NFL First Thoughts: Atlanta Falcons
Bad division. Easy schedule. Could the Falcons exceed expectations?
Below is a transcript from The Simple Handicap podcast (listen here), presented by Right Angle Sports. We’ll be doing a first-look preview of all 32 NFL teams, followed by more complete team previews prior to the season. Interested in signing up for the RAS NFL service? Join here.
First and foremost, there’s a big spotlight on head coach Arthur Smith. It’s his third year after posting back-to-back seven-win seasons. There’s huge expectations for the Falcons internally in 2023 and an urgency for Smith to meet them, otherwise there’s doubt in his job going forward. It hasn’t been implied directly, but you can read between the lines, and it seems like a do-or-die season for him in many ways.
Smith has gone out of his way to put in parts on both sides of the football to make sure he has the best chance at success this year. He has inferred that Desmond Ridder is his starting quarterback, and if that’s the case, it could work out quite well. When you think about what Smith does for quarterbacks, especially young quarterbacks, it’s taking a lot of pressure off them. Last year, Smith had the highest play-action usage in the entire league, and he’s also a coach who utilizes pre-snap motion. Not having Kyle Pitts at tight end hurt Atlanta last year and he will be more involved this year. Atlanta drafted RB Bijan Robinson, who seems like a perfect fit and will be very effective. We should also expect to see a lot of passing. Overall, this is an offense with weapons and a play caller who can bring it all together. Defensively, Atlanta upgraded with key pieces, especially in the secondary.
Then you have the division. It’s getting worse, not better. Tom Brady has left Tampa, and you have a full regime change there outside the head coach. There’s tons of new pieces and moving parts. That will be a team that faces lots of difficulty. Carolina has a new coaching staff and a rookie QB, lots more questions than answers. And then you have the Saints, the division favorite in the NFC South, but they are the weakest favorite in the NFL with lots of uncertainty.
The big question for Atlanta: “How long will it take for this team to come together?” Well, let’s look at the schedule. The distribution of games, for the most part, seems to benefit the Falcons in a big way. The first 10 games for Atlanta is extremely easy, with a litany of underwhelming quarterbacks. They’ll face, in order: Rookie, first-time starting QB, Jared Goff, Trevor Lawrence, rookie, rookie, rookie, Ryan Tannehill, Kirk Cousins, and whoever the Cardinals decide to use as their quarterback. So when you think about Smith trying to get this offense right, and a defense that’s upgraded and established facing a bad group of QBs, the low degree of difficulty should really benefit the Falcons. After their bye week, the games get harder, but there aren’t many offenses that will put a huge scare into the Falcons’ D.
So to recap: You have head coach urgency, offensive and defensive upgrades, a division full of question marks with a weak favorite, and a schedule that’s front-loaded with easier games. If the Falcons can get off to a fast start, they’ll be well on their way to clearing their regular season win total of 8.5, which RAS released to clients in mid-June.