FLOWERY BRANCH — After amassing nine penalties for 76 yards against the Saints on Sunday, the Falcons (2-2) focused on eliminating them before facing the Buccaneers (3-1) at 8:15 p.m. Thursday at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
“Coach (Raheem Morris) talked about it in our team meeting (Tuesday),” safety Jessie Bates III said. “Penalties are something that we can control. Usually, I think it’s a lack some type of concentration, some type of discipline or you’re tired. Some type of fatigue. Just being able to figure out what those penalties are, lock in on them. Make sure that we don’t get them.”
The Falcons had a drive-killing face-mask penalty called on left guard Matthew Bergeron and had an apparent touchdown called back on a holding call against left tackle Jake Matthews against the Saints.
“After it happens, it happens,” Bates said. “Whether you did it or you didn’t do it, it was called. You’ve got to fix it.”
Morris took the violations seriously.
“It was a huge conversation that (Morris) has (had with the team),” Bates said. “It’s big.”
The Falcons have 28 penalties for 194 yards on the season and are on pace for a whopping 119 penalties. Last season, the Jets led the league with 124 penalties.
“The penalties, we can’t have those,” offensive coordinator Zac Robinson said. “There are certain situations we are trying to avoid.”
The holding call against Matthews was a tough one for the offense, which has struggled to score touchdowns.
“The one with Bijan (Robinson) coming back on the touchdown, you hate to see those,” Zac Robinson said. “We are just going to continue to try to clean it up.”
The offense isn’t functioning at high-enough level to overcome the penalties.
The defense also is trying to eliminate their penalties.
“Raheem does a really nice job of addressing those in the team meetings,” defensive coordinator Jimmy Lake said. “We do as well on defense.”
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