Kyle Shanahan details play-calling regret in Falcons’ Super Bowl LI loss to Patriots

A Defiant Goose said:

in your logical brain, yes. in reality, no

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Yes in both. Sorry to have to tell you that.

Patsfan1958 said:

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This is pretty incredible and cool to hear 2 Superbowl coaches talk shop in detail like this.

You will never ever hear Belichick do this and I agree. Maybe when he's long retired. Don't give away anything now.

Ice_Ice_Brady said:

We had a good discussion about this in QB thread. If anyone thinks a 40-yard field goal is a virtual guarantee, I'd agree that running three times, or even basically kneeling down into the line, would have been the right call. If you think the reward of picking up 5-10 more yards was worth the risk of being moved back further, you should expect your players won't be absolute morons. And again, just like the Seahawks decision, the negative outcome here (being pushed back 20 yards) is one of those 1/100 fluke things that in retrospect seemed more likely. Atlanta still had a 50-yard field goal attempt after the sack but committed a second absurdly bad situational play with a holding penalty.

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Agree completely

Eh, Hindsight is 20/20. Teams have lost using both approaches.

One example off the top of my head, jets at steelers round 2 of 2004 playoffs. Game is tied, jets get a first down on pitt’s 25 with a minute left in the game. Sit on the ball and kick a 43 yarder “gimme”, no brainer right?

Same situation happened with us against the cardinals in 2012.

Thats why you dont assume you’re making a 43 yard fg when evaluating the playcall.

Deus Irae said:

4th and 2 will always be a "suspect call", and it's not because they failed to convert. It will be a "suspect" call because it was the wrong decision.

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I disagree. We couldn't stop Manning in those years.....it was the correct call.

Patsfan1958 said:

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I like reading the room and maybe it's over-thinking it but look near the end when McVay chimes in, it's pretty funny to me to see Peter and Kyle kind of zone out when McVay starts talking. McVay seems to have to take a long time to make a point, I wonder how that translates into the locker room....

Pats1971 said:

But no team is going to do that. When you are coaching you go by the flow of the game, the falcons felt they needed another TD, they did not have the time to say, ok let me take a day and think this through and oh yeah I will also know the results of each play I call and they run as well. Its easy to say what they should have done because it didnt work, mostly because the pats executed and atlanta didnt.

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I remember thinking that the Falcons were stupid for not running the ball after the Julio catch and kicking the field goal. I was doing the math in my head and after that catch I thought it was game over. I was completely surprised they dropped back to pass, facilitating the win. 3 points would have been a 2 possession game without nearly enough time to execute two scoring drives. The Falcons screwed the pooch on basic math that game.

He's pretty candid about it, which is cool. That was a blatant hold on Long though, don't go there

Deus Irae said:

Yes in both. Sorry to have to tell you that.

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Logically you are correct but here we are 12 years later still bringing up 4th and 2. Would we still be doing it if it worked? Highly doubt it. It's significant because it was a bad call and bad result. If it was a bad call with a good result it wouldn't have been scrutinized this much

Deus Irae said:

4th and 2 will always be a "suspect call", and it's not because they failed to convert. It will be a "suspect" call because it was the wrong decision.

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A Defiant Goose said:

in your logical brain, yes. in reality, no

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Deus Irae said:

Yes in both. Sorry to have to tell you that.

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The only non-painful thing about me being forced to agree with Deus...

...is that he'll never know it...

...because he has me on ignore.

oldrover said:

The only non-painful thing about me being forced to agree with Deus...

...is that he'll never know it...

...because he has me on ignore.

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WHAT'S THAT OLDROVER? WHAT'S THAT YOU SAY??! YOU SAY YOU'RE AGREEING WITH @Deus Irae BUT HE WILL NEVER SEE IT BECAUSE HE HAS YOU ON IGNORE????

aluminum seats said:

He's pretty candid about it, which is cool. That was a blatant hold on Long though, don't go there

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I agree, he had his right arm around Longs neck trying to drag him down.

XLIX said:

WHAT'S THAT OLDROVER? WHAT'S THAT YOU SAY??! YOU SAY YOU'RE AGREEING WITH @Deus Irae BUT HE WILL NEVER SEE IT BECAUSE HE HAS YOU ON IGNORE????

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I've long defended that Seattle play. Yes, we had GL out there. Lynch was 1/5 all year i believe. That was a good call, we see it every Sunday from every team. From everywhere on the field. We were just prepared to the max. And Butler & Browner just killed it on that play. Huge jam and Butler just hung on.

You wouldn't see or hear this back in the day but it's unbelievable content. Not a fan of the host, nice guy but that could improve. Get someone in there with something going on between the ears and we're cookin'.

Both of these guys were nerds before they became big shots and seem to get what it takes to win. I could listen to them all day. Its just stupid hard to win, win constantly, win it all in the NFL. It'll be interesting to see what happens to their respected teams after these shake-ups.

The decision to use Ryan is completely defensible. Neither team had a good rush attack that night. It was a battle of the quarterbacks for the whole game with both sides only really using their pass catching RBs for most part. We used White, they used Devonta Freeman

The problem with using the running game effectively in the Superbowl is that both teams had excellent front 7s. leGarritte Blount for all his faults is a decent power runner and he got humiliated. We put their big RB on his butt a couple times too. The possession game just wasn't there for either team and both teams had easy penetration of the middle of the football field through the air, and a miserable time doing the same on the ground.'

So the question is, why would you use a unit that wasn't getting the job done all game, to close out a game? It'd be like rolling in with the long man in the bottom of the 9th with a 1 run lead, sure you might get away with it but is that the best way to use your resources? Probably not.

It's a simple philosophy that I've seen Bill use a dozen times. You bring your strength against theirs. Our best unit against their best unit with the game on the line, no screwing around. If you think you can scheme the run game open maybe you use them for one down, but if Shannan could have done that he would have done so long before the closing minutes of the 4th. So if you don't have the meat at RB to attack a top notch front 7, and don't have the personnel or a good plan to scheme your RBs free, it's foolish to force it, especially against a team with momentum. Go with what got you there. And what got the Falcons to 51 was Matty Ice.

Frankly what killed the Falcons wasn't Ryan or Freeman or Shanny or any of the usual goats people blame. It was a weakness in the strength and conditioning throughout the team. Bill had the guys put it all in the bank and they had it to spend in the most important 30 minutes of their football lives. The Falcons didn't.

Freeman being put in a blocking position on the strip sack and missing his cue just raises so many red flags. You do NOT put a 200 pound running back in that position unless you have no choice, he's not used to it, and he really doesn't have the meat to pull it off anyway. Especially not liked up directly opposite Hightower in his prime! I can only think they did it because their OL was exhausted and they needed someone, ANYONE, to come in and try to help protect Ryan. Even with that though Freeman was an odd choice.

And the holding call is an exhaustion based error as well IMHO. OLs who are wobbly on their feet due to fatigue will hold if they get beat. In my mind what killed the Falcons was exactly that: strength and conditioning. Front 5 and front 7, we wore out the Falcons, they made mistakes, and we capitalized on them. All because our guys just plain put more in the bank than their guys did.

cscirpoli said:

I remember thinking that the Falcons were stupid for not running the ball after the Julio catch and kicking the field goal. I was doing the math in my head and after that catch I thought it was game over. I was completely surprised they dropped back to pass, facilitating the win. 3 points would have been a 2 possession game without nearly enough time to execute two scoring drives. The Falcons screwed the pooch on basic math that game.

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Shanahan's excuse doesn't even make sense. He panders about watching Brady for an hour then says who wouldn't go to Julio again. Falcons would have won if they just ran it after the sideline catch.

The game was crazy and if a whole slew of things don't go right, the Pats don't win and Shanahan doesn't get second guessed. I've probably rewatched that Super Bowl 5 times when it replays on NFL network and every time I watch it I still get nervous and ask myself how the hell the Pats will pull it out as if I don't know the result.

BaconGrundleCandy said:

I've long defended that Seattle play. Yes, we had GL out there. Lynch was 1/5 all year i believe. That was a good call, we see it every Sunday from every team. From everywhere on the field. We were just prepared to the max. And Butler & Browner just killed it on that play. Huge jam and Butler just hung on.

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If there was ever a time in any Super Bowl that the MVP trophy should have gone to a nerdy analytics guy, it was then. That could have been Ernie Adams’ finest moment.

Deus Irae said:

4th and 2 will always be a "suspect call", and it's not because they failed to convert. It will be a "suspect" call because it was the wrong decision.

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And if Kevin hadn't bobbled the ball but just caught it, it was a first down.

Pats1971 said:

Yep, but in his defense, it comes down to execution. If they make a play nobody questions it. Its only questioned when its not executed. Its like the 4th and 2. If that ball is not bobbled, Bill is a genius, but because it was, it was a suspect call. Coaches can hover between the genius and idiot if plays are executed or not.

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if execution is perfect, it shouldn't matter what plays you call............since execution is rarely perfect, you have to consider other things......there's a bunch of coaches on the sideline......it must be that none of them realized that even in the first half, their defense was on the field for 43 plays....their offense was on the field for 19.....they were prime to get steamrolled......they should have seen it and with a 25 point lead, they should have done everything possible to just make the clock keep moving.......they didn't