They also ran stupid runs plays, they kept throwing sweeps 

[tailg8or]

1 hour ago, *FreeFua* said:

That's just it. At least Shanahan recognizes the fact he f*cked up. Rivera and Shula never see it that way, they think it's the players fault

 

Which is why we never see a single adjustment made by either retard

Rivera interviewed with practically half the NFL before finally getting this gig ... ok, maybe not half.  I don't see Shula or Ron being comfortable in the cross-hairs as teams won't be scrambling to hire either one.

Pretty much a given that we aren't going to outcoach or outsmart another team once the game begins.  We come in with our gameplan and rely on our players to win their battles. 

[Panthers8969]

I'm really impressed with the amour of people who were sober enough to actually remember the game

[Davidson Deac II]

43 minutes ago, thomas96 said:

They complete a lot of short passes using the passing game basically as a running game, kind of similar to the Pats, and Ryan's completion % was very high, it seemed pretty likely he could complete a short one better than they could run for a loss of a couple. And yardage was more important than time there in my opinion. There was plenty of time.

They were at the 25 yard line.  I don't think that yardage was as important.  They did a wonderful job being aggressive and getting the ball into scoring position, but then they did a terrible job once they were there. 

In that situation, they need two things.  A score and run time off the clock (or force the Pats to use their timeouts).  And they need to avoid four things.  Turnovers, sacks, penalties, and stopping the clock.  Running it reduces the chances of 1, 3, and 4,  and eliminates the possibility of #2.  Even if they run it for a loss, that is still better than a sack because on average, sacks cause much greater loss of yards.  And New England hadn't been able to stop the run much, nor would they be able to focus exclusively on the run, so they have a very good chance of making some positive yards running the ball. 

 

Just my opinion of course, but to me coaches have to understand when to be aggressive, and when to conservative.  To much of either can be  very damaging. 

[top dawg]

51 minutes ago, thomas96 said:

That average is inflated by the long run in the first quarter. The run game was getting bottled up by the Pats as the game went on.

I agree with you to some extent. But they bailed on the run too early and too often. Moreover, even if you have to pass in that situation, why not try to get your RB the ball? It's not like Freeman can't catch. 

Sure, I don't think Shanny was the sole reason that they lost the game, but he played his part. So did Quinn it would seem.  

[t96]

2 minutes ago, Davidson Deac II said:

They were at the 25 yard line.  I don't think that yardage was as important.  They did a wonderful job being aggressive and getting the ball into scoring position, but then they did a terrible job once they were there. 

In that situation, they need two things.  A score and run time off the clock (or force the Pats to use their timeouts).  And they need to avoid four things.  Turnovers, sacks, penalties, and stopping the clock.  Running it reduces the chances of 1, 3, and 4,  and eliminates the possibility of #2.  Even if they run it for a loss, that is still better than a sack because on average, sacks cause much greater loss of yards.  And New England hadn't been able to stop the run much, nor would they be able to focus exclusively on the run, so they have a very good chance of making some positive yards running the ball. 

 

Just my opinion of course, but to me coaches have to understand when to be aggressive, and when to conservative.  To much of either can be  very damaging. 

Frankly though fans and people like us will criticize the move when it turns out to bad and praise the hell out of it when it turns out to be good. People in the game thread here were talking about how much it would suck to watch Shanahan and the Falcons passing the ball even while they're up instead of sitting on their lead like we did much of last year. It backfired on them and now Shanahan's the reason they lost because of that? I don't think so. They needed a first down there to really truly seal the game. There was like 4 and a half minutes left and the Pats had 3 time outs. 2 runs takes 1:20 off the clock. Pats get the ball down 11 with the two minute warning and 3 timeouts. Theoretically you don't even need an onside kick there to win it. If they ran the ball and that happened everyone would've criticized them for not staying aggressive and passing it. 

The reality is both strategies can work and both strategies can not work. In this instance their obviously didn't work, but is that all on Shanahan? He's not the one who took the 10 yard sack despite having a fair amount of time to get the pass off and he's not the one who held the defender the next play. Is there blame to go around? Yeah of course, Shanahan included. But to say that he lost them the game like so many are is ridiculous.