Falcons Entering 'Next Phase of Plan', Says General Manager Terry Fontenot
Atlanta Falcons coach Arthur Smith and general manager Terry Fontenot understood the challenge ahead of them when they accepted their jobs in Jan. 2021.
The Falcons were coming off their third consecutive losing season and had a roster filled with aging veterans on steep contracts, creating a clear rebuild project - even if Smith and Fontenot never wanted to openly call it that.
It was a tall task, but the duo went to work on building a team from the ground-up in the manner they thought was best ... which led to a pair of 7-10, playoff-less seasons to start, but was all a part of the bigger picture.
"We knew exactly what we were stepping into, we knew what the challenge was," Fontenot said. "And we knew early on in year one, we were going to have a lot of young players, but we had to sign some veterans because we wanted to establish the culture, we wanted to establish our identity and wanted to make sure we're setting the foundation the right way."
Fontenot, working with little cap space, brought in a plethora of experienced leaders - Smith listed tight end Lee Smith, safety Duron Harmon and outside linebackers Brandon Copeland and Steven Means - to fill up the roster and serve as role models for the younger, foundational pieces.
None of those four players returned in 2022 - but the impact they, and many others, made the year before certainly permeated throughout Atlanta's locker room.
"You could feel a little more of a foundation and an identity, especially up front," Smith said. "There's a physicality and a brand."
Now, with this foundation and identity further established and essentially all of the bad contracts off the books, the Falcons are set for an eventful offseason. Fielding the most players in the NFL under the age of 26 and a projected $80 million in salary cap space, much of the storm has been weathered.
How much so? Per Fontenot, Atlanta's progressed into a new stage of the vision he and Smith laid out some two years ago.
"We're in the next phase of the plan," said Fontenot. "So, we had a plan from the very beginning, and now we're in the next phase of that. This is going to be a different offseason than we had previous years. We're still going to be smart and we're still going to handle things right, we're still going to set parameters and have discipline with everything we do. And yet, it's going to be different than it was."
In each of the past two years, the Falcons entered the offseason near or below zero in cap space, forcing Fontenot to work overtime just to field a roster.
But now, the 42-year-old can be aggressive. There was a sense of quiet confidence in his voice during Wednesday's end-of-season press conference; one that expressed his faith in Atlanta's scouting staffs and the principles that have been established thus far.
One of the biggest differences that awaits Fontenot and Smith is the ability to enter free agency with a legitimate strategy. While obvious on the surface, Smith shared that the Falcons "haven't had" a strategy in his first two years, largely due to the cap situation and being relegated to bystander duties as a result.
And yet, everything this regime set out to do is still going according to plan - just ask Falcons CEO Rich McKay.
"What I've seen is they described a plan and the way they were going to play games and the way they were going to build a roster and they've really followed that and not varied from it," McKay said while expressing confidence in the duo.
It's taken two years, but Fontenot truly believes Atlanta's ready to move into the "next phase" of that plan ... thanks in large part due to what's already been built.
"Those players that were here, they're a part of setting that foundation," Fontenot said. "We always wanted to be as competitive as possible last year. This year, we wanted to be as competitive as possible. And yet, we want to make sure we're making the right decisions and now the phase that we're in, it's going to be a different offseason."
Now, the challenge becomes capitalizing on the cap space overload and building around a promising young core, spearheaded by record-setting rookies Tyler Allgeier and Drake London.
But considering the Falcons managed to stay competitive and play important football games into the month of December while fighting through the "challenge" Fontenot referred to, there's reason to believe this can be a fruitful offseason.
Nonetheless, the "next phase" has arrived - and Atlanta will be hoping it brings more on-field success along the way.
You can follow Daniel Flick on Twitter @DFlickDraft
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