Making sense of the Atlanta Falcons' late-season slide

• Diminishing play from Kirk Cousins: Cousins' overall passing grade has dipped since Week 9, as more of his turnover-worthy plays have translated into defensive takeaways.

• Permitting more big plays on defense: Before Week 10, the Falcons were above-average in allowing explosive pass and run plays but have since ranked bottom 10 in both.

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Estimated Reading Time: 5 minutes

Entering Week 10, it was virtually all sunshine and rainbows for the Atlanta Falcons. The team was 6-3 after a thorough victory over the Dallas Cowboys and given an 84.4% chance to win the NFC South — which felt like a guarantee given considerable injuries to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

But life in the NFL can hit you like Ray Lewis over the middle, and that’s precisely what’s happened to Raheem Morris’ bunch. The Falcons haven’t won a game since Week 9, dropping four straight and squandering their advantage in the South. Now, Atlanta has only a 36% chance to reach the postseason and a 33% chance to win the division, according to PFF ELO rankings.

So, where did it all go wrong? The answer mainly stems from a waning passing game, but other departments are also at fault.

Although the Falcons have taken on the Broncos, Chargers and Vikings in the last three weeks — each of whom ranks top-seven in defensive EPA per play — Atlanta still ranked fourth in overall offensive grade from Weeks 10-14, not to mention sat fifth in rushing EPA per play. It’s not as if the Falcons’ high-powered offense has simply stopped scoring points or moving the ball at an efficient rate.

Instead, the culprit has been balance. From Weeks 1-9, the Falcons were top-10 in both passing and rushing EPA per play. In the five weeks since, though, Atlanta slotted 24th in passing and fifth in rushing, dragging its overall EPA per play mark down from seventh to 20th and its success rate down from seventh to 15th.

The harsh reality is that most of the blame does fall squarely on the shoulders of prized free-agent addition Kirk Cousins. Cousins was stellar to begin the year, offering the Falcons their long-awaited savior under center after being stuck in quarterback purgatory post-Matt Ryan. In the weeks that have followed, however, Cousins’ play has declined. Consider the table below.

The bizarre part of Cousins’ season, no matter how you splice it, is that his turnover-worthy play numbers have always been elevated. In fact, Cousins’ 4.6% turnover-worthy play rate is his highest in a season since 2014, and his 23 turnover-worthy plays are the most in the league. Even as Atlanta was coasting, Cousins sported a 4.1% turnover-worthy play rate, which was the ninth-highest among qualified quarterbacks.

But, a stark difference in what’s changed since Week 10 is turnover luck regression. From Weeks 1-9, only seven of Cousins’ 14 turnover-worthy plays resulted in interceptions; from Weeks 10-14, eight of his nine turnover-worthy plays became picks. That type of trend should likely only be expected to occur if a player continues to commit a high volume of plays that should indeed be takeaways.

Moreover, Cousins hasn’t been nearly as good pushing the ball down the field. His PFF passing grade on deep passing attempts shifted from 90.9 to 76.9, while his intermediate passing grade has plummeted from 81.2 to 53.4 — the latter of which ranks 31st among 32 qualifiers in that span.

Those problems have extended on play action as well. Cousins was a top-10 passer on play-action looks until Week 9 with his 79.4 passing grade, but that figure has been whittled down to 46.3 — which is 27th out of 28 qualifiers over the last five weeks. Effectively, the Falcons haven’t been able to operate as a play-action, deep-oriented passing attack — which is how they can function best given their field-stretching receiver talent in Drake London, Darnell Mooney and Kyle Pitts.

Even though the Falcons were 6-3, their defense was still largely suspect, sitting 21st in EPA per play and 29th in success rate over the first nine weeks. Unfortunately for Morris, his defense has struggled more than before in several areas, namely in surrendering explosive plays. From Weeks 1-9, Atlanta was seventh in explosive passing rate allowed and 13th in explosive rushing rate permitted; since then, the Falcons are 28th in explosive pass rate and 23rd in explosive run rate. Just ask the Vikings, who compiled a gaudy 14 explosive plays in Week 14 alone.

The woes of kicker Younghoe Koe can’t be overstated, either — especially because two of Atlanta’s four losses have been by four points or fewer. Koo’s 45.6 field goal grade since Week 10 ranks 33rd out of 37 kickers, and the usually reliable veteran has made only 3-of-7 kicks from beyond 30 yards. Juxtapose that with his 81.7 field-goal grade before Week 10, and you can start to understand the blueprint for a collapse.

Even having relinquished the NFC South lead, all hope isn’t entirely erased for the Falcons. Atlanta plays the easiest schedule in the NFL over the final four weeks, with seemingly only one challenging game arriving in Week 17 in Washington. Even though the Bucs don’t rank far behind — playing the seventh-easiest slate — they have virtually zero margin for error given that the Falcons hold the head-to-head tiebreaker.

If Atlanta wants to regain late-season momentum, it will need Cousins to play better on play action and throwing down the field, because his unusually high rate of turnover-worthy plays probably won’t diminish this year. Likewise, allowing fewer explosive plays and making more field goals could all power the team’s first postseason berth since 2017.