It’s getting later in the season, and for many NFL teams, the playoffs are in sight. But some squads are already looking to next year. As each club is eliminated from the postseason, The Ringer will examine what went right, what went wrong, and where the franchise could go from here. Up next is the Atlanta Falcons, who saw their postseason chances snuffed out in Week 13.
What Went Right
Even the Falcons’ positives require asterisks. Tight end Austin Hooper was the team’s breakout player and the no. 1 fantasy football tight end with 608 yards and six touchdowns in nine games.* Younghoe Koo might be the best onside-kick specialist in the league after making three successful ones in a row on Thanksgiving.** Defensive tackle Grady Jarrett is one of the top-graded interior defenders by Pro Football Focus and has 5.5 sacks, on pace for a career high since entering the league in 2015.*** Not much went right for this team.
* Before injuring his MCL in early November.
** But he is a 75 percent career field goal kicker.
*** As a team, Atlanta is on pace for the fewest sacks since Jarrett was a rookie in 2015.
What Went Wrong
No team has a greater gap between who they thought they were and who they really are than the Atlanta Falcons. Entering this year, GM Thomas Dimitroff and owner Arthur Blank thought the Falcons could contend. Atlanta spent more than $250 million in cash to sign players to contracts and contract extensions this offseason, the most in the league. That’s actual money spent, not the accounting figures involved with the salary cap. Cap-wise the Falcons nearly maxed out; in exchange, they’re 3-9—the same record as the Dolphins, and dead last in the NFC South for the first time since 2007. They rank 28th in efficiency by Football Outsiders, only ahead of the Giants, Washington, Bengals, and Dolphins. Quarterback Matt Ryan looked lost under pressure, best exemplified by a Thanksgiving loss to the Saints in which he was sacked nine times and turned it over three times. Ryan has been sacked on nearly 8 percent of his dropbacks, the highest rate of his career. He’s thrown interceptions on nearly 3 percent of his dropbacks, his highest rate since 2009. Receiver Julio Jones has just 86 receiving yards per game, his fewest since 2012. Jones is also in the middle of yet another touchdown drought, as he’s been without a score for eight games. Running back Devonta Freeman doesn’t have a rushing touchdown this season, though he had three receiving scores before suffering a foot sprain in early November. Freeman’s backup, Ito Smith, is on injured reserve with a concussion, and Smith’s backups, Brian Hill and Qadree Ollison, have done almost nothing with more playing time. No. 14 pick Chris Lindstrom went on injured reserve with a left foot injury after Week 1. Atlanta’s offense leads the league in one category: pass attempts. That’s because the Falcons defense is so bad they have been playing from behind all season.
The Falcons defense has allowed a score on nearly 46 percent of their drives, a higher rate than every team except Miami. They’re one of three teams with fewer than 20 sacks this season and also one of four teams with 10 or fewer takeaways (tied for second fewest). Atlanta’s defense was a mess last season too, but that was mostly due to injuries to key players like safety Keanu Neal, safety Ricardo Allen, inside linebacker Deion Jones, and defensive tackle Grady Jarrett. This year, Neal is on IR again (this time with a torn Achilles), but the rest of the Falcons defense has been relatively healthy. They’ve just played poorly. Atlanta has just 18 sacks on the year, and a third of them came in one win against the Saints. The Falcons don’t have one above-average pass rusher on the roster. The team couldn’t move draft bust Vic Beasley Jr. before the trade deadline, defensive end Adrian Clayborn has just four sacks and seven quarterback hits in 12 games, and 2017 first-rounder Takk McKinley has just 1.5 sacks on the year.
Every facet of this team was a disaster, and the blame falls primarily on head coach Dan Quinn, who fired his offensive, defensive, and special teams coordinator last year but retained his own job. As the Football Outsiders’ 2019 almanac notes, it’s just the ninth time a team has retained its coach while firing all three coordinators. It’s highly unlikely Quinn returns if Atlanta finishes last in the division.
Free Agency
If Quinn shares the blame for this team’s failure with anyone, it’s general manager Thomas Dimitroff, who has locked the Falcons into their current team. Amazingly, the Falcons have the second-least cap space next season after giving a large contract extension to quarterback Matt Ryan and resetting the receiver market by giving a near-fully guaranteed $66 million deal to Julio Jones, and Jarrett a deal that pays more than $50 million from 2019 to 2021. Atlanta has such little flexibility that it’s going to have to make some hard choices to create the space to franchise tag Hooper. Even if the team releases starting center Alex Mack, Neal, and Freeman, it’ll save just $18 million. That’s enough to tag Hooper, but barely enough to do anything beyond that, like re-sign outside linebacker De’Vondre Campbell (the team will say good riddance to Beasley, and possibly Clayborn too). At that point the Falcons are just retaining the core of a team that earned a top-five draft pick without creating the money to find replacements at edge rusher, the most expensive position on defense. As bad as Atlanta’s year was, the team won’t be able to do much to fix things in free agency.
The Draft
No team needs to win the Chase Young sweepstakes quite like Atlanta. The Falcons have one of the worst pass rushes in the league. Beasley and Clayborn are likely gone in March, and the Falcons have virtually no money to acquire a veteran pass rusher to replace them. They need to draft someone stat, but their draft history is suspect. Beasley has been a bust, and 2017 first-rounder Takk McKinley is trending in the same direction. Ohio State’s Chase Young looks as close to bust-proof as it gets for a defensive end, though the Falcons may not be in range to get him if they don’t end up with a top-three pick. At that point the Falcons could reach for the next-best pass rusher (perhaps Iowa’s A.J. Epenesa or Notre Dame’s Julian Okwara) or add a third Alabama receiver to their roster after Julio Jones and Calvin Ridley (Bama’s Jerry Jeudy might be the best receiving prospect since Jones), but they’d likely be better off trading down. There will be a QB-needy team looking to get whoever is left among Oregon’s Justin Herbert, LSU’s Joe Burrow, and Alabama’s Tua Tagovailoa. The Falcons need so many players they’d be wise to acquire multiple picks and target some defenders like LSU’s Grant Delpit or cornerback Kristian Fulton. Of course, if the Falcons are looking for a new direction they could take one of those quarterbacks themselves. Yes, they have Matt Ryan, but this season showed how valuable having a second quarterback is. Teams don’t reach the top five in the draft often, and Atlanta may not get a better chance to replace Ryan for years.
