GAME STORY: Steelers 34, Falcons 16
The view from the pressbox at Heinz Field. (By D. Orlando Ledbetter/dledbetter@ajc.com)
PITTSBURGH — Falcons defensive end Ray Edwards had a quiet debut against the Pittsburgh Steelers in a 34-16 defeat Saturday night.
The Steelers improved to 2-1 and the Falcons dropped to 0-3 during the exhibition season.
Edwards, the team’s prized free-agent signee, did not play in the first two exhibition games because he was recovering from offseason knee surgery.
Edwards, who played well into the third quarter, did not record a sack or a tackle, but his presence may have led to sacks by defensive tackles Jonathan Babineaux and Vance Walker.
“I don’t know if they were too happy with my performance today, but I’m going back to the drawing board to see what I can do,” Edwards said.
After Edwards signed with the Falcons on July 29, Falcons coach Mike Smith noted that his presence would help the entire defensive line and not just right defensive end John Abraham, who finished with 13 sacks and 17 quarterback hurries last season.
“We did get some pressure on the quarterback early there in the first half,” Falcons coach Mike Smith said. “We got him on the ground. We had him running a little bit. . . I have to watch the tape, but I felt him out there. I certainly did.”
With Edwards in the lineup against the Steelers, Falcons defensive coordinator Brian VanGorder was like a kid with a new toy.
“We got some good pressure, but there are some other things we need to work on,” Edwards said. “We have to get more pressure, get more sacks and get more quarterbacks down.”
Edwards played some left end, but frequently switched sides with Abraham. He also dropped into coverage three times while playing on the left side in the first half.
On his second drop into pass coverage, Edwards picked up Pittsburgh running back Rashard Mendenhall out of the backfield.
The Steelers seem to pay Edwards a great deal of respect early. On their first two plays, quarterback Ben Roethlisberger rolled out to his left, away from Edwards, before he connected with tight end David Johnson for gains of 17 yards on each play.
On the Steelers’ second possession, the Falcons came up with a sack when they forced Pittsburgh into an obvious passing situation. On a third-and-17, Edwards had a strong rush from left end and appeared to be held by Pittsburgh right tackle Willie Colon.
Edwards flushed Roethlisberger to his left, where he was sacked by Babineaux. If Roethlisberger had scooted away from Babineaux, Abraham was waiting for him.
After a Falcons’ turnover and a hustle play by Harry Douglas to stop Lawrence Timmons from scoring on an interception return, Edwards didn’t take the field with the short-yardage defense. Playing without Edwards, the Falcons held the Steelers out of the end zone and forced them to kick a field goal.
Pittsburgh, on the strength off two long touchdown passes, held a 24-16 lead at halftime.
Roethlisberger and wide receiver Antonio Brown connected on touchdown passes of 77 and 44 yards. The Falcons’ defense was playing with defensive tackle Corey Peters (knee) and starting right cornerback Dunta Robinson (hamstring).
“I’m concerned when you give up big plays,” Smith said. “You can’t give up explosive plays. We talk about it all the time.”
The Falcons’ offense moved the ball, but had to settled for three Matt Bryant field goals in the first half.
“Obviously we caught the ball well,” wide receiver Roddy White said. “I felt good about what we did. But when we get down there in the red zone, we have to score touchdowns. Especially against teams that have really good defenses down there. When you get down there, you have to score touchdowns. We just have to do a better job of that.”
After a scoreless third quarter, the Falcons were driving early in the fourth quarter, but backup quarterback Chris Redman’s pass intended for Kerry Meier was intercepted by Pittsburgh’s Crezdon Butler, who returned it 95 yards for a touchdown to make it 31-16.
Pittsburgh’s Swayze Waters added a 27-yard for the final margin.
Despite the margin of victory, the Falcon had their moments.
Rookie wide Receiver Julio Jones flashed his speed and got behind Pittsburgh’s star safety Troy Polamalu, but dropped the deep ball in the end zone. Jones caught five passes for 59 yards.
“Matt threw a great ball to me,” Jones said. “I’ve just got to make that play.”
White, who entered the game with just one catch during the exhibition season, had eight catches for 101 yards and a 10-yard touchdown pass.
The Falcons wanted to unleash their running attack against the Steelers, but running back Michael Turner was held to 19 yards on seven carries (2.7 per carry). The Steelers led the league last season in run defense, yielding just 62.8 yards per game.
With the running game shut down, quarterback Matt Ryan threw 42 passes. He completed 22 for 220 yards, a touchdown, an interception and finished with a passer rating of 65.6.
The Falcons roster currently stands at 85. They must reduce their roster to 80 players by Tuesday as part of the NFL’s mandatory roster cut down. The Falcons must trim down to 53 players by September 3 and may establish an eight-player practice squad on September 5.
The Falcons host the Baltimore Ravens at 7:30 p.m. Thursday at the Georgia Dome in their exhibition-season finale.
They open the regular-season on the road against the Chicago Bears on Sunday, Sept. 11.
“We still have work to do,” Ryan said. “We still have some improving to do. We still have time to do it. We have these two weeks. We need to take full advantage of these two weeks so that when the regular season does roll around, when we go to Chicago, we are at our very best.”
–D. Orlando Ledbetter, The Atlanta Falcons beat blog
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262 comments Add your comment
bgfalcon
August 27th, 2011
11:31 pm
did more like what? maybe they could have moved up 21 spots to draft a freak at WR, or maybe they could get the best DE available at so litttle a price that if he turns out to be a bust he would not hurt the cap that much. maybe they could have keep 2 of the best o lineman on their team so they could protect the iceman, no sir it seems like the falcons brass did the very best they could.
bgfalcon
August 27th, 2011
11:32 pm
bg=initials
Dirty Bird Nation
August 27th, 2011
11:33 pm
This TEAM(Falcons) as constructed, will never beat the top tier teams in the NFL. DB’s are too small. QB especially back-ups are a JOKE. One is an Insurance Salesman and the other can’t QB a middle school. Pray Matt doesn’t get hurt! The Offense Co-ordinator should have been fired after the first round lost to Green Bay and ow the Falcons offense looked in that game. FIRE MM!
bgfalcon
August 27th, 2011
11:34 pm
lol at the very worst the falcons will find themselves 3-3 (barring injury of course)
Don't feed Aints trolls (It isn't 2009 anymore)
August 27th, 2011
11:34 pm
I agree that Edwards didn’t impress but it was his first game in months so I will wait to make a judgment on him. I would pay TD a dollar a day for the rest of my life if he would go out and get another veteran corner back. I do not like Owens or Franks and I think when they play it makes Grimes play bad because he has to watch the whole field instead of just his zone.
I hate Bosher. 35 yards average is going to kill us. He also is not very good at kicking off. It was his shoddy kick that got our entire team off balance.
I did like our RUN D though. We held a very good running team to 15 yards in the first half. We also had 5 tackles for loss.
Dirty Bird Nation
August 27th, 2011
11:35 pm
“How”
Tasha
August 27th, 2011
11:35 pm
All I could do was SMH! I couldnt believe they lost like that. Its going to be a jacked up season for the Falcons, pissed me off!
Stepchild
August 27th, 2011
11:36 pm
Don’t Feed – Matt Ryan threw 42 passes in a half of football….1 INT & 1 TD. I think if he throws 42 passes and completes only half of them I have to blame him. I stand by my comment that he did not throw accurately, didn’t throw well when on the move(rolling out) and failed to throw/complete passes down the field 20+ yards. We just don’t have those “splash” plays that change games. That’s what the Steelers had…”splash” plays…..2 Big pass plays…Interception returns…etc. We had none to speak of. Splash plays = explosiveness. without them we will be grinding for wins every week!!!
Chandler going Deep..
August 27th, 2011
11:37 pm
Mr Blank, Hope you have an exit plan?
The Grinch
August 27th, 2011
11:37 pm
We’ve still got some issues but I like a good bit of what I saw. Julio’s gonna make a big difference especially as he progresses. That’ll help Turner, but unfortunately Turner looks like he needs it. He’s clearly lost some burst and speed. Thankfully we have capable backups at that position. Franks looks like he’ll be a good punt returner, but I really wish we’d have picked up a veteran nickle back. All in all I still feel we’re gonna have a pretty good season against a tough schedule. I’m just glad nobody got hurt; that was the main victory tonight.
Falcon James
August 27th, 2011
11:37 pm
Falcon Fan need to wake up and smell the chicken and greens in the kitchen. Then while you make you plate, you get to miss the falcon defence getting beat deep on EVERY SINGLE DEEP PASS. Did you hear me falcon fan?? Our defence look good up front, but every pass deep was caught. What is we doing? The steeler backed off on the wooopen they dished us. If this is any indication of the what the regular season going to look like, I think I may be a saint fan!! No lie,
bgfalcon
August 27th, 2011
11:38 pm
you people need to open your eyes! its preseason! MR threw 42 passes in a half! cmon now. that means he was suppported by absolutely no running game. and the great vince lombardi once said “you cannot win if you cannot run” or something like that
Chandler going Deep..
August 27th, 2011
11:39 pm
Ben could have put up 50 on these real Dirty Birds….
Don't feed Aints trolls (It isn't 2009 anymore)
August 27th, 2011
11:40 pm
The point is even with a lot of misfires (blown coverage on a shoddy kickoff giving them a short field, 2 perfectly good touch down throws not resulting in points, etc.) we were down by 8 at the half against the AFC champions. It is not the end of the world.
Whoever asked if Smith will be on the hot seat needs to be on some kind of meds.
Shorty
August 27th, 2011
11:41 pm
Who cares…………….its the stinkin preseason??
M&M
August 27th, 2011
11:42 pm
If the falcons are so good, why is every football analysis across the country are picking the saint over the falcons ?! They must see something !
bgfalcon
August 27th, 2011
11:43 pm
falcon james if you are gonna hop off and join another team then you are welcome to, but you were never a true falcon fan to begin with then. we weren’t getting beat on every single pass play, we got beat on 2 if i can recall, both to an insanely fast receiver that just barely missed being int’s by grimes. with someone that fast you gotta just live with it because you can’t beat that.
bgfalcon
August 27th, 2011
11:46 pm
these people are crazy. i thought ray got some good pressure of the edge. he made ben go to his left alot, and on that one play where ray got pancaked i thought he slipped but i might have to see the play again.
Loyal Falcon
August 27th, 2011
11:46 pm
Boy! Some of you people are a bunch of Tards! Sure I’d like to win every game, but the fact is this was a preseason game. The preseason is used to fine tune things before the start of the regular season. I thought the first team offense looked good. I really liked the way we responded once the score was 10-0 to make it 10-10. That showed me we are making progress. Matt looked good and the first team defense was good with getting pressure on Ben. Once Corey and Dunta gets back I think we’ll be ok. Also, this was Ray’s first real action in awhile. He’ll be fine once he gets his footing.
Stepchild
August 27th, 2011
11:48 pm
with someone that fast you gotta just live with it because you can’t beat that.
Really BG??? I’d rather we get someone back there that can cover his @ss!!!!
Chandler going Deep..
August 27th, 2011
11:48 pm
Whats crazy is the Falcons have never won a SB? The streak will continue…….Easy prediction…
Loyal Falcon
August 27th, 2011
11:49 pm
You can really tell the fair weather fans on this blog. We lose PRESEASON games and they all panic. Do you all know how many teams win all of their preseaon game and then tank in the regular season and vice versa. Come on Man!
Professor Dan
August 27th, 2011
11:50 pm
Matt is the QB for next 10 years, get used to it. Really can’t drill the ball, can he? Most D2 QBs rack up 300 per game with these receivers. Not bashing him, nor team (nice goal line stand), but have to agree with those who say this is an 9-10 win, one and done playoffs, team.
Falcon James
August 27th, 2011
11:50 pm
Falcon, you need to hear me. Turn this train wreck around or else you be hearing from my other ego, Saint James!!!!
Falcon James
August 27th, 2011
11:51 pm
And he aint as easy on you as I is. He tell it like it is.
Chandler going Deep..
August 27th, 2011
11:52 pm
In the words of a famous former NBA baller: It’s just practice man, Just practice? practice? practice?
Don't feed Aints trolls (It isn't 2009 anymore)
August 27th, 2011
11:52 pm
Stepchild, you also have to factor in the dropped passes, penalties, and the lack of a run game. Also, I think the Steelers explosive plays had much more to do with our secondary than their offence. They don’t blow coverages. Almost no one has explosive plays against them. They only gave up 14 points per game last year. Our first team did better than almost any team did against them last year… the problem is we gave up too many big plays on defense.
Stepchild
August 27th, 2011
11:52 pm
Loyal….I don’t care that we lost the PRESEASON game. It’s not about the final score. It’s about competing from snap to snap. Evaluating players…and how the unit is playing. I don’t like what I’ve seen of Matt Ryan’s development. I want him to be elite….but my eyes tell me that he is not. He is a regular season star at this point. I want post season success!! He’s got to develop more to the point that he can carry the team in Big games and in big moments.
Chandler going Deep..
August 27th, 2011
11:53 pm
1st 6 games: 2-4? Just practice man? practice?
Jim
August 27th, 2011
11:54 pm
Let Ryan loose to call own plays. Get rid of both coordinators.
Stepchild
August 27th, 2011
11:57 pm
BG….they gave up 30 points in the Superbowl.
The Steelers defense put them in position to score tonight….So did their special teams. It wasn’t totally on the Falcons defense.
The first 10 points the Falcons D was working on a short field. The special teams gives up a big return…and then the Offense turns the ball over with an interception.
We are not executing at a high level.
BooBoo
August 27th, 2011
11:58 pm
People, this was the first preseason game the Falcons did any game planning for. By week 9, after they have really got the game plan thing down, they can start to win and end up having a respectable 4-12 season.
NoleRick
August 28th, 2011
12:03 am
So when the Falcons beat Chicago the first week, will the sky still be falling?
Stepchild
August 28th, 2011
12:04 am
Dimitroff…brought us Julio this offseason. Do we have anything else to show for this offseason? Ray Edwards….the jury is still out on him….so what other improvements do we really have????? Oh…Snelling is back.
Are we that pathetic as a fan base that we except this as buzzworthy!!??!! Nope, i guess we aren’t…..because tickets are still available!!
Don't feed Aints trolls (It isn't 2009 anymore)
August 28th, 2011
12:09 am
Tickets were still available the year they went to the Super Bowl… that only says that Atlanta has never been a football town… ever… and never will. If you can’t get behind a team that has had 3 winning seasons back to back, went to the playoffs 2 out of 3 years and had the best record in the NFC last year then you don’t need a team in that town.
doggoneit
August 28th, 2011
12:09 am
I bet the steelers are number one in big plays in the nfl just like they were last year. and Matty Ice throws more down and out passes than any quarterback in the league Predictable!
Loyal Falcon
August 28th, 2011
12:10 am
Stepchild…holla at me once the season is over. So we lost the 3 preseason games. It’s not as though we got blown out or anything.You all are killing me. We haven’t played one regular season game yet and some of you have already wrote this team off. wow! Every team had trouble running the ball against this team last year. The guys were just in the superbowl. Our starters played well against theirs. On another note: Quizz looked good running the ball.
go pack go
August 28th, 2011
12:18 am
Packers are gonna beat down the sorry falcons again and repeat as super bowl champs!!! Aaron Rodgers for mvp!
htwo0rider
August 28th, 2011
12:19 am
On paper, the off season moves look good, ie a big play reciever, and pass rusher. So far however, the birds look just like last year. I know the preseason is meaningless, but typically, most teams use the 3rd game as a tune up for the regular season. uh oh.
John
August 28th, 2011
12:29 am
42 passes, only 220 yards…that’s a lot of check-down routes. The secret is out on Matty Ice, the top tier defensive coordinators know, it will take most of you homer fans 10 years to find out.
Loyal Falcon
August 28th, 2011
12:34 am
Exactly! a tune up. They know what corrections they need to make. However i do believe if mularkey doesn’t utilize this teams talents he could be out after this year
WHO DAT BLACK
August 28th, 2011
12:52 am
Well, at least Matt Bryant is on my fantasy team. This will be special season.
ACE
August 28th, 2011
1:00 am
The Redskins under Steve Spurrier as coach went 4-0 in the preseason and then did not win a game all year I believe, this is practice folks, does not count!!
JONESBORO SLIM
August 28th, 2011
1:12 am
What the heck happen to my comment?
Turner The Burned Out
August 28th, 2011
1:12 am
NO ONE can run directly into 4 defenders one yard after he gets the ball BETTER than Turner. 25 runs of 2 yards and then he breaks a meaningless one late in the game to get his total up. Never have liked him. Need a speed back who can get outside.
ohhhYEAH
August 28th, 2011
1:17 am
ACE…..who do you think you are throwing facts around like that? dont you know youre not allowed to do that with these idiots? they are always right, because they like to judge on practice games! who do you think you are taking that away from them?
ATL Fan
August 28th, 2011
1:18 am
Jonesboro Slim,
Probably the same thing that just happened to mine.
JONESBORO SLIM
August 28th, 2011
1:20 am
Get off the fan wagon “Kool-Aid” drinkers
JONESBORO SLIM
August 28th, 2011
1:21 am
Oh I forgot “Talking Head” fans
ohhhYEAH
August 28th, 2011
1:25 am
04 patriots……1-3 preseason, including BLOW OUT losses to CINNCINATI and JACKSONVILLE. someone remind me how that season ended up for the Patriots please?