Matt Ryan: Is Poor Play From Center Hurting Offense?

Matt Ryan is still having a favorable season at quarterback for the Atlanta Falcons, but nowhere near what he’s capable of. Is poor play from center to blame?

Pro Football Focus has Atlanta Falcons QB Matt Ryan as the 8th highest grade passer in the NFL through Week 8 (80.7). This grading system accounts for how well or how poorly each player performs on a specific snap. +2 is the highest mark one can receive on a play and -2 is the lowest.

So in essence, Matt Ryan is playing better than most of the 55+ quarterbacks to have played in 2015. On the year, Matt Ryan has thrown for 2,399 yards, 11 touchdowns, and 7 interceptions. His NFL Quarterback Rating is 92.3, while the 0 to 100 scale ESPN uses has him at 66.37. These QBRs aren’t drastically worse than what he posted last season (NFL: 93.9, ESPN: 70.96).

While the numbers don’t necessarily dictate a massive downturn in the franchise QB’s performance, why does it feel like? In the last four starts, Ryan has looked more confused at times than I can remember even from his rookie year in 2008. The turnovers on offense are piling up in recent weeks and it’s maddening to lose a game to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at home when the Falcons didn’t ever have to use P Matt Bosher!

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After the 10-7 road victory over the terrible Tennessee Titans, I began to wonder if Matt Ryan had as good of a grasp of OC Kyle Shanahan’s offense as I had originally thought. Ryan and the Falcons offense’ looked great against the Titans in the preseason at home, not so much in Week 7 in Nashville.

Did the decline in offense in recent weeks have to do with the receiving corps dealing with injuries? To some degree, yes, but that doesn’t seem like the sole problem here. Could it be that the Atlanta Falcons play down to their competition in the onset, but choose to play their best football late? That makes some sense, but seems a little hard to quantify.

Where I think it all started was when starting C Mike Person got hurt against the Washington Redskins in Week 5. Not that backup C James Stone isn’t a good rotational interior lineman, but the Atlanta Falcons’ vastly improved offensive line has seemed out of whack ever since the ankle injury to Person in the second half of Week 5.

While Pro Football Focus still grades out the Atlanta Falcons’ offensive line as the third best overall unit in the NFL, there has been a slight downtick in pass protection for the Atlanta Falcons front five. Though Atlanta has the fewest penalties up front and have the second best running blocking unit (think Devonta Freeman‘s burst on the scene), the pass protection is now the eleventh best in football.

Pro Football Focus has LT Jake Matthews as the highest graded offensive lineman on the Falcons (80.4), while C Mike Person has the lowest overall grade of the starting five (58.6). Person’s total is all that bad, as it is a major improvement over Stone and Joe Hawley from last year.

So statistically, the Atlanta Falcons are doing better on offense that we think they are. The only really bad game for the offense was against Tennessee and maybe against Tampa, as four turnovers are never good. Then what is it then?

There seems like there is some form of disconnect in both snapping the football and handoff exchanges on the Atlanta Falcons offense. I’m not saying that Ryan, Person or Stone have the yips, but these bad snaps/handoffs are costing the offense dearly and are messing with the quarterback’s head.

For most of his career, Ryan had one reliable center snapping him the football in hopefully future Ring of Honor Member C Todd McClure. Mud Duck never made a Pro Bowl, but was a delight to watch play center for the Atlanta Falcons for a very long time. Joe Hawley and James Stone showed signs of strength for Ryan in parts of 2013-14. Even Person, who had never played center before, looked solid before the injury.