Atlanta Falcons - STILL Overrated

Atlanta Falcons - STILL Overrated
By Dylan Ehle

So, the Atlanta Falcons won a game that I expected them to lose last night. Good for them. But they're still GROSSLY overrated.

I'll hand it to Atlanta's defense for putting on a clinic yesterday as they snapped Drew Brees' record of consecutive games with a TD pass while forcing him into five interceptions. I haven't seen Brees play a game that bad in a Saints uniform (well....there was a certain wildcard game in Seattle), and anytime a defense steps up and shuts down an elite QB like we saw last night, they deserve a lot of credit.

My issue with the Falcons has nothing to do with their defense. Their defense throughout the Matt Ryan era has always been average at worst, while having moments of brilliance at their best. The D is a good unit, and they will not be what gives this team yet another early exit from the playoffs.

1/11. That's the stat of the night for me. 9.09%. That's what the Falcons did on third down against the #32 defense in the NFL. That's right, the Saints are last in points allowed...they're even worse than my Jaguars, who are #31. If you convert less than a tenth of your third downs against the worst defense in football, you are not an elite team. Sure, everyone has their off day - Drew Brees gave us the perfect example of that last night. The problem is that the Falcons offense has been off more than they've been on in the second half of this season.

The Falcons only managed to produce 23 points against the league's worst defense. That would be a bad day for any team that considers itself an offensive powerhouse, but if you factor in that Drew Brees gave the Falcons five extra possessions with his INTs, then it because an abysmal day. If we played this game 15 times, I bet the Saints would win 13 times, but even when the Falcons' defense gave the offense so many opportunities to score, the offense petered out and allowed the Saints to keep it close. With as little as four minutes left, there was still a legitimate feeling that Brees would overcome his nightmarish day and lead the Saints to victory.

So, with the Falcons being this bad, you might raise a legitimate question: "How the hell is this team 11-1?!" The answer is actually really easy: their strength of schedule is pathetic. They have only beaten two teams with winning records all year, the Broncos and the Bucs. The win against the Broncos was much like this one against the Saints, as Peyton threw four INTs and had his worst game of the year....still, the Falcons were only able to squeak by, 27-21. The Bucs game was essentially handed to the Falcons on a silver platter, as the Bucs led for most of the game and then squandered it. In the end, the Falcons only scraped a meager 1-point win.

Those two victories, coupled with the Saints win, constitute the only impressive (and I use the word lightly) wins on the Falcons' schedule so far. However, if the Falcons had routed the easy teams on their schedule, I'd still count them as legitimate wins...when the Patriots, Texans, Packers, and Giants rout easy teams, we're impressed, right? Well, the Falcons only have two of these so far, a 40-24 win over the Chiefs in week 1, and a 27-3 beatdown of the Chargers in week 3. Since week 3, their only double-digit victory came against the Eagles, 30-17...and we all know how good that team is.

Now that their "good" games have been discussed, let's look at the bad. There's a lot of it. The Falcons have had an multitude of games against supposedly inferior teams that have been very close. You can make the argument that good teams have off days, but find ways to win games even when they aren't playing their absolute best...if it was one or two games, I'd give it to you, but it's been an entire season of this. Let's look at their other tough competitors and the Falcons' margin of victory: Panthers (2), Redskins (7), Raiders (3), Cowboys (6), Cardinals (4). With the exception of the Cowboys, these are all games the I would have expected them to dominate. In three of these five, it took late-game miscues by the other team and a lot of luck on the Falcons' part for them to win. Three losses there, and this team would now sit at 8-4, and no one would think that they were anything special.

If the Falcons struggle this much against mediocre teams, how can anyone think that they will hold up against the beastly competition in the NFC? If they need a late-game miracle to overcome the Panthers, how will they be able to stop the Packers when they come to town (see 2010-11 playoffs)? If Matt Ryan throws five interceptions to the Cardinals, how many pick-6s will that translate to against the hungry Bears defense in the postseason? If they have to rely on late-game miscues from a young Raiders team to squeak out a win, how will the fare when they face the super-clutch Eli Manning and the fearsome front four of the Giants (see 2011-12 playoffs)?

The answer is that they will get annihilated. This team, once again, is going nowhere fast. They might win the #1 seed and take homefield advantage throughout the playoffs, but it will only be homefield advantage for one game since whoever makes it out of that bloodbath of the NFC wildcard round will simply embarrass the Falcons on their home field.

Enjoy the last few regular season games, Falcons fans. Your team won't be winning anything else in January.

Your comments are welcome below! Feel free to try to defend this hollow team.