After trading longtime franchise quarterback Matt Ryan this offseason, the Atlanta Falcons are clearly looking to the future. But don’t tell head coach Arthur Smith that the focus is on 2023.
Atlanta will have a new starting signal-caller for the first time in 14 seasons this year. It appears that former first-round pick Marcus Mariota, whom the Falcons signed after trading Ryan, is in the driver’s seat to be the starter. However, the team also drafted Cincinnati’s Desmond Ridder in the third round of the 2022 NFL Draft, which means they’re going to want to hand him the keys at some point.
The question that many are asking is whether or not the franchise sees this as their plan or if they’re simply biding their time until 2023 when the crop of quarterbacks entering the draft is expected to be much more enticing than this year.
Smith isn’t taking the bait on that.
“This is a waste of your time and my time if you want to talk about ’23,” Falcons coach Arthur Smith told The Athletic’s Jeff Schultz. “It’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard — that a team would try to not win football games. If you don’t, there’s going to be consequences. OK, you’re at the top of the draft — I got it. But you’re in a very transactional phase of the National Football League right now. Trades in the draft. Trades for quarterbacks.
“It’s a different landscape than when Jimmy Johnson took over the Dallas Cowboys in 1989. It was pre-free agency. The famous Herschel Walker trade. They blew it up and went 1-15, and … it was a long rebuild. That is not the same NFL as today. Back then, people would’ve given their firstborn before they gave their picks away. People are still going off old narratives, and it’s comical.
“Any good team knows how to rebuild every year.”
You can’t say the Falcons are standing pat for the upcoming NFL season. Along with their quarterback changes, they res-signed Cordarrelle Patterson and signed a bevy of playmakers like Damien Williams, Bryan Edwards, and Damiere Byrd, as well as defensive help, in order to start the rebuild right away. Coming off a 7-10 season, you can expect that the Falcons aren’t interested in playing for the 2023 draft but rather trying to figure out how to end up in the playoffs by the time 2023 gets here.
