Geaux Falcons

With the win over the Saints this past Sunday, the Falcons improved their record to 2-7 on the season. This win was great not only because it was against a hated rival, but also because there were several changes that were made beforehand that likely lead to this win.

Mid-season Changes

There were a few personnel changes made by head coach Dan Quin that seemed minor at the time. Those seemingly minor changes looked to have made a profound impact on the team. These changes likely lead to the win against the Saints.

• Coaching Changes: There were three big coaching changes that took place during the teams most recent bye week. The first one was Raheem Morris moving from being the wide receivers coach to being the new secondary coach. The second big change was moving Dave Brock from running backs coach to wide receivers coach. Finally, the third major coaching change was Bernie Parmalee becoming the new running backs coach. He was previously an offensive assistant. These coaching changes looked very minor at first, but they seemed to have made a great impact after the teams win over the saints.

• Kicker change: During the bye week, the Falcons released their long time kicker, Matt Bryant. He was very inconsistent during the season. This was very painful because he had been great for the Falcons for a long-time. He was a huge part of their success in previous seasons. The falcons signed Younghoe Koo to replace Matt Bryant as their place kicker. He did a very good job in the win over the saints making all four of his field goal attempts during the game. He was also named NFC special teams player of the week. Hopefully he will keep this success going for the remainder of the season.

These seemingly minor changes that were made during the bye week looked to have made a major impact on the team. They played with higher energy against the saints than in previous games this season. They looked like they played smarter as well. they looked better on defense than in previous games. This could be attributed to the fact that Dan Quin wasn't calling the defense during the game against the saints. Jeff Ulbrich and Raheem Morris took over defensive play calling during the game. Hopefully these changes will translate into wins for the remainder of the season and carry over into next season as well.