New York Giants Week 16: Keys to Beating the Atlanta Falcons

What do the New York Giants need to accomplish to upset a desperate Falcons team on the road Sunday?

New York Giants Head Coach, Brian Daboll / Kevin R. Wexler-NorthJersey.com / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

The New York Giants have just three games remaining in their 2024 regular season, but their quest for a long-awaited win is not over yet. One of their final chances to notch it will come in their second-to-last road trip to the South to face the Atlanta Falcons in Week 16. 

It’s been quite a rough stretch for the Giants in the five weeks since they cut ties with quarterback Daniel Jones in November. The former starter was benched and then released for poor play after six seasons with the team and replaced by third-stringer Tommy DeVito, but ironically, that same issue, along with injuries, has not been resolved by him or the other two gunslingers New York has been forced to throw out on Sundays. 

As the Giants roll into Atlanta to square off with the Falcons, they find themselves losers of their last nine, which ties a franchise record for the longest recorded losing streak and boasts the worst total offensive production in the entire NFL. They also will be running out a different quarterback for the fifth straight week as Drew Lock will return from the sidelines while searching for answers to avoid what is quickly becoming a 2-15 fate at the end of the year. 

However, the one surprising element to this matchup has been their opponent's similar route at their own quarterback position this past week. After playing the first 14 games behind him, the Falcons elected to bench starter Kirk Cousins amid a five-game stretch where he has gone 1-4 and thrown nine interceptions compared to one touchdown in the same span. 

In return, Atlanta has chosen to take the field with backup and No. 8 overall selection Michael Penix Jr. for the remainder of the season. Penix will be making his debut as a starter at the NFL level and at no more of a crucial time for the Falcons, who are 7-7 and on the brink of elimination from the NFC playoff picture. 

The Falcons are desperate for a win against the disheveled Giants to keep their postseason dreams alive for at least another week. At the same time, the situation with a new player coming in at quarterback could pause the success of  Atlanta’s game plan and offer the Giants a chance to steal a late-season win to wrap their finish around.

The Giants have nothing more than pride and draft positioning, which some might want them to maintain by losing out, to play for down the stretch. Still, there are hungry professionals in their locker room seeking to prove they can win a football game despite the challenges plaguing them all year.

Here are three keys for the Giants to end their losing skid and defeat the Atlanta Falcons in their upcoming matchup.  

Find a Passing Game

The Giants have had a respectable year running the football despite not having Saquon Barkley manning their backfield, but they’ll need to adopt a different approach if they want to compete with the Falcons’ staunch run defense. 

Pushing the football up the middle has become a major part of the Giants’ offensive identity this season. The team has fallen behind in the air due to inconsistent quarterback play. They have tallied the 18th-highest rushing yards in the NFL and scored 12 of their 21 touchdowns on the ground. Kudos to the heroic work of Tyrone Tracy Jr. in his professional debut. 

However, earning their keep through the run game hasn’t been as easy in recent weeks, and that isn’t likely to change against the Falcons’ defense, which performs well against that phase of opposing offenses. The Giants have struggled as their rushing attack is stifled, and the passing effort can’t pick up the slack. They’ll need to figure that out in order to compete with Atlanta, who will be looking to force them that way. 

According to Pro Football Reference, the Falcons own one of the league's top 15 units in opposing rushing metrics, including 13th in yards allowed and second in touchdowns. In three of their last five games, they’ve held running backs below 100 yards rushing and forced four turnovers in crowded scrums of tacklers. 

It is one of the reasons why the Falcons' high third-down conversion rate to opponents is so strange. They give up first downs at the second-highest rate in the NFL, and that’s with a defense that does a good job of winning the battles at the line of scrimmage on early downs when the enemy tries them in the trenches. 

That said, the Giants need to establish a passing-oriented game plan and test the resilience of the Atlanta secondary early. Over the last few games, they’ve been slow to get a groove going in that element of their offense and have not found it until the second half, when the game is already out of hand on the scoreboard. 

The Giants only have two games in their last five with over 180 passing yards and are averaging just over 185 yards per game with nine total touchdowns from the pocket. Last Sunday, they only got 68 yards from Tommy DeVito before he left with a concussion, but even then, he was averaging just 5.2 yards per throw on 10 of them. 

The one player they’ve found in the passing realm has been Malik Nabers, who notched 10 catches for 82 yards and a touchdown against the Ravens. It was his third double-digit catch outing of the season. Perhaps the Giants could look for him at the jump to gash the Falcons secondary and open up opportunities for their other playmakers as the defensive focus shifts.

A solid, consistent passing effort has been missing for most of the season, and it’s going to be a key once again to the Giants’ success on Sunday. A one-dimensional attack can no longer keep them afloat as opponents are adjusting, making it more difficult for Tracy and Devin Singletary to feast. 

Get Some Pass Rush

The Giants defensive interior might be a little light on weapons due to injuries, but they still have a group that can create pressure and get a decent pass rush to the quarterback. They need to find that again with the Atlanta Falcons, who have a vulnerable front and a quarterback who will just be getting his feet wet as an NFL starter. 

The Falcons will certainly have a little more mobility to use against the Giants with Michael Penix's skill set under center. However, their offensive line is nothing to write home about when it comes to pass protection and giving the quarterback extra time to throw the football. 

Entering Week 16, Atlanta’s offensive line is ranked 21st in team pass block win rate, winning about 58 percent of their pressure battles, which extends to about 70 percent in running looks. The Giants' pass rushing ranking has dropped from where it was at the start of the season, but they still are the 15th best unit in the league and 12th when attacking opposing running backs. 

This season, six players have earned at least 182 pass-blocking snaps for the Falcons, and only three have earned blocking grades above 70.1 in that span. Their two bookend tackles, Jake Matthews and Kaleb McGary, have each allowed five sacks and 49 total pressures to pass rushers, meaning there is an open opportunity for the Giants to capitalize on. 

They won’t be going in with their fully healthy squad up front, but it could signal the long-awaited dominant outing for Brian Burns or Kayvon Thibodeaux, who has been awfully quiet on the edge after a career-high sacks campaign in 2023 when he notched 11.5 takedowns. 

Even with battling a very mobile quarterback in Lamar Jackson last week, the Giants got him down three times for a combined loss of 15 yards. It was their most in a single game since Week 8 when they recorded four against the Pittsburgh Steelers and Shane Bowen has recently mixed in some unique looks to get the secondary involved in the action a bit.

Even though Penix hasn’t thrown any of the Falcons turnovers this season, he might come in playing a little fast as the nerves of his first NFL start get the best of him. This is where the Giants if they can get some pressure in his face early, might force him to dart some throws into traffic or play lazily with the football and put themselves into positions to make plays on ill-advised footballs. 

The turnover game was what helped them win so many close games back in 2022 when they won nine games, but it’s been lacking all year with just two interceptions by the defense. Getting back to that effort will always help teams win games in the NFL and that’s no different as New York faces off with Atlanta. 

Contain Bijan Robinson

The Giants have done a pretty good job of slowing down opposing running backs in their last two games, and that trend has to continue as they face the challenge of Falcons lead back Bijan Robinson on Sunday. 

Despite their woeful year in run defense overall, the Giants haven’t looked too shabby on the ground in December. After giving up 10 100+ yard games to running backs in their first 13 games, New York has stunned the last two bulls they have faced to keep them below that mark. 

In Week 14 against the Saints, the Giants held Alvin Kamara, one of the league’s most consistent rushers year over year, to a mere 17 carries for 44 yards and his entire backfield to 92 yards for the third-lowest total allowed this season. 

Then, against the All-Pro in Derrick Henry and the Baltimore Ravens last week, the Giants followed it up by limiting one of the top-2 position players in the NFL to just 67 yards and a 4.8 average on 14 carries. Baltimore finished the day with 179 rushing yards overall, but that was boosted by the six carries and 65 yards from the nifty legs of quarterback Lamar Jackson. 

Their next fighter coming in is Robinson, the second-year running back who also has one of the best rushing stints in 2024. In 14 starts behind Kirk Cousins, he has rushed for 1,102 yards and eight touchdowns on the ground, which is good for the fifth-best start line in the position. 

With Robinson as their lead guy, the Falcons own the seventh-highest rushing attempts and have translated them into an average of 124.2 yards per game and 11 touchdowns overall. They opened the season with 10 100+ yard games in the first 11 contests and have had two in the last month of the schedule alone. 

At 5’11” and 215 pounds, Robisnon might feel like a slightly smaller back, but he has been known as a power runner since his days in college with Texas. He is utilized a ton in zone looks that force the defense interior to the outside and open up the middle of the field in play action, but with the ball in his hands, he can power through and earn extra yards after contact. 

The Giants' tackling effort has improved a little in the last couple of games, as evidenced by their production, but if it doesn’t continue against the Falcons, they could see Robinson earn another solid outing. He currently has 707 yards recorded after contact, the eighth-highest total in the position, and has forced the sixth-most missed tackles simultaneously. 

New York needs to bring crisp and efficient tackling for a third straight week to help their chances of beating Atlanta and forcing them to test Penix’s arm through the air in his first NFL start. 

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