Dan Quinn’s Clock Management Raises Questions
In the wake of a 1-3 start, much of the blame for the three losses have been on the defense. In my opinion, a good amount of the blame should be on Dan Quinn.
36+ points and no turnovers for two weeks in a row and you lose both games. While not ideal, it makes a lot of sense with four defensive starters out (Counting Grady Jarrett). A loss isn’t necessarily what makes most of us Falcons fans mad, it’s how we lost.
It’s no secret that Dan Quinn has had his problems with clock management but the last two games have been exceptionally poor. In this game, the example that sticks out to me is at the end of the game.
The Bengals got the ball down 36-31 on their own 25 with 4:15 left. The Bengals averaged about 4 minutes on every scoring drive so it was conceivable that Cinncinatti would have the ball last or at least hold it until the game was pretty much over.
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With that in mind, Dan Quinn had two timeouts and should’ve used them, especially when they got inside the 30 with one minute left. Not taking a timeout at all on the last drive was inexcusable when your defense has let them run all over you all day. Another point on that drive where at timeout would’ve been a good call would be right before the two-minute warning. With 2:22 left, after 11-yard pass for a first down, 22 seconds came off the clock.
While it is a bit nitpicky, your defense has played awful and it’s more likely the Bengals score than you stop them. So that means you need to preserve as much time as possible for your offense to operate. Another example of poor clock management happened at the end of the first half when Quinn didn’t call a timeout either.
No one can definitively say that we would’ve won the last two games with better clock management but Dan Quinn’s poor decisions have certainly cost this team opportunities.