By Luke Fletcher ｜ Atlanta, Georgia

At some point, the Atlanta Falcons stopped being merely a struggling NFL franchise and became something closer to a weekly test of just how bizarre professional football can get. Different owners? No. Different eras, coaches, quarterbacks and front offices? Absolutely.

Yet somehow, the Falcons keep finding entirely new ways to produce stories that would be rejected from a movie script for being too unrealistic. Now, two games into the Matt Ryan era in Atlanta’s front office, the Falcons are 0-2 after being humiliated at home by Carolina. The final was 34-3.

This is Matt Ryan’s first season as Atlanta’s President of Football, a position Arthur Blank gave him in January with authority over the football operation, including the head coach and general manager. Nobody should expect Ryan to repair nearly two decades of dysfunction in two games, but Falcons fans have seen this movie before, and the opening scenes of the newest version (2026) are already getting weird.

Bobby Petrino: Where the Modern Madness Began

Go back to 2007. The Falcons hired Bobby Petrino away from Louisville with a five-year, $24 million contract, believing his offense could help maximize Michael Vick.

Vick never played a snap for him. The federal dogfighting case exploded, Vick eventually received a 23-month prison sentence, and Atlanta’s season disintegrated. How could the Atlanta brass not know what Mike Vick was doing? In December 2004, the Atlanta Falcons signed Michael Vick to a 10-year contract extension worth $130 million, which made him the highest-paid player in NFL history at the time? They didn’t do their homework.

Then Petrino provided the perfect Falcons ending. He lasted 13 games.

With Atlanta sitting at 3-10, Petrino resigned and took the Arkansas job. He didn’t even hold a face-to-face meeting with his players. Falcons players instead arrived at their lockers and found a 78-word letter from the coach who had just abandoned them.

That should have been the craziest Falcons story of the century.

It wasn’t even close.

Up 17-0 in a NFC Championship Game With the Super Bowl Right There

They somehow get lucky and draft a HOF quarterback from Boston College and by the 2012 season, Atlanta appeared to have finally escaped the chaos.

Matt Ryan was the quarterback and Julio Jones and Roddy White were catching passes. The Falcons went 13-3 and hosted San Francisco in the NFC Championship Game.

Atlanta raced out to a 17-0 lead. The Georgia Dome was rocking. The Falcons were one victory away from the Super Bowl. They lost 28-24.

Atlanta didn’t score in the second half. If only Falcons fans knew that blowing a huge postseason lead wasn’t finished becoming part of the franchise’s identity.

Then They Got Caught Pumping Crowd Noise Into the Georgia Dome

Apparently, the Georgia Dome wasn’t loud enough.

The NFL determined that artificial crowd noise had been played during Falcons home games. The league ultimately fined Atlanta $350,000, stripped the Falcons of a 2016 fifth-round draft pick and temporarily suspended team president Rich McKay from the Competition Committee. The league identified former director of event marketing Roddy White (not the Falcons receiver) as directly responsible and said President Rich McKay was unaware of it.

Think about that. A franchise already capable of finding unusual ways to lose games managed to lose a draft pick over fake crowd noise. Somehow, we’re still nowhere near the craziest part of this story.

“Do You Like Men?”

At the 2016 NFL Combine, Ohio State cornerback Eli Apple said a Falcons coach asked him about his sexuality.

The question? “So do you like men?”

Falcons assistant Marquand Manuel subsequently took responsibility and apologized. Then-head coach Dan Quinn called the question inappropriate and unprofessional, and the NFL looked into the incident. It became another one of those Falcons stories that leaves you wondering:

How does this even happen?

Then came the 2016 season.

And nothing before, or since, quite compares. 28-3. There isn’t much left to say.Falcons fans already know the numbers. 28-3. Atlanta was less than a half away from its first Super Bowl championship.

Then came Tom Brady, Bill Belichick, missed opportunities, questionable decisions, the Julian Edelman catch and a collapse that became permanently embedded in NFL history.

New England won Super Bowl LI 34-28 in overtime. Atlanta didn’t merely lose a Super Bowl. 28-3 became a punchline.

The number itself became shorthand for blowing an enormous lead. For Falcons fans, it became something closer to a scar.

Then Matt Ryan Left and Atlanta Entered Quarterback Purgatory

The decision to part ways with Matt Ryan after the 2021 season that was heavily catalyzed by the Atlanta Falcons’ public pursuit of quarterback Deshaun Watson. Up until that point, Ryan had spent 14 seasons as the franchise’s cornerstone. The Falcons eventually traded Ryan to the Colts. Deshaun Watson never signed, he instead signed with Cleveland leaving Atlanta in QB Purgatory.

Next came Marcus Mariota. Then Desmond Ridder. Then Taylor Heinicke.

Then the Falcons handed Kirk Cousins a massive contract in 2024, only to draft Michael Penix Jr. eighth overall weeks later. The organization was so desperate to find the next quarterback that it effectively pursued two succession plans simultaneously.

And now we’ve reached 2026. Somehow, the quarterback situation may be even stranger as Cooper Rush is our Starting QB.

The Falcons Finally Find a Pass Rusher and Then This Happens

For years, Falcons fans begged the organization to find somebody, anybody, who could consistently get to the quarterback. Atlanta finally appeared to do it.

The Falcons traded back into the first round of the 2025 draft, surrendering significant future draft capital, including their 2026 first-round selection, to draft Tennessee edge rusher James Pearce Jr.

And Pearce delivered. As a rookie, he recorded 10.5 sacks and 16 quarterback hits, leading Atlanta in both categories and becoming an AP Defensive Rookie of the Year finalist.

Finally. The Falcons had their pass rusher. Then came February 7, 2026.

Pearce was arrested following an alleged incident involving his ex-girlfriend, WNBA player Rickea Jackson. He initially faced multiple felony allegations; prosecutors later formally charged him with three felonies and one misdemeanor after dropping two of the original counts. Pearce subsequently entered a one-year pretrial intervention program; successful completion could allow him to seek dismissal of the charges.

Atlanta spent years trying to find a legitimate double-digit-sack player.

They finally found one.

Then another completely unexpected Falcons story arrived.

Don’t Forget the Shedeur Sanders Prank Call

During the 2025 NFL Draft, Shedeur Sanders received a call from someone pretending to be Saints general manager Mickey Loomis. Sanders was led to believe he was about to be drafted.

It was a prank.

And somehow the Falcons were connected to it. Falcons defensive coordinator Jeff Ulbrich’s son, Jax, had obtained Sanders’ confidential phone number from an open iPad at his parents’ home and helped facilitate the prank. The Falcons said Jeff Ulbrich had no knowledge of what happened until afterward.

So add confidential draft information being used for a prank call to one of the most famous prospects in the country to the Falcons file.

Because apparently the file wasn’t thick enough already.

Enter Matt Ryan – New Team President

After another disappointing season, Arthur Blank made one of the most fascinating decisions in franchise history. He brought Matt Ryan home. Not as a ceremonial ambassador. Not as an adviser. Not as a television personality.

On January 10, 2026, Ryan became the Falcons’ President of Football, overseeing the entire football operation. The head coach and general manager report to him, while Ryan reports directly to Blank.

There was something poetic about it. The greatest quarterback in franchise history, the man who had experienced some of Atlanta’s greatest victories and most painful defeats, was being handed responsibility for finally fixing the Falcons.

Two games into his first season overseeing football operations, however, Atlanta is 0-2, and we’re already back in familiar territory.

34-3. At Home. Against Carolina.

The Falcons opened the season by losing 20-13 at Pittsburgh with Cooper Rush at quarterback. Rush completed 12 of 22 passes for 143 yards, one touchdown and two interceptions, including a costly pick-six. Then came Sunday’s home opener.

Carolina 34. Atlanta 3. At Mercedes-Benz Stadium. This wasn’t Patrick Mahomes. This wasn’t Josh Allen. This wasn’t some powerhouse coming into Atlanta and overwhelming the Falcons. It was a divisional opponent that entered the game 0-1.

And the Falcons got embarrassed. So after two games of the Matt Ryan front-office era:

Falcons 13, Steelers 20.

Falcons 3, Panthers 35.

Record: 0-2.

Atlanta has scored 16 points in two games.

And Somehow the Quarterback Situation Is Already a Mess

This is where the 2026 Falcons story starts sounding like another entry in the franchise’s greatest-hits collection.

Michael Penix Jr. is still working his way back from reconstructive knee surgery. Despite being a full participant in practice during the week, Atlanta ruled him out against Carolina. Head coach Kevin Stefanski has emphasized that Penix must hit physical benchmarks before returning.

Meanwhile, Tua Tagovailoa suffered an oblique injury in practice before Week 1 and was inactive again against Carolina.

That left Atlanta with Cooper Rush.

Rush started Week 1.

Then he started Week 2.

And the offense has been dreadful.

The Falcons now have Penix, the quarterback they drafted eighth overall to become the future of the franchise, not yet ready to return from his knee injury.

They have Tua, the veteran brought in as another option, hurt before getting his season started.

And they have Rush trying to hold everything together.

Two weeks in, it isn’t working.

Could This Actually Get Worse?

This is where Falcons fans have every reason to be nervous. Atlanta’s next three games are all in prime time:

at Green Bay.

at New Orleans.

vs. Baltimore.

That schedule doesn’t exactly provide an easy reset. Maybe Penix returns and changes everything. Maybe Tua gets healthy. Maybe the defense stabilizes.

Maybe Ryan and Stefanski’s vision starts becoming visible as the season progresses. But after watching Atlanta lose 20-13 and then get demolished 34-3 at home, it isn’t unreasonable for Falcons fans to look at the schedule and wonder:

Where exactly are the wins coming from?

Going 0-17 remains extraordinarily difficult in the NFL, and two games obviously don’t establish what Atlanta will be over a 17-game season.

But this franchise has taught its fans something over the years:

Never dismiss the possibility of something bizarre happening.

You Couldn’t Write the Atlanta Falcons

Think about the complete story. Bobby Petrino arrived to coach Michael Vick. Vick never played for him. Petrino quit after 13 games and left his players a letter. The Falcons eventually rebuilt, reached the NFC Championship Game and went up 17-0.

They lost.

They got caught pumping artificial crowd noise into the Georgia Dome. A Falcons coach asked Eli Apple about his sexuality during the pre-draft process.

Then Atlanta reached the Super Bowl. 28-3. They lost. Matt Ryan eventually left.

Atlanta wandered through Marcus Mariota and Desmond Ridder years.

The Falcons finally found a double-digit-sack rookie after years of searching for a pass rush, only for James Pearce Jr. to be arrested the following offseason and face serious criminal allegations. Their defensive coordinator’s son obtained Shedeur Sanders’ confidential draft number and helped orchestrate a fake draft call.

Then the Falcons brought Matt Ryan back to run football operations.

And now?

0-2.

16 total points.

A 35-3 home loss to Carolina.

Penix unavailable.

Tua injured.

Rush struggling, and three consecutive prime-time games are waiting. There are franchises that have been worse than the Atlanta Falcons. There are franchises that have suffered longer championship droughts.

But has any franchise managed to combine heartbreak, bizarre decisions, scandals, quarterback drama, improbable collapses and plain old weirdness quite like Atlanta?

That’s what makes being a Falcons fan different.

With most NFL teams, when something sounds too ridiculous to be true, it probably is.

With the Atlanta Falcons, you check the score and discover it somehow got worse.