Jones: Offense not ‘on same page’

After Julio Jones was done talking to the assembled media Sunday night, he had a one-on-one interview on the way to the team bus with Falcons beat writer D. Orlando Ledbetter of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Jones knows the offense is misfiring and that the team has issues to correct, but he’s trying to remain upbeat after a 23-7 loss to the Patriots dropped the Falcons to 3-3.

Q. What’s wrong with the offense?

A. Every week it’s kind of different. Last week, we didn’t take shots down the field. This week it was third down and the red area. We just (weren’t) on the same page and weren’t connecting. We played poorly. We just have to keep working. There’s no secret about that. We go out there with great effort and play hard for one another. We are just missing. We are not connected.

Q. How do fix that and get on the same page?

A. In practice, it’s one day at a time for us, but the key is staying positive. You can’t get down, and we can’t worry about expectations outside of the organization.

Q. A lot is off track offensively, how do you get back to scoring 34 points a game?

A. We have to keep working. At the end of the day, it’s on us. Everything falls on us, coaches and the players. We have to continue to keep working and building. We have to keep stacking our days up. It starts with practice (Monday) when we get in and watch the film.

Defense seeks push

If it looked to you like Tom Brady had too much time to throw the ball Sunday night, and that the Patriots quarterback often found a safe zone by stepping forward into a cozy pocket, your eyes did not deceive you.

The Falcons sacked Brady twice in a 23-7 loss as linebackers De’Vondre Campbell and Vic Beasley each rang one up, and defensive end Adrian Clayborn applied six pressures.

All that pressure came from the edges, and Atlanta got little push from the interior of its defensive line, where tackles Grady Jarrett and Dontari Poe rarely made an impact.

Jarrett sacked Brady three times in the Super Bowl 51, but Sunday night he was not credited with a single pressure according to Pro Football Focus, and PFF gave Jarrett his lowest grade of the season (43.9).

Consequently, with Poe (one pressure) unable to get much push either, Brady frequently slid forward before throwing. He completed 21 of 29 passes for 249 yards and two touchdowns.

“I’m glad you brought the point up,” Falcons coach Dan Quinn said Monday. “It’s one of the topics that we talked about today. In pass rush, most good pass-rushing teams are best when all four are in concert. I felt like in that game there were, maybe, [a player saying to himself ], ‘I was going to take a shot and I jumped outside,’ and the middle stayed open.”

Other than Clayborn and Beasley, who was credited with two pressures, no other Falcons had more than one.

Quinn said defensive line coach Bryant Young and his players this week will focus on better coordinating the pass rush.

— Matt Winkeljohn