More Banjo: Week 8 @ Falcons

[Maxie the Taxi]

Wasn't Monty more or less cleared to return? Maybe that was enough for TT. Davis wasn't all that impressive.

[Harlan Huckleby]

Does this mean Starks is ready to return?

Starks has looked no better than Knile or Action Jackson. He has had a real rough season. Maybe, just maybe, he was dealing with a nagging injury all along. He certainly didn't have his old burst.

I wish the Packers would cut Starks, but maybe they have reason to believe he can rebound.

[gbgary]

Wasn't Monty more or less cleared to return? Maybe that was enough for TT. Davis wasn't all that impressive.

they need a real running back. Monty is surprisingly good in the duel roll but with his condition they/he will really have to manage his hydration, oxygen, etc.
the extra work he's received the last few weeks probably brought this on.

[pbmax]

Does this mean Starks is ready to return?

That was my first thought. Not sure they want to trade more picks away.

[Freak Out]

Bull shit. If Rodgers didn't play as well as he did today we would have been blown out of the Georgia Dome. A depleted secondary and not enough pressure on Ryan on their last drive is what killed us.

Please don't feed the trolls.

[gbgary]

Does this mean Starks is ready to return?

they can only bring back one from ir. why would it be starks?

[gbgary]

That was my first thought. Not sure they want to trade more picks away.

to get better NOW. if min had thought that way they wouldn't have bradford.

[Joemailman]

they can only bring back one from ir. why would it be starks?

Starks isn't on IR. Lacy and Shhields are.

[Teamcheez1]

Someone will have to rename future threads of this type. Banjo has been released.

[vince]

Say NO to More Whitehead.

[texaspackerbacker]

+1

It's the same ol' same ol' with this team. We can play with average to weak teams, but we figure out ways to lose to upper tier teams, i.e., teams with either an elite defense and/or an elite QB.

The problem is there is nothing elite about us.

Yes, we have injuries. Our starting CB's were out, as was Clay. To tell you the truth, Clay's loss didn't mean much considering how he's been playing this year (not to mention how little he's played). And people here were ready to lynch Randall for his poor play, now we're using his absence to excuse losing.

To compensate for the loss of our cornerbacks, we gave the youngsters help by playing a vanilla -- pseudo-prevent defense: rushing the passer with 2-4 players and dropping the rest into coverage. I suppose that's one way to handle it. But it wasn't working. At the half Atlanta was on pace to score 38 points. Another defensive coach might have endeavored to adjust, i.e., go all in on pressuring the QB in the second half. But that didn't happen. Apparently, Stubby and Dom were content with our defensive performance in the 1st half.

Except for Clay, the front seven were healthy AND I keep being told that we can generate pressure on the passer with the best of them. I just don't see it. It's kind of like being told time after time after time that we have the best QB in the league but not seeing much evidence of it, especially in the clutch.

Maybe I'm too old and cynical, but I've seen and heard all this crap before. We went into the season being hyped as a Super Bowl contender. Considering the strength of the schedule, some were even predicting we wouldn't lose a game. Now it looks like we'll be 8-8 with maybe a chance to limp into the playoffs.

People will say injuries are part of the game. Yup, and injuries seem to be the only part of the game we excel at. And injuries will be one of the biggest reasons we go nowhere this year.

P-A-N-I-C!

I saw Gunter in single coverage on Jones most of the game and Goodson often single coverage on the other side too. Both were not great, but were fairly decent. I would liken most of our pass rushers to hitters in baseball with warning track power. They almost get the sack - almost only counting in horseshoes and hand grenades. Our home run hitter is Matthews, and I'd say we missed him yesterday. I'm one of those ready to lynch Randall, and I don't see our secondary as missing him much. Rollins, however, is a different story, as, of course, Shields is.

The past two weeks, the team has played the kind of offense they need to play - both type and quality. If the D just gets back to near what it was before last week, the team will be way better than all right. I still say, everything is within reach - division championship, go to and win the Super Bowl.

[gbgary]

Starks isn't on IR. Lacy and Shields are.

my bad. thought he was. thx

[pbmax]

We here at Banjo's Inc. are sticklers for legacy. Chances of a change this season are minimal.

You could say we are stubborn.

[Pugger]

Starks has looked no better than Knile or Action Jackson. He has had a real rough season. Maybe, just maybe, he was dealing with a nagging injury all along. He certainly didn't have his old burst.

I wish the Packers would cut Starks, but maybe they have reason to believe he can rebound.

With only one other HB on the roster that is not on IR I don't think we can afford to let Starks walk right now.

[pbmax]

Blown coverage on Sanu's TD.

No one would identify who was responsible for giving up the game-winning touchdown pass the Falcons’ Matt Ryan threw to Mohamed Sanu with 31 seconds left in the game.

McCarthy said he wasn’t going to blame it on a single player, but admitted a mistake was made.

“There’s adjustments in each and every coverage and in particular on alignments and so forth,” McCarthy said. “I’ve never corrected players here in the media. We looked at this morning. We’ll go through it thoroughly.”

Defensive coordinator Dom Capers described it as a zone coverage and also wouldn’t identify what went wrong. He did not say he regretted the call, which left linebacker Jake Ryan trying to cover Sanu.