Wow, Atlanta on track?

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The Falcons surprised everyone last year with Matt Ryan at quarterback and Michael Turner at running back and winning and winning and winning and then they lost to Dallas. It was a heck of a year. But therein lays the problem.

And then, the iron-clad capper: After 43 years in operation, the Falcons still haven’t had consecutive winning seasons.
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Will Matt Ryan be as good in 2009?

43 years is a long time in anything and even a longer time not to have back to back winning seasons. Can that curse be broken this year? Well, the easiest way to find out is to go right to the top and ask the owner, Arthur Blank.

“Hey, Arthur can you have a winning record this year?”

Blank now: “I don’t think there’s any jinx. That doesn’t enter my mind. I know we’ll be very well prepared and we’ll play with a lot of energy. Now whether that translates [to a winning season], I can’t know. But the press we’re getting seems to be appropriate, and when the season is over I hope people will say, ‘We should have given them even more praise.’

“As an organization, we were facing a lot of questions last season we don’t have now. We didn’t know how our new coaching staff would work together. We didn’t know if Matt Ryan was going to be a terrific NFL quarter in Year 1 or Year 3. We didn’t know if Michael Turner could carry the standard of being a starting running back. We didn’t know if Sam Baker and Curtis Lofton and Harry Douglas could play. We have positive answers to all those questions now.”
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Image: Zuma Press

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