NFL Winners and Losers: Dan Quinn makes regrettable call in Falcons loss

Without hesitation, Atlanta Falcons head coach Dan Quinn sent in the field-goal unit.

Down four points. With just over three minutes remaining. Two timeouts left.

Go figure.

The Falcons trailed 17-13 to the Blaine Gabbert-led San Francisco 49ers and stood at the 1-yard line on fourth-and-goal. Quinn didn’t even appear to consider going for it.

The field goal was good. The ensuing loss was wholly predictable at that moment.

The decision was regrettable immediately. If the Falcons failed to score on fourth down, they would have pinned the 49ers and Gabbert, who had 33 turnovers in his 28 career NFL starts (including Sunday), in a precarious spot trying to salt the game away.

Gabbert started the game well, throwing two touchdowns, but had thrown a bad interception minutes earlier and had taken a brutal hit that knocked him out briefly. If ever the bad Gabbert would emerge, it would be in that spot.

Instead, Quinn went ultra-conservative. After the field goal, the Falcons couldn’t stop replacement 49ers running back Kendall Gaskins (eight rushes, nine yards for his season to that point) on four close-out rushes for 17 yards. Throw in a Gabbert run, and the Falcons watched as the 49ers ran out the clock.

“The fourth-down play, I chose to kick it there and thought we were getting the stops defensively,” Quinn said. “We’d get the kick, get the stops, use our timeouts and then go attack on offense. We’re a really good two-minute team on offense. So, that was the reasoning for it. We didn’t stop them on the third down. They converted.

“So I wanted to make sure I explained our thinking going into that one.”

That’s the Falcons’ third loss in four games after starting 5-0. The past three games, the Falcons beat the Tennessee Titans and backup quarterback Zach Mettenberger by three points; they lost to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and rookie Jameis Winston; and then dropped Sunday’s game to Gabbert, starting his first game since Week 5 of the 2013 season, and the roster-gutted 49ers.

Not befitting of a team with playoff aspirations.

Quinn and the Falcons head into the bye week as a mystery wrapped in an enigma. On the one hand, they have elite offensive performers in Devonta Freeman and Julio Jones, but on the other they — still — have limitations with Matt Ryan and the rest of the offense. The defense has improved but is not a shutdown unit.

The Carolina Panthers, meanwhile, beat a respected Green Bay Packers team to move to 8-0 and build a strong cushion for the NFC South lead. Expecting the Falcons to find themselves, even with games against the Panthers looming in Weesk 14 and 16, feels like a giant stretch.

Quinn put too much faith in his defense that allowed Gabbert, Quinton Patton and Shaun Draughn to do consistent damage all game. The first-year head coach failed to smell the momentum switch in the game and realize he had to seize the moment on the road against an inferior opponent.

Instead, he showed weakness and allowed the 49ers to grind out a win they probably had no business winning. A month ago, Quinn was a popular Coach of the Year candidate. Now he’s fighting for his team’s playoff life — still in the sixth spot in the NFC totem pole but having to withstand the coming push from the 4-4 Seattle Seahawks and St. Louis Rams, and perhaps others.

Here are the rest of the winners and losers from Week 9 of NFL action:

WINNERS

Replacement offensive coordinators: How about the performances from the Indianapolis Colts and Tennessee Titans amid a week of turmoil for both franchises? The Colts fired offensive coordinator Pep Hamilton, Andrew Luck’s close confidant from their Stanford days. Ken Whisenhunt, the head coach entrusted to usher Marcus Mariota into the NFL and help him transition into more of a pro-style offense, was fired after a 1-6 start.

The Colts’ Rob Chudzinski stepped in for Hamilton and made some clear changes. He called a slew of quick, short passes to get the ball out of Luck’s hands, and the results — 365 yards of offense against the vaunted Denver Broncos defense, gaining an early 17-0 lead — were strong.

Luck entered the game with a league-worst 13 turnovers but did not give the ball over once in the 27-24 win, and he was sacked only once in 37 dropbacks. Running the ball 40 times, even with middling success, at least sent a message: The Colts would be balanced and physical, a stark contrast from the Hamilton offense.

Titans play caller Jason Michael teamed with interim head coach Mike Mularkey to put Mariota in a position to succeed in the OT win over the New Orleans Saints. After a slow start, Mariota and the Titans got going.

Like Luck, Mariota received good pass protection (zero sacks) and was turnover-free. Although the Titans went three-and-out five times, they also strung together seven drives of at least 52 yards, including the 80-yard walk-off drive in overtime in which the poised Mariota — despite not having leading receiver Kendall Wright for the game — went 6-for-6 passing and threw the game-winner to Anthony Fasano, a beautifully drawn throwback call from Michael.

Changing coaches midseason isn’t always a great long-term solution, but two AFC South teams that badly needed to help out their young, talented passers had good immediate results in Week 9.

Buffalo Bills: The health gods shone brightly on the Bills this week — mostly — as the team got its core skill players back. Yes, Percy Harvin was placed on injured reserve, but we mostly had written him off to this point. And double yes, LeSean McCoy returned Sunday only to later leave the game. But before doing so, he had 16 rushes for 112 yards and a 48-yard touchdown run. Backup Karlos Williams, also returning to the lineup, had another big game: nine carries, 110 yards and two scores as the four-minute back to help close out a 33-17 win over the Miami Dolphins.

But it was the passing duo of Tyrod Taylor to Sammy Watkins that helped the Bills step on the accelerator. Watkins’ 44-yard TD catch was exactly what he and the team needed. Amid cries that the Bills overspent to get him in the draft two years ago, and having berated fans for their criticism of him, Watkins’ best defense was a huge game, and he delivered with eight grabs for 168 yards.

Taylor completed only three passes for 13 yards to pass catchers not named Watkins, as the pair connected on all eight passes between them. Taylor’s running ability (10 rushes, 44 yards) also was a breath of fresh air for an offense that needed a shot in the arm, and he misfired on only one of his 12 passes in the game.

This was what the Bills needed with a season-defining stretch upcoming. Rex Ryan heads back to his old stomping grounds next week against the New York Jets, and then it’s his old rivals, the New England Patriots, the week after that. Five of the next six games are on the road. The Bills’ season will come down to how they play in this spell of games.

New York Giants defense: The return of Jason Pierre-Paul no doubt galvanized the Giants’ beat-up and bruised defense. He started and played about three-quarters of the team’s 62 snaps against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and seemed to get stronger as the game went on as the Giants’ defense closed things out. Pierre-Paul provided several pressures, filling a pass-rush void that had worn this group down up until Week 9. His return was a huge development.

Why? Well, a unit that was without Jon Beason and Prince Amukamara entering the game also lost defensive tackle Johnathan Hankins in the first quarter with a torn pectoral that could threaten his season.

Jasper Brinkley stepped in for Beason and played well, recovering one fumble and forcing another. Creating turnovers and pressure defensively was crucial in this game with Eli Manning (two INTs, 5.3 yards per attempt) and the run game (114 yards on 33 carries) largely struggling.

The 5-4 Giants are the only NFC East team over .500, and they face a brutal schedule down the stretch. Losing in Tampa wasn’t an option, and the defense carried that burden on Sunday, allowing a 59-yard run and a 68-yard pass but clamping down other than that, especially in the red zone.

LOSERS

Colin Kaepernick: As Gabbert mostly put his best foot forward in the win over the Falcons, the benched Kaepernick looked worse by contrast. Had Gabbert struggled in Week 9, the Kaepernick truthers might have had a point — after all, this is a flawed roster and a team that had lost six of seven games entering Sunday.

Kaepernick actually made a decent throw on his first attempt on Sunday after he replaced Gabbert following a helmet-to-helmet hit, but 49ers tight end Vance McDonald dropped the pass. But then Kaepernick took a timeout before Gabbert came back in the game.

There was a small irony in Gabbert using his legs well in the game, too, rushing for 32 yards (including three end-game kneeldowns) and escaping a few pressure plays. Kaepernick clearly is the superior athlete of the two of them, and his critics have bemoaned the fact that he doesn’t use them enough. Gabbert’s Week 9 rushing total surpassed any that Kaepernick compiled in his past four starts.

One game will not make up their minds, but the 49ers have more evidence that Kaepernick might not be the answer and that the decision on bringing him back in 2016 might be a little less easy.

Eddie Lacy: What in the world of Packerdom has happened to the third-year back who accounted for 3,001 yards from scrimmage in his first 31 NFL games? Lacy has been a shell of himself this season, and his five rushes for 10 yards and a critical fumble in the Packers’ loss to the Carolina Panthers were another sign the team might have to lean even more on James Starks. Clearly the better option at this point, Starks had 10 rushes for 39 yards and took over the Lacy receiving role with six catches for 83 yards and a 29-yard TD catch that helped give the Packers a chance to pull off an improbable comeback before falling short.

Lacy now has only 308 rushing yards at the midpoint of the season, more than 500 yards off his rushing average his first two seasons. Is he unhealthy? Overweight? Mike McCarthy likely won’t shed much more light on that. Meanwhile the Packers are 6-2 and in a dogfight for the division race and on even footing with the Minnesota Vikings with a showdown between the teams looming in Week 11.

Dan Campbell: This was a bad game for an interim coach who is trying to establish an identity and convince his Miami Dolphins bosses he deserves a permanent position. The past two weeks have not gone well, as the Dolphins have been outcoached and outplayed early in double-digit losses to division foes that dropped them to 3-5 and 2-2 under Campbell after he had won his first two games in impressive fashion.

Campbell had two coaching errors that cost his team dearly.

The first one was failing to call timeout near the end of the second quarter as the Dolphins were driving for a score, down 19-7. Lamar Miller was tackled inbounds with just under 20 seconds remaining in the half at the Buffalo 7-yard line. Instead, the Dolphins allowed nearly 15 seconds to run off, going hurry-up instead.

The fact that the Dolphins were bailed out by a Bills pass-interference call is immaterial. The wasted opportunity took away the field-goal option when the Dolphins opted to go for six points. Ryan Tannehill’s pass to backup tight end Dion Sims fell incomplete, and the Dolphins cost themselves points.

“In hindsight, yeah, I should have used a timeout there,” Campbell said.

The second major mistake was accepting a holding penalty against the Bills in the third quarter on a third-and-4 play from the Miami 34-yard line, down only 19-14 and momentum in the Dolphins’ corner.

Campbell accepted the penalty. Had he declined, the Bills would have been forced to attempt a 51-yard field-goal try and — worst case — the Dolphins would still have been down one score. Instead, Taylor hit Watkins for a 44-yard score, which would be the back-breaker. The Dolphins never recovered.

“I understand that questioning there,” Campbell said. “It’s hindsight again. [I am] frustrated as well.”

He should be. Campbell’s two curious decisions, consistent with a first-time head coach, cost his team a chance to win a key division game. Now the season is slipping away.

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Eric Edholm is a writer for Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Eric_Edholm