Ryan showed some fight

Ryan showed some fight
September 15
Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Think of this game as a big fat cake. Picture Matt Ryan bending down to inspect the delicacy. Imagine his shock when the top layer flies open and up springs a boxing glove to smack Matty Ice on the snoot.

Only then does he read the inscription on the icing: "Welcome to the NFL."

Every rookie has this game, rookie quarterbacks especially. Matt Ryan got his in Week 2 of Season 1, and for nearly a half it was as bad as Week 1 had been good. Against Detroit, he'd thrown his first NFL pass for a 62-yard touchdown. Against Tampa Bay here Sunday, his first nine passes were incompletions, and two were caught by the wrong team.

So addled was the guy lauded for his poise that he actually slung the ball backwards for an 11-yard loss at the end of the second quarter. "I was trying to pull it down," he said, but at that stage he really didn't know what he was doing.

It was 17-0 after 21 minutes, and it looked for all the world like one of those vintage Bay beatdowns - such as the 34-10 wipeout in 2002, Michael Vick's first start here, or the 37-3 annihilation of last December. So it was with great surprise that you looked up with seven minutes remaining and saw …

The Falcons down 17-6 with first-and-goal at the 4.

"It looked rough from the beginning," said receiver Roddy White. "But we did have a chance."

No, they didn't win. Matty Ice didn't throw the big chill on the Bucs in the final reel. But Ryan did, in his first road start against a proud and polished defense, fight his way through what began as an abomination and turn it into just a garden-variety bad game.

White again: "Everything he did today, he's learning on the run. And [Bucs defensive coordinator] Monte Kiffin always does this to young quarterbacks."

Young Matt Ryan was buffeted and bewildered like he'd never been before and might not be again, and still he gathered himself and completed 10 of 18 second-half passes, a half in which he drove his team inside the Tampa 10 twice.

"As a rookie, it's never going to be easy," Ryan said. "You have to continue to weather the storm and learn from it."

And he will. He'll profit from the worst day of his professional life. It isn't often a team can take solace from a 24-9 loss, but the Falcons could and did. They knew this could have been 37-3 all over again, but their resolve wouldn't allow it.

Ryan: "You've got to keep battling. All our guys are continuing to battle."

Back to first-and-goal at the 4. The Falcons choose a play that left Ryan running with the ball, which made no sense then and less in hindsight. Mike Smith, the coach, said the play was supposed to be "a run-pass option." Ryan said it was a straight quarterback draw. It wound up losing three yards and limiting them to a field goal at a time when a touchdown would have made it dicey for the home side. But that, too, is fixable.

The Falcons are starting over, and they're growing as they go. Standing in"


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