Written by Mark Bradley at MyAJC.com
Surely it had something to do with the charged setting — his new team had come within a Richard Sherman armlock of toppling his old team in the fortress where that old team has gone 34-5 since 2011 — but one Dan Quinn response Sunday was unlike every postgame DQ response as the Atlanta Falcons’ coach. This one sounded unscripted. This one sounded, dare we say, genuine.
On Sunday in Seattle, someone (blush) asked Quinn if he felt better about these Falcons, who are 4-2, after six games than he did last year’s Falcons, who were 5-1. His unedited answer:
“I like what our team identity is becoming. So badly did I want the identity to happen right away. It’s growing stronger, that toughness that resolve to where we can attack in all three phases. That identity is one that I’m pleased that were starting to become, we way we want to finish, the different people that get involved. We have had some games where different groups came through. Two weeks ago certainly the defensive line had a big day. Two weeks before that the quarterback and receivers had one. We have had games where the special teams have been involved.
“Having that team identity knowing that all phases are going to attack, I feel it’s coming together. We so desperately wanted that to happen last year, I believe that’s where we were going with some of this but it didn’t in terms of all the way. I wanted that to happen overnight but it didn’t. But I feel like this group is growing, quite a bit different from last year’s group. We will be ready to get back rockin’ here in a few days.”
The two things I liked about that were the absence of “resolve” and “resiliency,” two DQ buzzwords invoked so often as to have shed all buzz, but mostly the part where Quinn, who tries hard to say nothing, said something. Three times he mentioned how “badly” and “desperately” he wanted this “coming together” to happen last season — and then admitted what we knew from the 8-8 finish after a 5-0 start: It hadn’t.
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