Quick Slant: MNF - Strong at the Broken Places
Falcons @ Raiders, Monday @ 8:30 PM
Antonio Pierce's journey began in Compton, California, where warmth from pink sunsets blankets earnest smiles at the baseball fields of Gonzales Park; people are still outside and no one is a stranger. But Compton is also a place of hardened corners and fleeting mercies, where resilience isn't taught but carved into bone. No help was coming to Compton in the eighties and nineties; the community had to pour into itself, even after tireless double shifts to make ends meet. After dark, the working-class fathers and mothers learned to keep their heads down, avoiding small gatherings of young men in Locs and colored bandanas, bored and looking for trouble. Pierce grew up trudging uphill, as tough as his streets, something as true today as it was then. He had to fight to play football in college, fight to earn a transfer to a reputable school, fight to make a professional team after going undrafted, fight to earn a role and fight to be a contributor to a champion. Nothing was ever given to Antonio Pierce; he took what he needed through sheer will. And with all he took, he has given half back; a devoted family man with seven kids, Pierce freely returns the gift of football through charity to the streets he was forced to take it from. It is instinctive to root for Pierce; his players no doubt know he is theirs as much as they are his.
Like Compton, Irvington, New Jersey in the '80s and '90s was a place where dreams faltered against the weight of poverty and violence; a town molded by industrial decay and economic transformation, though quieter and more suffocating in its desolation amid bleak winters. As Irvington and Compton have parallel lives, so too do Pierce and Atlanta Falcons head coach Raheem Morris. Passionate about football while recognizing its transformative grace on hard lives, Morris went from playing at Hofstra with Lance Schulters and Dave Fiore to interning with Herm Edwards at the New York Jets in three years. In his first job as a paid defensive quality control coach under Jon Gruden, Morris earned a Super Bowl ring. By 2009, he was head coach in Tampa but fell flat. A 2012 stint with Washington under Mike Shanahan changed everything, as Morris forged relationships and made impressions on the future leaders of the NFL, securing his place in the league for life.
Fan bases for the Falcons and Raiders have slipped from desperate to disillusioned, but the warriors at the top keep doggedly striving. The Falcons still have a shot at the playoffs and a division crown; the Raiders can still honor themselves and the game. Along the way, Pierce and Morris claw and scrape to hold the ground many assumed they were never meant to walk but they’ve defiantly come to occupy. But these are conquerors yet to conquer; holding an elusive position is half the battle. They fight now for the right to stay in the fight—to hold a patch of ground and see final victory tomorrow. For as far as they’ve come, anything less would betray what they’ve already done.
Falcons’ Implied Team Total: 26
Atlanta runs on 57% of its plays from a neutral script, tied for the seventh-highest run rate in the league. Atlanta’s pass rate over expected (PROE) is the fifth-lowest. And yet, it maintains passable play volume by being the second fastest team at the line, snapping the ball at an average of 26.6 seconds; Atlanta is one of only two teams running a sub-27 neutral script seconds-to-snap average. In the aggregate, their offensive play volume comes in at 67 plays per 60 minutes, tied for eighth.
The Falcons rank 14th in EPA per play and eighth in offensive success rate. They rank 16th in EPA per dropback and 10th in offensive success rate on dropbacks.
Notoriously, Kirk Cousins has struggled lately. He has thrown zero TDs and eight INTs in his last four games, and the Falcons have tumbled from 6-3 to 6-7, now two games back of the Buccaneers in the NFC South. This has forced many to call for a change from Cousins to rookie first-round pick Michael Penix Jr.
The Falcons have experienced the second-most significant drop-off in EPA per dropback between Weeks 1-9 to Weeks 10-14.
There is no other concerning factor in the statistics that would indicate trouble. Obviously, if Cousins is simply careless with his reads, this can impact the frequency of Atlanta’s turnovers. However, that the primary delineating factor has been a high-profile run of bad luck is at least possible.
Notably, the last three teams Cousins and the Falcons have played were the Broncos, Chargers, and Vikings, each among the six best defenses in the NFL in EPA per play allowed.
The Raiders, their opponent this week, are not that. They rank 25th in EPA per play allowed and 21st in defensive success rate. They rank 26th in EPA per dropback and 25th in offensive success rate on dropbacks. If Cousins has it in him to get right, this is his chance. If he can’t here, there may be a fair chance the Falcons could turn to Penix—especially if they lose and fall two games out of first.
The Falcons have four players with at least a 15% market share: Drake London (28%), Darnell Mooney (21%), Ray-Ray McCloud (17%), and Bijan Robinson (15%).
Even amid Cousins’s troubles, London is drawing a substantial amount of targets; he is tied for second in targets since Week 10, trailing only Puka Nacua. He has the fifth-most targets among WRs for the season, translating to top-ten reception and yardage totals; London is the WR8 in PPR and sixth in first-read target percentage.
The Raiders play the ninth-highest rate of man defense. Like most teams, they use Cover 3 more than any other alignment, but they only run it at 28.7%, which is not at a super-high rate. They play Cover 1 at 21.1% and Cover 2 at 18.7%. This is the seventh-highest rate of Cover 2 in the league. They utilize Cover 0 more than any other team; however, this only constitutes 9.7% of their defensive alignments.
This week, Kirk Cousins ranks only 22nd in Fantasy Points’ Matchup Expected Fantasy Points model, based on how well a player performs in fantasy against the types and rates of coverages utilized by the opposing defense. London ranks 20th and Mooney ranks 47th among WRs and TEs.
Against specific personnel, the situation gets far better for the Falcons. The Raiders have the worst PFF team coverage grade by a wide margin.
Decamerion Richardson, who would most often play the offensive left side for Las Vegas, is ranked as PFF’s 111th CB out of 113 qualified entries in coverage grade. Jack Jones, who primarily plays the offensive right side, is 83rd. Slot corner Darnay Holmes is 100th. Safety Isaiah Pola-Mao is 84th of 95 qualified safeties in coverage grade. Tre’von Moehrig is 72nd. Anywhere London or Mooney line up should be to their advantage. Even embattled Falcons’ TE Kyle Pitts should have a slightly favorable matchup.
The Falcons rank 11th in EPA per rush and fifth in offensive success rate on rushes. The Raiders rank 17th in EPA per rush allowed and defensive success rate on rushes.
