The Atlanta Falcons were operating at a serious disadvantage during the first two years under head coach Arthur Smith and general manager Terry Fontenot, even if nobody wanted to admit it at the time.
The team’s desperation to return to the Super Bowl following the 2016 season led to some questionable decisions by the former front office. The Falcons neglected the salary cap for years in order to keep the core of the roster together. Eventually, team owner Arthur Blank was forced to clean house in 2020.
Two years and a handful of trades later, Atlanta is finally in position to make some noise in the NFC. Smith thinks the lessons of the past two seasons will serve the team well in 2023.
“Obviously you need to keep morale up,” Smith told ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler about the balancing act during those first two years. “You’ve got to have some results. With two completely different teams, ’21 and ’22, we were not satisfied, but we were right there at the end. … You try to do things the right way. Tough lessons were learned, but we think we’ve had a lot of progress going into Year 3.”
Another interesting tidbit in Fowler’s feature was Smith’s comments on the team’s lack of flash.
“Love it. We’re a gritty football team,” Smith said. “We don’t have any social media stars here.”
It’s hard to argue with Smith there. One thing that definitely carried over from the previous regime is the lack of big personalities. Although, it’s hard not to consider Cordarrelle Patterson a social media star.
The veteran running back made a habit of using the program formerly known as “Twitter” to recruit free agents throughout the offseason. Aside from Patterson, though, this is a group that doesn’t say much.
Obviously, that’s the way Smith likes it. We’ll see if it translates to results this season as the Falcons look to end their five-year playoff drought.