The Atlanta Falcons had a straightforward matchup, which should have been our first sign that things were going to go wrong. All they had to do was square off against a Panthers team they have at least been competitive with for many years now, a Panthers team that was 0-2, and build on what they had shown against the Vikings to have a good shot at winning the game. That divisional win would have been critically important, and the Falcons had to know that and had to be ready to triumph here.
Instead,
this did this, and basically never stopped doing it.
Look, you and I know that we cling to our good feelings like smoke to an extinguished candle, and that we’re rarely ready for the next big Falcons failure. We can get this way because sports fans hope, even after all the many mishaps, and we must pay the price for that hope. We saw Atlanta beat the Vikings in a dominant, rough-and-ready 22-6 victory that showcased the ground game and defense and saw the glimmers of good things ahead, which made the subsequent 30-0 dismantling against the Panthers even worse. It was not so much that the Falcons lost—they’ve lost to the Panthers plenty in recent years, usually at the worst time and in frustrating last-minute fashion—but that they barely looked like the football team we saw the first two weeks. They were ruinously terrible, so embarrassing that it defied belief despite that belief getting a real workout over the last decade, and thus we were left to descend into that syrupy sense of bewilderment once again.
The offense didn’t struggle; it was inept. The defense was much better, yet it couldn’t take advantage of Panthers injuries and opportunities to make plays throughout. Special teams weren’t bad; they were instrumental to the game going off the rails so spectacularly. The coaching staff wasn’t shaky; they seemed lost and unequipped with answers. And so on. The Carolina Panthers were 0-2 coming into this one, and yet they looked like a juggernaut who had the Falcons all figured out. Perhaps they did.
We love these Falcons in spite of ourselves, but there was less than nothing to love about that game. The Falcons knew they’d need to win to keep pace with the Buccaneers, who are now 3-0, but couldn’t muster a single point. They have previously wrecked this Carolina defense even while stumbling on their own defensively, but in this one they did less than nothing against a vulnerable-seeming Panthers D. The issues that we were worried about—kicker, the passing game, the pass protection, and the inconsistent pass rush—all came to the fore in a way that made it clear the Falcons aren’t really past any of them.
We can and will find joy in this team again, because we’ve done it before and the roller coaster nature of the first three games suggests they Falcons have some positive surprises to mix in with all the stupid things they love to do. But a team capable of losing 30-0 to an 0-2 Panthers squad is not a team we should expect to be the next great Falcons team, unfortunately, and it’s only shielding ourselves from further harm to put the walls up, soak in the darkness like a sponge, and wait for the day they can prove us wrong and put the awful defeats in the past.
This is not that day, and we can only talk for so long about how the Falcons have to prove to us that they’re something better and different than they’ve been in years past. At some point, they have to do it, and they have to do it for more than one week at a time. This loss ought to be the wake-up call this bleary-eyed team clearly needs, but like us, they seem to be firmly stuck in a nightmare.
On to the full recap, which is slightly truncated for the sake of our collective sanity.
The Good
- Bijan Robinson is the salve for Atlanta’s many offensive woes, so it’s unfortunate he can’t be out there on every play. In the early going, everything looked laborious except for Bijan’s carries and catches. He was tied for the team lead in receptions with five and turned those in 39 yards, and averaged 5.5 yards per carry en route to 72 yards on 13 carries. The Falcons lost for many reasons Sunday, but Bijan was not really one of them.
- Dee Alford had a really good day in coverage overall working against a talented rookie receiver in Tet McMillan, even if he picked up a borderline pass interference call in the third quarter. Again and again, he made life difficult for McMillan, made plays on the ball, and generally played tough against a receiver much bigger than him. I came away from today feeling better about Alford as an A.J. Terrell fill-in, even if I didn’t feel great about much else.
- It was an uneven game where Kaden Elliss made some puzzling decisions early, but he was the only man who got a sack and he flew to the ball on a couple of nice run stops. Kudos also to Ruke Orhorhoro and James Pearce Jr., who set up some other close calls or nearly got there on a day where the pass rush just wasn’t good enough consistently enough.
- There’s plenty of justified criticism of the defense—see below, especially for the pass rush—but this was not as catastrophic an effort as the final score suggested. Carolina only had one scoring drive where they started deep in their own territory, as they scored on a pick-six that had nothing to do with the defense and started their other scoring drives from their own 39, the Atlanta 44, the Atlanta 45, and the Atlanta 30. I am frustrated with the defensive effort, sure, but I don’t think we should write them off based on this one.
- Bradley Pinion has figured out some sort of wizardry, because his punts suddenly seem very difficult to hold on to. In the first quarter, Trevor Etienne muffed it badly and it was scooped up thanks to a heads-up play by DeMarcco Hellams, giving the Falcons a shot they did not capitalize on. Hellams hasn’t had the role on defense we thought he might—though he did get some work in this one—but he’s also a vital special teamer.
- It’s only one game. This felt like a half season’s worth of terrible vibes and terrible drives, but it still only counts as one loss in that column. Considering what a disaster the game was, that’s one of the few blessings we can collect.
The Ugly
- That opening defensive drive was vintage Falcons in the very worst way. Bryce Young kept finding open men when Dee Alford wasn’t (admirably) handling Tet McMillan, and while there was a controversial non-holding call on Young’s touchdown scramble, the pursuit and ability to hold him in the pocket was poor. It resulted in Carolina looking like a juggernaut for the first time in the 2025 season, earning an early lead. The lack of results, the blown coverage, and the poor angles and slow feet were a fixture in Falcons defenses in recent years, and we did not enjoy seeing them return.
- I said in the roundtable earlier this week that Penix’s only major flaw to this point was his lack of accuracy, and while that was true the first two weeks, his decision-making was mighty shaky in this one, too. Penix missed Kyle Pitts high on the game’s first pass, went a little too low or a little far afield on open receivers on several occasions in the first three drives, and generally just missed too often to keep the passing game in rhythm. He also threw a pick six on a ball where he simply didn’t seem to see the defender and made multiple ill-advised throws along the way, including another not-even-a-prayer ball to a slipping Ray-Ray McCloud. That’s uncharacteristic for a player who had taken very good care of the football up until this point, and concerning that such an unflappable player looked so flappable. I’m probably far less worried about Penix than others on the staff here and fans elsewhere, but the Falcons have to figure out a way to get him in rhythm and consistently hitting throws, because the trend line is not good right now, and with Kirk Cousins as your backup the calls will begin soon enough, if they haven’t already.
- The Falcons have had some unbelievably poor stretches just getting the play off, but it’s hard to top their second drive. On third down, the Falcons had a yard to go and called a timeout. Following that, somehow the play didn’t come in (a comms issue, perhaps) and the clock ran all the way down for a delay of game. After a timeout! That cost the Falcons five yards, and they ended up having to punt. There was an announcement at the stadium by the officiating crew, intentionally or not, that Penix’s headset kept going out, but regardless of the reason, the Falcons looked extremely out of sorts operationally in this one, and had to burn another timeout with the clock running out late in the second quarter, which in turn led to a pre-halftime would-be scoring drive simply dying due to lack of time. Robinson and Penix have to figure this thing out, because regardless of the headset, plays coming in late have been worryingly common.
- He was once again not helped by his receiving corps or offensive line. The pressure was frequent, with Penix absorbing multiple hits while he threw despite not really lingering all that long in the pocket on his average throw, and some on-target-to-in-the-area throws that were quite catchable went right off the fingertips of Darnell Mooney in particular. This passing game looks and is a mess.
- On a day like today, I don’t know if I really want a bulleted list of every defender who had trouble, but rest assured there were plenty along the way. Just know that even though they were by far the superior side of the ball on Sunday, the defense didn’t take advantage of Bryce Young’s tendency to get skittish under pressure and two major injures on the interior of the Panthers offensive line, with no turnovers and just one sack on the day while Chuba Hubbard ran all over them to the tune of a crisp 73 yards on 17 carries. There were individual moments of fine play and an effort that might have been enough to at least keep things competitive had the offense showed up at all, but too often it looked easier than it should have for a Carolina team dealing with injuries and question marks.
- Moving on from Younghoe Koo made sense, given his struggles, but the Falcons had to be pretty sure Parker Romo was the guy. After he made all five kicks in Week 2, it seemed like that might be the case. After Week 3, the Falcons may well be shopping for another guy. Romo missed a pair of not-so-easy kicks, a 49 yarder badly and a 55 yarder narrowly, as the Falcons came up empty on two would-be scoring drives in their first three tries. They never tried a field goal again. There are other options out there, but the Falcons badly want to avoid getting stuck in a biweekly kicker carousel, something they haven’t had to do in years.
- Billy Bowman Jr. accidentally tackled Ray-Ray McCloud on the punt return before the half. That’s about as neat a summation of the Falcons shooting themselves in the foot as you can get, but McCloud and Nate Carter both fumbled return attempts on Sunday to make life that much more difficult for an already struggling offense.
- Nate Carter and Ray-Ray McCloud were not good on returns Sunday. I’m bullish on Carter as a runner even after he fumbled late, but both he and McCloud looked completely overwhelmed on Sunday, with frequent drops and poor decision-making miscues putting the Falcons extremely deep in their own territory. Paired with an offense that couldn’t get out of its own way, that was a dagger, and we can’t get Jamal Agnew back on that field soon enough.
- You cannot look this inept against a team pretty much everyone agrees is less talented, especially not one week after a coming out party on the national stage where you showed heart and aggression. The Falcons struggled to get plays in, burned timeouts because of it, missed throws, missed blocks, missed tackles, and barely looked like they were playing with any urgency and fire throughout the first half. They bumbled punts and returns, tackled their own returners, took bad angles to the ball, and failed to reel in catchable balls. That’s a complete top-to-bottom failure for a team that knew they needed this win and knew Carolina was capable of giving them hell based on past experience, which should make this team sit up and pay attention before the season is lost early.
- For those who have had blistering criticism for Raheem Morris and Zac Robinson, in particular, this day gave you an entire belt of ammunition, given that they couldn’t find any inspiring efforts or clever workarounds for all the problems Atlanta faced. Robinson’s offense never even made it into the red zone to struggle in this one, choosing to do so between the 20s, and the lack of an early focus on the run when Penix was scuffling came back to bite them. Robinson and Morris both share blame with their players for the team’s inability to get in scoring range right before the half, because while the time and distance meant a high degree of difficulty, the lack of urgency, the absence of timeouts, and the baffling series of targets to the middle of the field with the clock running doomed the drive. This coaching staff and front office can’t oversee collapses like this, because otherwise the Falcons are cooked. Again.
The Wrapup
Game MVP
Nope. Bijan if you have to.
One Takeaway
A team capable of this kind of effort is a team capable of anything, with the anything arrow pointing toward all the really bad things we fear.
Next Week
The Falcons head home to host the Commanders, who have beat them repeatedly in recent years and may or may not have Jayden Daniels back. If they don’t, it’ll be former Falcons quarterback Marcus Mariota out for revenge.
Final Word
Awful.
