The Atlanta Falcons needed a win real bad, and we didn’t really care what form it took. It’s a good thing we didn’t, because the form it took was a real snoozefest.
The Falcons had a terrific day on special teams, a predictably strong day on defense against a woeful Raiders offense, and ran the ball pretty well. The problem was that outside of a tiny handful of big plays, the passing game was a complete zero and four (!) false start penalties contributed to Atlanta sputtering on several drives. The result was a win and that’s important—the defensive and special teams performances were encouraging even given the opponent—but all the familiar concerns about how Kirk Cousins is doing and how undisciplined this team is are still very much there.