Las Vegas Review-Journal (Sunday)
Offensively, Falcons pack plenty of punch
Gruden says Atlanta’s 3-7 record misleading
The record suggests the Falcons are not a very good football team. A check of the talent on the roster suggests otherwise.
Raiders coach Jon Gruden is focusing on the latter as he prepares his team for a pivotal interconference matchup in Atlanta on Sunday.
“They’re 3-7. That’s a joke,” Gruden said. “This is the best 3-7 team I’ve ever seen. I don’t know how they’ve lost some of these games. I’m sure they don’t know either. … They’re a lot better football team than their record.”
While it is tempting to take Gruden’s praise with a grain of salt, his respect for the Falcons seems genuine. He was particularly effusive in his praise for emerging star linebacker Foyesade Oluokun, who played at Yale and was a sixth-round pick in the 2018 draft.
“Everybody has to start figuring out who he is and where he came from,” Gruden said. “He’s as good a linebacker as we’ve seen on film all year.”
Even the most casual football fan is well aware of the talent that makes up the Falcons’ offense.
Matt Ryan, Julio Jones, Calvin Ridley and Todd Gurley, who has been ruled out of Sunday’s game with an injury, have been among the biggest names in the entire league. While the results haven’t always been there over the last two seasons, the group remains dangerous.
Raiders defensive coordinator Paul Guenther has spent the week reminding his unit to focus on the players and scheme instead of the record.
“They have a bunch of first-round picks on the offensive line,” he said. “They have two really good backs that can run the ball. Matt Ryan gets them in and out of good plays at the line of scrimmage, and they have good skill guys on the outside including their tight ends. … So they have a full complement of guys that will be a challenge for us Sunday.”
Here are three keys for the Raiders:
Focus on the Falcons
The Raiders have proven capable of playing with some of the best teams in the league as they have put together a 6-4 record against one of the toughest schedules in the league.
While the difficulty starts to ease up down the stretch, they must avoid playing down to the level of competition or starting to think too much about the potential to make the postseason.
Sweeping the upcoming two-game road trip against teams with a combined 3-17 record would be a great start, but the Raiders can only win one of those games at a time.
The same attention to detail must be put into preparing for the Falcons and Jets as was devoted to the Chiefs last weekend.
“This isn’t college football,” offensive coordinator Greg Olson said. “This is the National Football League. If you don’t prepare each week, you will be embarrassed. … I think the more mature team you have, the more veteran players you have, the more you avoid those pitfalls of the trap games. I think we have a mature team. They’ve prepared well this week.”
New coach, new defense?
Atlanta doesn’t look like the same team as it was early in the season when it started 0-5 and blew fourth-quarter leads of 15 and 16 points, leading to the dismissal of coach Dan Quinn.
Raheem Morris has gone 3-2 as interim coach, and the team has responded, particularly on defense.
The Falcons are allowing an average of 22.8 points under Morris after surrendering 32.2 in five games under Quinn. That unit also has cut its yards allowed per game from 446 to 367.2.
Olson said the team is preparing for the Falcons’ defense at its best.
“There’s some subtle changes that we’ve seen defensively,” Olson said. “You see subtle changes as you would expect any time an interim head coach takes over.”
Keep it rolling
Derek Carr is coming off the highest-rated game any quarterback has played this season, according to Pro Football Focus.
Carr and the offense have been performing at a high level all season and seem to be hitting their stride over the last month.
Olson believes that confidence and momentum can carry over and build upon itself.
“It’s certainly an emotional game,” he said. “I think through those 10 games on our side of the ball, our players feel like we can stack up against anybody. We’ve played a number of different defenses and different teams that we feel like in our own minds that nobody’s stopping us but ourselves. That’s a good feeling.”