opinion of a die hard raider fan living in atlanta:
atlanta knows they live and die by vick. if he plays, they tend to win, if he doesn't play, they tend to lose. his first season as a starter, they make it to the playoffs, beat green bay in green bay. the next season, breaks his leg in preseason, falcons finish 5-11. this season, 11-4, nfc championship round.
is vick worth the money? blank thinks so, and i guess that's pretty much all that matters, lol. in reality, only 37 million is guaranteed... which isn't all that bad, considering 1. vick puts fans in the seats 2. provided he makes it 10 years, he'll only be 34... not to mention the contract will likely be restructured after 4 or 5 years anyway (huge contracts of this magnitude are almost always to defer salary cap monies).
what do they do well? run the damn ball. led the league in rushing without a player in the top 10. dunn was #15 in the league (finished with over 1000 yards), and i believe vick finished #27 (with over 900 yards).
what else do they do well? run defense.
where are they poor? passing offense. outside of alge crumpler, the falcons have no credible/legitimate threat at wide receiver. peerless price, finneran, jenkins... can't get it done. can't get open deep, can't get open short, not on slants, not on curls... their performance is poor. it's not as if they've been facing the toughest pass defenses either.
also, though vick's scrambling ability can be an asset in designed rollouts, qb draws, etc. ... it hurts them in drop back passing... you have receivers who can't get open (with the exception of alge crumpler), and a guy who can run... once the receivers are consistently not getting open (which is pretty much every game), vick's gotta run. can't believe in the receivers, but he can believe in his legs. with all of that movement and lack of trust, it's hard for the o-line to hold blocks for any longer than about 3 seconds (since vick's gotta make the decision to run or not by then). add to that, the o-line's not very big and you can see the dilemma.
are the falcons overrated, idk.
but the eagles corners will surely shut down the falcons receivers this weekend (not that it will be that hard in the first place). the eagles can easily afford to put 7 or 8 guys in the box, knowing the falcons want to run, without fearing that the falcons will stretch the field.
the falcons db's have to put pressure on the eagles receivers... not too hard, as the panthers did it last year... guess we'll see if d'angelo hall is the real deal or not this weekend. right now, i don't think he's the real deal (as he was absolutely smoked by randy moss in preseason before the hip injury, a game i attended
).