Falcons likely avoid playing their former starting quarterback in Week 15

Much was made amongst the Atlanta Falcons fanbase about Raiders starting QB Gardner Minshew suffering a season-ending injury last week. Everyone immediately thought Falcons starting quarterback from last year, Desmond Ridder, would be the new starter for the struggling Raiders.

However, that was all for not; fans forgot about the return of Aidan O'Connell. The former undrafted free agent was the team's starter before he landed on injured reserve—but not season-ending IR.

O'Connell returned to the starting lineup and will likely remain against the Dirty Birds on Monday Night Football.

Don't expect Desmond Ridder to start against his former team

It is crazy to think that 15 months ago Desmond Ridder was leading the Atlanta Falcons offense. Since then he has been benched twice, traded, released, signed to a practice squad, poached from a practice squad, and seen action in two games due to injury.

But he is back as a backup, meaning he won't have the chance to dice up his former team's porous defense in Week 15.

Aidan O'Connell returned as the starter in Black Friday's game against the Chiefs. Assuming he stays healthy and isn't awful, Ridder will remain on the bench.

Of course, with how the season has gone for Antonio Pierce's team, you cannot fully extinguish the chance of Ridder playing the team that drafted him.

If he does you can only expect him to throw for 400 yards and four touchdowns because that is just how things go in Atlanta. Way too often we have seen bad quarterbacks look like Joe Montana against the usually poor Falcons defense.

I think we are all taking a sigh of relief that O'Connell will be the starter.