Four years ago, the Atlanta Falcons made a mistake in giving coach Dan Quinn another year to patch the endless holes in a sinking ship.
Four years later, they need to give coach Arthur Smith another year to finally get his ship on the water.
You may point the finger right at Smith for the failures of 2023, blaming him for the regression of the offense and the whiffed decision to give Desmond Ridder the keys to the starting quarterback job without any meaningful competition. Sure, the ground game hasn’t been as potent as it was in 2022, and Ridder’s stating tenure didn’t yield a franchise player.