Where the Falcons rank in five different NFL power rankings

The Atlanta Falcons have been viewed as one of the worst teams in the league by the outside world, which is honestly a lazy take.

Most fans love to look at power rankings to see how optimistic other writers are about their team, unfortunately for the Falcons, the optimism is not high. The good news is that these power rankings a couple months from now will look totally wrong, for all we know the Falcons could make the playoffs.

How the Falcons rank in NFL power rankings from five different sports websites

Let’s not waste any time and get right into where the Atlanta Falcons place in some power rankings from around the internet:

• NFL.com: 31st overall
• Pro Football Focus: 30th overall
• Bleacher Report: 31st overall
• USA Today: 32nd overall
• The Sporting News: 31st overall

Before we get any further, let’s take a minute to thank Pro Football Focus for their generous ranking of the Atlanta Falcons.

Okay, that was obviously a joke, the Falcons should not be consistently ranked in the bottom three,  it is crazy.

This team is not a bottom three team. Sure, they might be a bottom ten team but to say with certainty that there aren’t at least three teams worse than this them is ridiculous. Off the top of my head here are five teams that are worse than the Falcons; the Lions, the Panthers, the Bears, the Seahawks, and the Texans.

Anyways, let’s take a look at what Dan Hanzus of NFL.com had to say about the Falcons’ rankings:

"Shout-out to Dean Pees, who hears all your pitying takes about the prospects of the 2022 Atlanta Falcons and is having NONE of it. Here’s what the veteran defensive coordinator said last week: “We’ve been in the top 10 (in defense rankings) one time out of the last 20 years. That bulls—‘s over. Sorry, I’m getting fired up today, but I’m tired of this crap. We’re going to change the culture of the defense around this frickin’ place. People are going to start talking about the Atlanta defense like they did Baltimore and New England. It’s going to be the same s— around here.” We’re not buying, but we respect the vigor."

Not to be rude but it is ridiculous that the only thing he said is “We’re not buying, but we respect the vigor.” He at least needs to give a couple reasons why they are worse than every team other than the Bears.

The fact that the Panthers are ranked eight spots higher is also crazy. Marcus Mariota is better than Baker Mayfield and certainly better than Sam Darnold. They have Christian McCaffrey but is he really going to stay healthy for the full year? The only reliable player on their offense is D.J. Moore. At least the Falcons have Kyle Pitts, Cordarrelle Patterson, and possibly Drake London.

But anyways, we could spend all day long tearing apart everyone’s power rankings, truth is that they are an opinion, that’s it.

Let’s also see what Pro Football Focus said about the Falcons:

"Atlanta jumped into the bidding war for Deshaun Watson only to come up short and effectively end relations with Matt Ryan as their starter. Trading him away creates a devastating blow to the salary cap in terms of dead money, but it represents the start of a franchise reboot. Marcus Mariota is a fine stopgap at quarterback and the team had a very good draft, but we may be a year away from these moves paying real dividends."

See, now that is more like it, they actually gave some reasoning for it and also said some positive things. They are right, if you only look at this season then you would say the Falcons are a mess with how their salary cap is set up.

But sometimes you have to bite the bullet for the greater good, that is what the Falcons are doing.

In conclusion, not a single one of these rankings matters, if anything they should motivate this team even more. Arthur Smith already showed some passion toward the press for making a negative comment about the team, so they know what the outside thinks and they would like nothing more than to prove them wrong.