Falcons Place Hawley, Holmes On IR, William Moore On Short-Term IR

The Falcons made three major moves today, putting two starting offensive linemen on injured reserve and starting safety William Moore on IR with designation to return:

The Falcons have placed Joe Hawley (knee) and Lamar Holmes (foot) are being placed on IR today.

— Atlanta_Falcons (@Atlanta_Falcons) September 30, 2014

The Falcons will place S William Moore (shoulder) on IR designated to return.

— Atlanta_Falcons (@Atlanta_Falcons) September 30, 2014

The Falcons will promote Harland Gunn and Sean Baker from the practice squad.

— Atlanta_Falcons (@Atlanta_Falcons) September 30, 2014

Falcons also signed tackle Cameron Bradfield who was originally with the Jacksonville Jaguars.

— vaughn mcclure (@vxmcclure23) September 30, 2014

I'm not going to put a sweet glaze on this one, folks. The Falcons can probably hold up okay at right tackle with Gabe Carimi playing there, but going from Joe Hawley to Peter Konz or Harland Gunn is likely a significant downgrade. Bradfield was a walking nightmare in Jacksonville, and he should be behind Ryan Schraeder on the depth chart. As much as I like Kemal Ishmael, losing Moore hurts the defense, and the Falcons are suddenly a depleted football team that was already coming off an ugly Week 4 loss.

The losses along the line will likely hurt a resurgent ground game and give Matt Ryan less time to throw, which means more quick hitters will be necessary. The loss of Moore puts more strain on the rest of the secondary.

This doesn't sound a death knell on the 2014 season, but it leaves the Falcons in a bad spot, to say the least. There are going to be questions about the training staff and strength and conditioning staff that are not easy to answer, and there's going to be questions about how this team can perform going forward. We don't have any of those answers right now, but we'll watch closely and hope mightily.

The Falcons also signed Adam Replogle and Kimario McFadden to the practice squad.

Your thoughts?