What Week 1 taught us about the rest of the Tennessee Titans schedule

Week 4: Atlanta Falcons

I didn’t see that coming. Not that the Atlanta Falcons couldn’t lose to the Minnesota Vikings, but the fact that they were really shut down by that defense the entire time.

The running game had a few bursts here and there, but in large part it was limited and the passing game was going to have to be the Falcons method of victory. However, Matt Ryan struggled with 2 interceptions and 4 sacks and that is only going to get worse after the injury news.

You never want to see offensive or defensive linemen struggle with their feet or their backs. All that weight ends up putting so much stress on the bones to heal and to properly recover you have to be very careful in how you move.

So the Titans would face the Falcons without their second best interior lineman after they allowed a sack to a DT yesterday and would get to face OTs that allowed sacks to three separate EDGEs.

Jurrell Casey, Harold Landry, Sharif Finch, and especially Cameron Wake should be excited at those potential matchups.

On defense, the Atlanta Falcons couldn’t stop Kirk Cousins who attempted just 10 passes all game. Still, he managed a TD and hit on 8 of the 10 so I guess that is fine?

Aside from the weird QB statline, the gameplan for the Vikings was clearly to attack the Falcons with the running game and they had Dalvin Cook and Alex Mattison combine for 160 rushing yards on 30 carries.

The game was really a one sided affair until the Falcons scored all 12 of their points in the 4th quarter. This game easily could have been 28-0 and for a Titans team that just won by taking deep shots occasionally but by putting pressure on the front-7 with a strong running game and play action, this couldn’t be a more perfect fit.