Atlanta Falcons: Owner and head coach see things a bit differently

You’re not the only one clueless about what transpired Sunday afternoon in Dallas, the Atlanta Falcons are too.

The Atlanta Falcons are trying to set the record straight as to why no player jumped on the football for the onside kick. In their efforts, they have ended up giving us contradicting reports.

After the game, Atlanta Falcons head coach Dan Quinn clearly stated that the players on the “hands team” knew the rules of when they could jump on the ball. Why they refused to jump on the ball, is the question I doubt we will ever get a clear answer to. To make matter worse, team Owner, Arthur Blank spoke Monday afternoon and stated:

"“Clearly our defense is not playing at the level we want to see it play at. And clearly on the last play of the game yesterday our players, you know, didn’t do what they, you know, either what they were instructed to do and they didn’t understand it, or, it’s clear though they didn’t, in my view, they didn’t clearly understand what the rules were and exactly what they had to do. I think that’s demonstrated when you watch the video of it.”"

This is a really bad look for the Atlanta Falcons.

Having contradicting statements about the incident just adds another layer to the Dan Quinn hot seat and may indicate a crack in the Quinn/Blank loyalty that has been going on the past few seasons. It usually doesn’t end well when the team owner and head coach don’t see eye to eye on a potential season altering play.

The Atlanta Falcons need a sharp turnaround to get out of the rut they have put themselves into.

I find it hard that professional football players don’t understand a basic rule of football, not just as individual players, but as an entire unit. It makes you even more dumbfounded when you see the aerial shot of the ball, and the players around it, and see two starters on offense, Julio Jones and Hayden Hurst, backing away from the ball and waiting. It just adds to the everlasting question of “Why?”.

The more rational assumption was that the players seemingly had a momentary “brain fart” and were struck like deer in headlights.

That missed onside kick cost the Atlanta Falcons the game and brought the Falcons to 0-2 to start the season.

Since 2002, only 16 of 148 teams started the season 0-2 and made the playoffs. For a fan base that is reeling and broken, we will once again be fighting an uphill battle, but it is not outside of the realm of possibilities that this team is sitting at 6-3 at the bye week before we get into the toughest part of our schedule.