The Atlanta Falcons don’t make it easy and they don’t make it pretty. If they win, though, we’ll embrace them no matter how many warts they’re sprouting.
They won this one. Despite a double digit lead, the Falcons made mistakes late and whittled things down, with a botched handoff resulting in a safety followed by a Tampa Bay touchdown followed by a long drive that ended in a Younghoe Koo missed field goal. That meant the final play of the game came down to a hail mary to the end zone by Baker Mayfield, and blessedly Richie Grant tipped it out of bounds to end things for Atlanta. That makes the Falcons 5-3, 2-0 against the Buccaneers, and 4-0 against the NFC South, making this the sweetest sort of nerve-wracking victory you can imagine.
Flawed but exciting, incomplete but aggressive and learning by the week, the Falcons are in a prime position to return to the postseason for the first time in years after that win. It’s on them to build on these big divisional wins and take over the games they’re supposed to triumph in with perhaps a little less drama, but again, the problems are something we discuss during the week if the results are like this on Sunday. It was, in the end, another beautiful win…