The Atlanta Falcons All-Decade team had some tough choices, but there was never any doubt who the quarterback would be.
The Atlanta Falcons All-Decade team had some tough choices, but there was never any doubt about who the quarterback would be.
Matt Ryan has been the Falcons QB since 2008. Over 12 years, he’s established himself as one of the most consistent passers the NFL has ever seen. Earlier this week, we compared Ryan and Peyton Manning through their first 12 seasons, and Ryan stacks up surprisingly well.
After unveiling the offensive starters for the All-Decade team, Atlanta’s social media accounts released a video celebrating its former MVP quarterback. Check it out below:
We’ve already examined safeties Ricardo Allen and William Moore, and now, let’s take a look at the All-Decade team’s starting front-four.
The entire writing and editing staff for the Atlanta Falcons has done an outstanding job of unveiling the All-Decade team during a very slow news period.
So far, just the defensive and special teams starters have been released. We’ve already looked at safeties Ricardo Allen and William Moore, and now, let’s check out the All-Decade team’s front-four.
Grady Jarrett and Jonathan Babineaux are the two starting defensive tackles, surrounded by ends Jonathan Abraham and Vic Beasley.
Watch the highlight video of the four former and current Falcons below, as shared by the team’s Twitter account:
Sure, Aaron Donald is the top dog. But what about the rest? Here are the best interior defenders in the game today.
Twitter can be a difficult place sometimes, like almost any social media outlet. There can be vitrol and abuse, there can be arguments that never seem to end, and there can be moments where you wonder just why in the world you spend so much time on the bird app.
However, Twitter also can provide some great ideas for content. A prime example is this tweet from Matt Miller, who covers the NFL draft incredibly well for Bleacher Report:
Which best at their position NFL player is farthest separated from the next best player?
We can dispense with the suspense, as Mr. Donald is certainly the player atop this list. Even the best debaters in the would might have difficulty making a case for anyone else atop the interior defensive line rankings in the league today. But there are some fascinating names to consider for the remaining ten spots, and as always there are difficult choices ahead.
Best Interior Defensive Line Unit
(Tommy Gilligan-USA TODAY Sports)
When you place a pair of players on a list like this, you are in good shape. The Philadelphia Eagles sport a very solid group up front, starting with Fletcher Cox. but they gave him quite the running mate when the organization added Javon Hargrave in free agency. When you have those two on the inside, and players such as Derek Barnett and Brandon Graham on the outside, you are truly cooking with gas.
But there are some other talented duos in the league. The Buffalo Bills have a nice 1-2 punch of Ed Loiver and Star Lotulelei, while the Cincinnati Bengals also have a great combo with Geno Atkins and the recently acquired D.J. Reader. Finally, do not forget about the Dallas Cowboys. They added Gerald McCoy and Dontari Poe this offseason, and have solid depth behind them in Trysten Hill and third-round pick Neville Gallimore.
Honorable Mentions
(Jason Getz-USA TODAY Sports)
As with every position group, there are players who just missed the cut who merit both consideration and accolades, and interior defensive line is no exception to that rule. Tampa Bay Buccaneer Vita Vea is – perhaps quietly – living up to his pre-draft expectations, and last year he notched career highs in pressures, tackles and quarterback hurries. Tennessee Titans’ defensive lineman DaQuan Jones is another very solid player, and interestingly enough he led all interior defensive linemen with 14 pass coverage snaps, according to charting data from Pro Football Focus. Veteran Steve McLendon with the New York Jets had a very solid season, posting a career-high of 18 pressures. Finally, both Dalvin Tomlinson and Dexter Lawrence had good years with the New York Giants.
Fletcher Cox is No. 3 in a ranking of the NFL’s top-10 defensive tackles
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If not for Aaron Donald, Fletcher Cox would likely be a consensus first-team All-Pro and a likely candidate for the best defensive player in football.
Even with Donald’s presence Cox has reigned supreme and will likely use his standing among his peers as the ultimate motivation for the 2020 NFL season.
Jeremy Fowler of ESPN.com polled a group of more than 50 executives, coaches, scouts, and who ranked the NFL’s interior defensive linemen and Cox was third behind Aaron Donald and Chris Jones.
Cox had a similar composite ranking to Jones but garnered fewer top-three votes. “If you’re talking quickness, Cox gets the edge,” an NFC exec said.
Cox is still No. 1 on opposing offenses’ game plans each week. But production slipped last year. Cox’s 3.5 sacks were his lowest total since 2013.
“Fastball wasn’t what it was two years ago, but still premier,” said a veteran NFL defensive coach.
Ask veteran offensive linemen about that fastball — as we did — and they’ll debunk that in a hurry.
“There’s no one else I hate facing more, maybe other than Aaron Donald,” said one veteran NFL guard. “He can beat you with speed or overpower you.”
Even if he’s lost a step, Cox is still dominant and should benefit from getting Malik Jackson back and Javon Hargrave added to the mix.
As Cox enters his ninth NFL season, the future Hall of Famer has made the Pro Bowl the last five seasons and is a four-time All-Pro.
Cox failed to make an All-Pro for the first time since 2016 last season and his 3.5 sacks were the second-lowest total of his career yet he still earned an 84.5 grade from Pro Football Focus.
Every NFL team has at least one player whose play deserves more praise than it gets. Here’s every team’s most underrated player.
In the NFL, players are underrated for all kinds of reasons. Sometimes, they’re second banana to a superstar whose deeds take up all the oxygen. Other times, it may be that the player has to climb up the depth chart as a little-regarded contributor, and the media hasn’t caught up yet. It’s also possible that the player has an incandescent talent that’s hidden by an unfavorable scheme. And it could also be that the player has had one great season, and everyone’s waiting to see if it’s a fluke.
No matter the reasons, every player on this list has set an exceptional standard deserving of more recognition. Here are the most underrated players for every NFL team going into the 2020 season.
Arizona Cardinals: EDGE Chandler Jones
(Getty Images)
Do you know which NFL player has the most sacks since 2012? We’re kind of giving it away here, but yes, it is Chandler Jones with 96 since his rookie season. That puts him above Von Miller, J.J. Watt, Cameron Jordan, Justin Houston, Aaron Donald, and anyone else you’d care to mention. Jones also has 85 quarterback hits and 307 quarterback hurries in that time, but he’s rarely discussed when it’s time to talk about the league’s edge-rushers. This despite the fact that he led the league in sacks in 2017 with 17 and finished second to Shaquil Barrett with 19 last season. Perhaps it’s because he’s been doing his work of late with a Cardinals team that hasn’t made the playoffs since 2015, but no pass-rusher deserves more praise in line with his accomplishments than Jones.
Atlanta Falcons: DL Grady Jarrett
(Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports)
Lost in the specter of the Falcons’ 28-3 meltdown in Super Bowl LI was the fact that Jarrett, the Falcons’ fifth-round pick in 2015, was a borderline MVP candidate with three sacks and four quarterback hits before everything fell apart. Downgraded out of Clemson because he was allegedly too short, Jarrett has been a remarkable interior disruptor throughout his NFL career. Whether aligned at nose tackle or three-technique, Jarrett has totaled at least 43 quarterback hurries every season since 2016. The Falcons rewarded him with a four-year, $68 million contract in July, 2019, but Jarrett still doesn’t get the recognition he deserves.
Baltimore Ravens: OT Ronnie Stanley
(Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports)
Who’s the best left tackle in the NFL today? Were you to poll 100 experts, you’d get several different answers. But it’s hard to argue against Stanley, who allowed just one sack and 10 total pressures in 543 pass-blocking snaps last season, and helped the Ravens put together the NFL’s most dynamic rushing attack in his 489 run-blocking snaps. The 2019 season marked Stanley’s first All-Pro and Pro Bowl nods, and there should be more of that to come. Lamar Jackson is the talk of Baltimore’s offense, but it wouldn’t go the way it does without Stanley’s presence.
Buffalo Bills: WR John Brown
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The big news for the Bills this offseason was the trade that brought Stefon Diggs to the team, but Buffalo’s receiver corps was already pretty strong, and Brown was the primary reason in 2019. Despite the fact that he plied his trade in a new offense and took passes from erratic quarterback Josh Allen, the former Cardinal and Raven set a career high with 72 receptions and posted the second 1,000-yard season of his career. The addition of Diggs should give Brown more one-on-one opportunities to succeed — especially if Allen is able to get his GPS aligned.
Carolina Panthers: S Tre Boston
(Jim Dedmon-USA TODAY Sports)
Few deep safeties have been as adept in pass coverage than Boston over the last five season, so it has been a mystery why the Panthers cut him in 2017, and why he was unable to find more than a series of one-year deals with different teams until Carolina re-assessed its approach and signed him to a three-year, $18 million deal in March. It’s still chump change for a guy who plays as well as Boston does — he’s totaled 16 interceptions to just eight touchdowns allowed in his career — but it’s a nice bounceback for a player whose desire to protest may have cost him a more lucrative deal.
Chicago Bears: WR Allen Robinson
(Raj Mehta-USA TODAY Sports)
If any current receiver would be justified in filing a grievance against the NFL for lack of quarterback support, it would be Robinson, who has moved from Blake Bortles as his primary QB in Jacksonville to Mitchell Trubisky in Chicago. Hardly ideal. Still, Robinson led the NFL in touchdown receptions with 14 in 2015, and last season, with Trubisky falling apart most of the time, he still caught 98 passes for 1,147 yards and seven touchdowns. 2020 marks the last year of Robinson’s current contract with the Bears, and he’ll undoubtedly make the best of Chicago’s Trubisky/Nick Foles quaterback situation, and perhaps wind up on a team with a functional quarterback after that.
Cincinnati Bengals: RB Joe Mixon
(Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports)
The hope in Cincinnati is that the offense will come around with Joe Burrow at quarterback, but the Bengals are already set at the running back position, where Mixon gained 1,137 yards and five touchdowns on 278 carries last season, adding 35 receptions for 287 yards and three more touchdowns for good measure. Only five backs broke more rushing tackles than Mixon’s 52, and he totaled 14 runs of 15 or more yards last season, tied for fourth in the league.
Cleveland Browns: RB Nick Chubb
(AP Photo/Nick Wass)
Tennessee’s Derrick Henry was the NFL’s rushing leader in 2019, but it could easily be argued that Chubb was the league’s most efficient rusher. Not only did he gain 5.0 yards per carry (1,494 yards and eight touchdowns on 298 carries), but he also led the league in rushed of 15 or more yards (20), only the Raiders’ Josh Jacobs broke more rushing tackles than Chubb’s 66, and only Henry averaged more yards after contact per carry than Chubb’s 3.77. He was a one-man wrecking crew in a broken offense in 2019 — perhaps new head coach Kevin Stefanski can change that, but there’s no doubting Chubb’s status as one of the league’s rising stars.
The grind never stops for Falcons defensive tackle Grady Jarrett. That’s what it takes to go from a fifth-round pick to an All-Pro first-team selection in five years.
The grind never stops for Falcons defensive tackle Grady Jarrett. That’s what it takes to go from a fifth-round pick to an All-Pro first-team selection in five years.
Jarrett has become one of the elite interior defensive linemen in all of football and doesn’t look to be slowing down anytime soon. The Falcons’ Twitter account released another video of Jarrett’s offseason workout routine.
Check out this freakish display of strength from one of the NFL’s most underrated players below.
That’s simply the price this organization must pay for paying its top players, though. It’s hard to blame Dimitroff for extending Matt Ryan, Julio Jones and Grady Jarrett.
As pointed out by Touchdown Wire, 31 NFL players made Forbes’ top 100 highest-paid athletes of 2020, including four Falcons. Ryan, Jones, Jarrett and free agent Dante Fowler Jr. are each set to earn big money in 2020. Let’s look at what TD Wire’s Barry Werner had to say about Atlanta’s highest rollers.
On Fowler. (No. 81):
Dante Fowler signed a three-year, $48 million contract as a free agent with the Atlanta Falcons in March 2020. This marks his third NFL team as he has been with the Jaguars and Rams. His earnings in 2020 will be $24.2M.
On Ryan (No. 47):
Longtime Atlanta Falcons QB Matt Ryan is riding a long-term contract that will see him earn $24M in salary this year. Add in another $5.5M in endorsements and Ryan is at $29.5M.
On Jarrett (No. 37):
Atlanta’s Grady Jarrett plays every play ferociously and the Falcons love having him in their nest. The defensive lineman weighs in at $33.1M, with almost all of it coming from his NFL contract.
On Julio Jones (No. 26):
Atlanta’s star wideout Julio Jones was a great catch, and the Falcons are paying him as such. Jones will carry $37.5M from the team and another $3M in endorsements, putting him at $40.5M.
It’s tough to remain competitive with so many many big contracts, but the Falcons have the talent to make a run this year if they can avoid another slow start.
Here are the top 10 interior defensive linemen in the NFL right now.
With Luke Kuechly gone, the best defensive player on the Panthers roster is now DT Kawann Short, who has been one of the league’s most underrated defensive linemen for a long time. Last season, he sat out 14 games due to a shoulder injury. If Carolina’s defense is going to be anything but a total disaster, they need him healthy in 2020.
Is Short still among the top players at his position, though? Let’s find out. Here are the top 10 interior defensive linemen in the NFL right now.
10. Jurrell Casey
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It’s rare for defensive linemen to play as well as Casey has for as long. He came into the NFL as a third-round pick by the Titans in 2011. Since then, Casey has played 139 regular season games, totaling 51 sacks and 115 quarterback hits. A model of consistency, Casey hasn’t had less than five sacks in a season since 2012. Casey was recently traded to Denver.
The team’s 6-2 finish may have been too little, too late, but defensive coordinator Raheem Morris established a strong foundation that the Falcons can build on in 2020.
The Atlanta Falcons stumbled out of the gate in 2019, starting the season 1-7 and frequently trailing by insurmountable deficits at halftime. The team’s 6-2 finish may have been too little, too late, but defensive coordinator Raheem Morris established a strong foundation that the Falcons can build on in 2020.
Atlanta’s defense allowed 24.9 points and 355.8 yards per game last year, numbers that reflect an average unit. The impressive play by this group down the stretch was enough to make the top 12 of Touchdown Wire’s defensive rankings.
Check out what Doug Farrar wrote about the Falcons’ defense below:
The Falcons had as drastic a defensive turnaround as any team in the 2019 season, which occurred when now-defensive coordinator Raheem Morris took a more pronounced role. From Weeks 10-9, Atlanta gave up 24 passing touchdowns and came up with just two interceptions. From Weeks 10-17, the difference was graphic — just nine touchdowns allowed, and 10 interceptions. The team lost cornerback Desmond Trufant in free agency, but selected Clemson cornerback A.J. Terrell in the first round, and Terrell is a much better player than he showed in his team’s loss in the College Football Championship. Expect this defense to play far more to its talent with Morris firmly in charge.
As Farrar pointed out, Morris has proven to be a great asset to the defense, and assuming he picks things up where he left off, Atlanta has a chance to be very good this season.
Some of the team’s early struggles in 2019 can be attributed to a painfully one-dimensional offense. The Falcons’ averaged 85.1 yards per game on the ground and often had to abandon the run game altogether by the second quarter.
Todd Gurley has a chance to turn that around this season. If Atlanta can get off to a better start, the team should be able to compete in a vastly-improved NFC South.
While the Falcons have several new faces this year, the team’s three best players are under contract for the foreseeable future. Quarterback Matt Ryan, wide receiver Julio Jones, and defensive tackle Grady Jarrett
Just a few years ago, the Atlanta Falcons were viewed as one of the NFL’s most talented young teams from top to bottom. As time goes by, however, that young talent becomes too expensive to retain.
Despite having several new faces, the team’s three best players are under contract for the foreseeable future. Quarterback Matt Ryan, wide receiver Julio Jones, and defensive tackle Grady Jarrett aren’t just Atlanta’s undisputed leaders, they’re some of the best players in the entire league.
All three made CBS Sports’ top 100 NFL players of 2020. Jones was the highest-ranked of the trio, coming in at No. 14 on Pete Prisco’s list:
He had 99 catches for 1,394 yards – second only to Michael Thomas in yards – and he also caught six touchdowns. At the age of 31, he isn’t slowing down.
Jarrett was the only other Falcons player to crack the top 25, landing at No. 22 overall:
He had a career-best 7.5 sacks last season as he continued to be a pocket pusher from the inside. He’s also good against the run, but he does need more help around him.
The list wasn’t as kind to Atlanta’s former MVP signal caller. Ryan was ranked all the way down at No. 70:
He took a beating last season, but still put up solid numbers for the Falcons. His protection has to be better to get him back playing close to his MVP numbers of a few years ago.
Ryan was the ninth-ranked quarterback on the list, behind Patrick Mahomes, Russell Wilson, Lamar Jackson, Aaron Rodgers, Drew Brees, Tom Brady, Deshaun Watson and Dak Prescott.
As for honorable mentions, defensive end Dante Fowler Jr. was the only Falcons player to make the cut.
