Live from the Dome: An important Falcons’ season begins
"Hut one! Hut two! Hut three! Play championship football!" (AJC photo by Curtis Compton)
If you can win four seasons running and make the playoffs three times in four, you’re not far off. You’re not a team without talent or an organization without savvy. You are, as they say, in the mix.
The trouble with the Falcons is that, three times in four Januarys, they’ve played their worst game of that season (or very near) at the moment it mattered most and the watching world was paying rapt attention. Three times in four seasons they were eliminated by a team with a lesser record.
The Falcons have become, to invoke the British term, the NFL’s nearly men. They’ve almost made it. (Had the Falcons beaten Green Bay here in January 2011, they’d have won the Super Bowl.) They’ve gotten close enough to make you – well, maybe not you, but me for sure – think this time would be different, and to date it hasn’t been.
The offseason just past marked this franchise’s first real period of recalibration since Thomas Dimitroff, Mike Smith, Matt Ryan and Michael Turner arrived in 2008. A staff of four years’ standing underwent major upheaval, and the message has been both sent and received: No longer will “nearly” be good enough.
The exhibition part of this massive season is about to begin, and I’m here at Ye Olde Dome to monitor developments. I’d be happy if you tagged along. And I thank you, as ever, in advance.
By Mark Bradley
Tell us what you think about the site
Customer Care »
Vacation stops, manage subscriptions and more
AJC Services
Sections
Other Editions
Visitor Agreement | Privacy Statement
© 2013 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
462 comments Add your comment
Nite Owl
August 9th, 2012
9:42 pm
Thanks for the props, Seen. I think it’s going to be an interesting year all around.
Nite Owl
August 9th, 2012
9:42 pm
I’m going to shut up for a while. I’ve been talking too much.
Mark Bradley
August 9th, 2012
9:45 pm
And I’ll miss you, Nite Owl. Thanks for keeping it going.
JSS
August 9th, 2012
9:50 pm
@ Nite Owl…
Saw it, noted
ijonathan
August 9th, 2012
9:52 pm
Boy, this came is just clipping right along. Nice pace to it.
J-MAN
August 9th, 2012
9:54 pm
Even though Im not able to watch this game im in here and got gamecast on ESPN goin
J-MAN
August 9th, 2012
9:55 pm
Right now I wanna see who is gonna take the #4 and #5 WR spots who can get open and catch the ball
ijonathan
August 9th, 2012
9:55 pm
Mark, have you resorted to taking toothpicks out of the frou-frou press box sandwiches and using them to keep your eyelids open?
ijonathan
August 9th, 2012
9:57 pm
If the Falcons lose this game, it will mean absolutely nothing. The first teamers absolutely dominated the Ravens first string.
Mark Bradley
August 9th, 2012
9:58 pm
Tied now. Falcons fumbled. Ravens punched it in, as they say.
J-MAN
August 9th, 2012
9:58 pm
Yea but injuries can always happens and then these 2nd stringers are starting
J-MAN
August 9th, 2012
10:03 pm
Well JPW isnt much better than Redman. Lets see what Dominque Davis can do
ijonathan
August 9th, 2012
10:03 pm
Is it good or bad when your GM drops the “it is outside the scope of this conversation” during a pre-season, in-game interview? Discuss…
Nite Owl
August 9th, 2012
10:05 pm
Ah, I’m back. “Choke” just made me a nice sandwich. He’s been in the kitchen crying most of the night. He says it’s just the onions from my sandwich, but I know better…
Did I miss anything? Oh my God, is it really still the 3rd quarter? Whew.
I would have JPW shoot me to put me out of my misery, but he’d probably miss…
Nite Owl
August 9th, 2012
10:09 pm
As great as Smitty is at coachspeak, TD is even better at GMspeak.
Nite Owl
August 9th, 2012
10:10 pm
Had a fun post about taking a break to eat the sandwich “Choke” made me, but I think it got eaten. It was too cheap a pop anyway.
JSS
August 9th, 2012
10:10 pm
I trust “nothing” out of Dimitroff’s mouth…
todd grantham
August 9th, 2012
10:11 pm
what about the ones that got away like Bret Favre? and Harmon Wages?
J.J.M.
August 9th, 2012
10:11 pm
I wish we could throw the ball down the field. I’m sure the crowd is half sleep lol
Nite Owl
August 9th, 2012
10:12 pm
The post got eaten, not the sandwich. Well, the sandwich got eaten too. Never mind.
That was NOT pass interference. That was a perfect defensive play. Where did they get these refs anyway?
Oh, right.
Mark Bradley
August 9th, 2012
10:12 pm
The crowd is not half-asleep. But I might be.
Nite Owl
August 9th, 2012
10:12 pm
That would have been a touchdown in the CFL.
todd grantham
August 9th, 2012
10:15 pm
great picks of Falcons: Scott Woerner. Warren Bryant. Tony Casillas.
Nite Owl
August 9th, 2012
10:15 pm
@Asst Head Coach Grantham:
The ones that got away…definitely Deion.
How about All-Pros that came here at the end of their career? Eric Dickerson, Chris Doleman, Pierce Holt come to mind.
Mark Bradley
August 9th, 2012
10:15 pm
Ravens lead 24-17. Have outscored the Falcons 24-3.
Then again, the Falcons’ starters outscored the Ravens 14-0.
J.J.M.
August 9th, 2012
10:16 pm
Number 82 still ended up scoring
todd grantham
August 9th, 2012
10:16 pm
No in anyone’s wildest dream could anyone realize the Falcons’ best pick was their very first one: Mr. Tommy Nobis.
todd grantham
August 9th, 2012
10:17 pm
Nite Owl,remember Bobby Hebert?
todd grantham
August 9th, 2012
10:18 pm
and the old, old QB from Dallas Wade something or other
Matt "CHOKE" Ryan
August 9th, 2012
10:18 pm
Dang….Ravens number 3 looks better than Falcants number 1.5
Nite Owl
August 9th, 2012
10:18 pm
@JSS:
What’s there to trust? He’s not giving you anything. “We’re happy with the team we have, but we’re always looking to improve.” Blah blah blah.
But they actually have been very forthcoming about the fact that it’s not acceptable to go one-and-done in the playoffs. “Our goal here is to win a championship.” Not hiding from anything.
Do you want him to go Looney-Tunes like Jerry Jones and start saying things like “The window is closing, we need to win before I die soon”?
nobody
August 9th, 2012
10:18 pm
Maybe we should make lamark a LB. Bad hands but nice hit
J.J.M.
August 9th, 2012
10:19 pm
Yes that should have been a catch
Matt "CHOKE" Ryan
August 9th, 2012
10:19 pm
Mark
Its not how you start its how you finish.
Nice GOP spin though
Mark Bradley
August 9th, 2012
10:20 pm
Dimitroff is a famously engaging conversationalist. I mean that sincerely.
J-MAN
August 9th, 2012
10:21 pm
Boy guess we should make a call to John Kitna, Donovan McNabb or Dante Culpepper. Our Back-ups are awful
todd grantham
August 9th, 2012
10:21 pm
It was so obvious when the Smiths owned the team they loved UGA football and wanted to emulate it from the red jerseys, to the draft picks of Royce Smith and Scott Woerner to hiring Mr. Munson to do the play-by-play.
Nite Owl
August 9th, 2012
10:21 pm
@Asst Head Coach/Defensive Coordinator Grantham:
Yes! Bobby Hebert and Wade Wilson! They both played pretty well for us, actually. Wade had a gallon or two left in the tank.
I was at the game (’95 I think) when Jeff George went down from a cheap shot by the 49ers and Hebert came in to lead us to victory and a playoff berth. The lunatic next to me kept yelling, “Throw at Eric Davis! He’s an All-Pro!” To this day, I’ll never understand why he was screaming that.
J.J.M.
August 9th, 2012
10:21 pm
Lmao wait where was this choke guy when the falcons were winning?
J.J.M.
August 9th, 2012
10:23 pm
Number 70 on the falcons will get cut
Nite Owl
August 9th, 2012
10:23 pm
@”Choke”:
That sandwich you made me was awesome. A little too much mustard for my tastes, though. I’m sure you’ll learn from this and do better next time. And when the pony keg is kicked, you need to be a little quicker to tap the next one.
Oh, and you couldn’t be wronger. It’s not how you finish in the preseason. It’s how much you disappear while you’re getting your rear end kicked.
todd grantham
August 9th, 2012
10:24 pm
remember the Falcons drafting Pat Sullivan who stood all of 4 feet 9 inches tall?
Matt "CHOKE" Ryan
August 9th, 2012
10:24 pm
Well folks it looks like this will be the last season the city will have to watch the clown show known as CHOKE
J.J.M.
August 9th, 2012
10:25 pm
Gotta love the screens to the running back
J-MAN
August 9th, 2012
10:25 pm
I bet the Colts are asking where this Painter was last year…..actually their not since they got Andrew Luck
JSS
August 9th, 2012
10:25 pm
Just give me Ozzie Newsome confident, you can be honest without being Foxborough South… There is a balance
J-MAN
August 9th, 2012
10:26 pm
So it appears we have Blane Gabbert type of Back-ups
Nite Owl
August 9th, 2012
10:27 pm
Don’t get me wrong, Mark. I love listening to TD’s interviews. I just don’t think he’s going to give you the Rex Ryan or Jerry Jones type of crazy stuff. Which is a good thing. It means he’s not crazy like, say, Rex Ryan or Jerry Jones.
Matt "CHOKE" Ryan
August 9th, 2012
10:27 pm
Just in……………..
Art Blank is on the phone with Baltimore to make a trade for Painter and CHOKE will be holding Flacco’s clipboard…..ha ha
todd grantham
August 9th, 2012
10:28 pm
is it time to turn out the lights?