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12. Atlanta (4-2). Why do the Falcons drop in the Fine Fifteen? The Saints, a mentally battered team without their franchise running back, rushed for 211 yards on the Falcons, who used to have a defense. Not anymore.

A little love from King this week too.

Warrick Dunn. He slipped and fell on a third-quarter carry at the Alamodome, got up, and bulled for six yards. Overall, I can't name three backs in football better than Dunn, try as I do almost every week.

Eric Allen on ESPN said he can't believe that week in and week out J. Mora Jr comes to his press conf and doesn't talk about Dunn. Dunn is much more than many give him credit for and looking at the Vikings it is nice to see a guy with such character carry a team on his shoulders. This guy flat out plays, period, and could be just as important as Vick to the Falcons.

Also, speaking of our defense (or lack thereof) I think the loss of Cash was even more hurtful than Hartwell. We have argued this many times on these forums but our run D sucks with or without Hartwell because our front seven are built around speed and pass rush. Hartwell or no we are going to give up massive yards on the ground due to our lack of size, but Cash brought some true bite to our Nickel Package. I mean, how many of you were just sick yesterday watching Saints scrubs rush for 10, 9, 12, 10, 8 etc EVERY TIME they got the ball. D starts with stopping the run, which means you had better be able to stop them in the air at least if you are going to let them run like that. Cash = true D death for the Birds. 32 first downs! *pulls his hair out*

Our Safty play has to step up as well. How many times this season (and three times for Scott yesterday) have our safties had balls in their hands and come up empty. With the D we have we cannot afford to give up those kind of chances. (plus Scott got burned on bad tackles yesterday and had ZERO takles in the Pats game).

MF1

I liked Scott & Carpenter going into the regular season but it appears that my opinion was misguided. I would like to see Carpenter become a coach with Atlanta but his best days are gone after his injury. Me thinks it's time to move Carp or Scott to the bench and give Ronnie Heard a shot at starting. He was average in San Francisco but that's better then what we've witnessed with Scott/Carp on the field.

I also must admit that DeAngelo Hall is quickly falling into my overrated list. He was good against T.O. and true warrior when he cameback injured to finish the game. But he has been transparent in all of our other games. He's started playing soft because of the numerous penalities our secondary has been getting (some warrented some not). It's probably largely due to the safeties not getting their job done but I've seen DeLo get burned on more then one occasion this year.

Agreed on D. Hall Dirty, but I am a firm believer you can't be a great CB without solid safety play. E. Robinson (ugh, I know he cost us the Super Bowl but still) made that backfield great in 98 and we haven't had anything like it since. D. Hall can't depend on Carp/Scott and therefore has had to adjust his play. With T.O. he used his speed to bump him off routes at the line because at that point he had faith in the Safety Postion but now he is backing off and giving up 10 yard throws for easy first downs. All you ever see of him is a flash-in at the end of the catch to knock a guy down or out of bounds. Also, his cushion is giving the WRs too much headspeed when they get to him for any chance at catching up. If you watched the critical 20+ yard PI on Hall yesterday in the 4th however, you saw he was doing everything right all by himself (head turned, hands up) and they still called it PI. Our defensive backfield is gunshy and running scared out there, and each is becoming an island which is a fast way to give up big plays and 300+ yards passing every game.

MF1

Deangelo has made some mistakes, but he is only a second year player and is covering the opposing teams best WR every week. TO, Darrell Jackson, Deion Branch (when healthy), are all very good wide outs in the league. I think that Deangelo is going to be a top corner in this league still. He is probably the surest tackler on our team and has been one of the only guys making plays in the secondary.

Brian Scott, on the other hand, needs to be benched. I would not be opposed to moving Ronnie Heard into the lineup to replace Scott. Carp is too much of a field general to pull off the field and is still capable of making some game changing plays.

I agree very strongly that losing Mathis and Cash were a much bigger loss than Hartwell. I was big on hartwell before this season, but he has looked like a flop for us. I hope that he comes around next season, but this season he was all hype and no action on the field. However, our run defense was never as good with Lavalais in the lineup instead of Ed Jasper.

I think that we need to pick up a CB, S, and DE in the draft to continue to build our depth on defense. Hopefully, Shropeshire can get some experience and get into the lineup over Lavalais because he cant stop the run to save his life...

I have to definitely disagree about D.Hall dirty. It's too early to start calling him overrated. You can place his poor performance on lack of a pass rush and poor playcalling. Even Deion Sanders couldn't cover an NFL wideout for 5,6, or more seconds and he has said so publicly. Add to that the fact we're asking him to play a soft zone on most plays to protect the rest of the DB's and you have a formula for poor coverage. D.Hall is going to be a top 3 corner in the league at a minimum, but if our D-line cannot stop the run we need to sell out on rushing the passer like we did against Phily. It seems to work somewhat for the Colts and it is all you can do when most of your secondary is a liability, plus it will allow D.Hall to make more plays as well.

Warrick Dunn is a warrior and deserves more praise than he is gettting. Our front seven is not designed to stop the run, thus they need to get more aggressive about getting penetration & getting into the backfield. Notice how Brooking did it a couple of times and it pretty much stalled the other team's offense at that point. If the linemen could do this by moving as if it were a pass rush it might be exactly what we need to get our D going.

Lack of pass rush??

NFL Sack Leaders:
#1 Atlanta, Indy, Dallas: 20 Sacks

We are tied for the league lead in sacks. The only problem DeLo has is the poor performance of the safeties. Our pass rush is still among the best. Our run defense is horrible and our safeties are horrible.

Our pass rush is all or nothing, it's like calling our rushing game the best in the league...it's true statistically, but in reality it isn't. One week we get 5-9 sacks and then we get 1 each of the next 2 games...and that one is almost always Rod Coleman...lol

I agree with Incomparable, our pass rush is very good, but it's by no means consistently great. Fact is, from recent weeks, it seems only Rod Coleman consistently puts pressure on the QB. I've been disappointed with Kerney's play all year long. He has had the privilege of facing some very below average OTs this year, and has not taken advantage of it. I realize some of it is because teams are compensating and leaving the TEs in for help and chipping, but I suspected more from him vs. NO going up against Jamar Nesbit as well as vs. Buffalo against Greg Jerman. It's the equivalent of Steve Herndon shutting down Kerney.

Hall is not yet the type of player that can set his own tone. As the pass rush goes, so does his play. I think it also doesn't help that our run defense is so bad. He now must pay too much attention to helping in run support rather than on focusing on shutting down WRs.

I'm not giving up on Hall, but he does need to return to his earlier form. He was good vs. Philly, vs. Buffalo, but has been bad or blah vs. all the other teams we've faced.

I never had high expectations for Scott and Carpenter. But I didn't really think either would become liabilities, which I think they are. They really do have to step up their play because of the injuries we've had at CB. I'm not going to give up on Scott either. The pressure of leadership and injuries seems to be getting to him. I think he can still be a good NFL safety, but hopefully this is just a cold streak. But I do agree that a fire needs to be lit under his butt, and if that means getting Heard more PT, then so be it...

Let me qualify my earlier statement. I still have faith in Hall and he is a fine cornerback to be sure. But for the hype he gets (and I've been doing this too) here on the board and the hype he gets in the media he is not living up to the billing. He will get better and maybe he'll live up to the Neon Deion hype but right now he hasn't. This of course is because of a myriad of things from QB pressure, poor run stopping, and bad safety play.

One thing is for sure DeLo's speed was overhyped. He is still one of the fastest guys in the league but too many receivers have beaten him in a foot race.

I agree on all points. I think Kerney's issues have been because of a mild injury in his side or something which has limited his effectiveness. Brady hasn't been himself either. Normally, both are flying by the OTs and getting pressure up field. Perhaps the recent troubles with the run defense has taken them out of there element in order to help cover for others' problems. I want to see them back to getting up field fast, along with the DTs penetrating, and the LBs and Ss recognizing the run quickly and closing up the gaps. That's the way we've done it before, and we have to get back to that high-pressure, attacking style of defense that makes us a good defense. If that means pulling out Scott or Carp, so be it because we can't afford these issues anymore. (I hesitate to say this, but was Cory Hall really more valuable than we thought?)

I think we can pull Carp or Scott but not both. McCadam hasn't shown anything as a starter and Newton/Lowe are practice squad punching bags. I would like to see what Heard is capable of.

In respect to Kerney I think he still has issues with the groin injury he had during the pre-season. (reaks of the Ed Hartwell situation). Brady Smith cameback from a major neck surgery so I can't imagine he's running 100% yet either.