Atlanta Falcons: The only person Arthur Blank should be upset with is himself

As that second day in camp is underway, the biggest story surrounding the Atlanta Falcons on day two of training camp is owner Arthur Blank being disappointed in Julio Jones asking for a trade from the franchise that he called home for a decade.

Honestly, what did the Atlanta Falcons and Blank expect? A Hall of Fame player isn’t satisfied with getting paid – they want to win and over the last 10 years the Falcons front office under Blank, never attempted to win.

We can point to the Super Bowl season of 2016, but everyone knows that was a fluke.

The team got hot after the bye-week and made a run only to fall apart when it mattered. Why did they fall apart? Because the wrong people were in charge and there was no one within the franchise willing to provide actual leadership when it was really needed.

Atlanta Falcons should be run like Home Depot

There is no denying that Arthur Blank was a great businessman, but he became a success in the business world because he hired the best people to do a job and then let them do their jobs.

As the Atlanta Falcons owner, he has repeatedly hired the wrong people and then allowed them to hire more wrong people. To compound the problem, not once did he ever step in until the franchise was in the midst of a horrible three-year run with two future Hall of Fame players on the roster.

He has hired three terrible head coaches and then left two of them in a place far too long, which is why the franchise is where they are and why Julio wanted out.

Blank told atlantafalcons.com that he was unable to speak to Julio before being trading –

"“We had a 10-year relationship. We had a good relationship. He was productive, a Hall-of-Fame player, and I was disappointed he felt that way. For whatever reason, I’m not sure, I wasn’t able to speak with him. I tried to, but he felt the way he felt and he wanted to make a change.”"

More than anything that tells us that Julio had enough of the song and dance from Blank and no longer believed anything that was said to him.

It’s terrible that it got to that place between the franchise and Julio, but ultimately Blank only has himself to blame, and dwelling on it moving forward will not allow the franchise to move forward under new general manager Terry Fontenot and head coach Arthur Smith.

We wish Julio the best but it is time to focus on those that want to be here and those that want to win a Falcons uniform.