Falcons red zone struggles end playoff hopes

The Falcons have some serious issues they need to work out. They’re just not able to beat playoff-caliber teams at this point because, well, they’re not a playoff team. After losing Sunday’s matchup with the 49ers, Atlanta has dropped to 6-8 and 11th in the NFC; aside from some chaotic ending, the Falcons postseason dream is essentially dead. More facets of the team faltered than performed how they were supposed to; however, shout out to the special teams for playing their tails off.

One area, in particular, has been frustrating — the red zone offense, which just hasn’t improved under Arthur Smith like many had hoped. Smith left Tennessee after coordinating one of the most effective offenses in the league, specifically in the red zone. Before the San Francisco game, the Falcons offense ranked 19th in the league in red zone touchdown scoring percentage, scoring touchdowns on 58.33% of trips — a slight improvement from the Falcons 53.45% rate in 2020 under Dirk Koetter. On 17 trips, the offense only reached the end zone eight times.

All statistics are courteous of Team Rankings

The performance the offense gave in the red area on Sunday against the San Fran defense isn’t going to help those statistics either. Matt Ryan and the offense scored just one touchdown on five red zone trips, and to make matters worse, three of those drives resulted in zero points despite getting the ball inside the 10-yard line.

On the other hand, the 49ers’ offense scored four touchdowns on five red zone trips while limiting the Falcons to just 2.7 yards per rush and pressuring Matt Ryan the entire game. Even though Atlanta had a couple of explosive plays, once they needed to get 10 yards or even just one, they were unable to. Ryan was sacked three times and hit about a dozen more times; the offense couldn’t get it going on the ground or in the air.

The Falcons ran 20 plays in the red zone, which were all failures outside of a 20-yard Russell Gage touchdown. The rough day in the red zone for the offense has now dropped them to a lower touchdown red zone percentage than last year under Koetter. The Falcons currently rank 26th in red zone touchdown scoring percentage with a 53.33% success rate, which is slightly under the 53.45% mark a season ago. The Falcons have many things to improve upon, but the red zone execution and game plan must be at the forefront of the to-do list.