When football fans hear the name “Atlanta Falcons,” it is hard to immediately say what their immediate thoughts are.
This is not an NFL team with a rich legacy like the other three teams in Sunday’s NFC and AFC Conference championship games — the Green Bay Packers, the Pittsburgh Steelers and the New England Patriots.
Atlanta do not even have a history of heartbreak over their five decades. No library of colourful just-misses like, say, the Buffalo Bills.
No one ever describes the Falcons as great or awful, or lucky or unlucky. That’s because no one ever describes the Falcons at all. What is to describe?
If ever a franchise needed a shot of charisma, a memorable championship season, or even a household name superstar to give them a story, it would be the Atlanta Falcons.
Perhaps quarterback Matt Ryan can lead the Falcons past his more famous counterpart Aaron Rodgers and the Packers on Sunday, and on to the Super Bowl, and the first ever championship for the team. But even that sounds improbable.
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The Falcons are certainly overdue. The franchise was born in 1966, and has one Super Bowl appearance, in 1999, playing the role of “the other team.”
That was the year Denver Broncos Hall of Fame quarterback John Elway capped his resume with a second consecutive championship, a rather unexciting 34-19 contest.
You get the picture here. The Falcons are not the most horrible franchise in the league, just among its most invisible.
They are actors in a big show, but they never get a speaking part. If they were a piece of living room furniture, they would be the footrest.
The Falcons are 8-12 in their dozen post-seasons, and sport a pedestrian .444 all-time winning percentage in the regular season.
How about big stars and famous players?
Only one man in the Pro Football Hall of Fame spent the majority of his career with Atlanta, a defensive end named Claude Humphrey, who played in the 1960s and 70s.
Michael Vick was the face of the franchise from 2001-05, before he earned even greater notoriety serving prison time on dog cruelty charges.
All-time leading rusher, Gerald Riggs gained a modest 6,631 yards in Atlanta, but he did score two touchdowns in a Super Bowl — for the Washington Redskins.
Nine-year veteran Ryan easily is the best quarterback the Falcons have ever had. He has started 142 of 144 games since his rookie season. His 37,701 career passing yards are 14,000 more than the No 2 guy, Steve Bartkowski, who may stir a fuzzy memory with more seasoned fans.
The Ryan-led Falcons did reach the NFC title game after the 2012 season, but lost to the San Francisco 49ers by blowing a 24-14 lead and going scoreless the second half.
That was their last .500-plus season until this one.
If there ever were a time for Atlanta to step forward and make some noise, this would be it.
Sunday they play at home against Green Bay. The Falcons are the highest scoring team in the NFL, and Ryan finally earned comparisons with the best. He led the league with a 117.1 passer rating.
The most notable thing he doesn’t have, that the other three elite quarterbacks still standing do have, is a Super Bowl ring.
Rodgers has one, Ben Roethlisberger of the Steelers has two and Tom Brady of the Patriots has four.
One thing Ryan does have is a ready-made, cool nickname: Matty Ice. What a shame if it just melts away, with everything else, in Atlanta.
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