The Atlanta Falcons journey to Super Bowl 53 begins, as they will travel to face the New York Jets in Week One of the 2018 NFL Preseason.
It’s been nearly seven months since the Atlanta Falcons suffered defeat in the Divisional Round of the NFC Playoffs. The Dirty Birds fell just a few yards short of beating the eventual Super Bowl champion, Philadelphia Eagles, on that chilly day. It not only sent the Falcons packing into the offseason, but the loss also meant the team would go another year without hoisting their first Lombardi Trophy.
Needless to say, after blowing a 28-point lead in the Super Bowl a year prior, the Falcons attempt at redemption last season fell just short.
As we all know, no one is going to feel sorry for you in the NFL. Only one team each year gets to celebrate a championship, while the other 31 franchises try and figure out what went wrong on their path to glory. For 52 years the Falcons have been trying to figure out what it takes to win it all, but this year, everything could finally fall into place.
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History is definitely not in their favor, but if Atlanta makes a run to the Super Bowl in the 2018-2019 season, they’ll get to play on their home field, Mercedes-Benz Stadium, for the big game. That would not only be phenomenally epic, but it would be a legendary story for a franchise desperately seeking their first world championship.
As we’ve heard so many times before, the journey towards winning a title starts in the dog-days of summer, where teammates are working out, practicing, and refining their minds for the upcoming season. It’s in these moments that true superstars are working harder than anyone else, preparing themselves for, what could be, their best season ever.
For the Falcons, mini-camp is over, contracts are decided upon, and the first preseason game is finally here. The first opponent standing in the way between Atlanta and their first Lombardi Trophy is the New York Jets. No, the final score will obviously not matter, but the experience each and every rookie will get this Friday night will matter over the course of the grueling 16-game NFL schedule.
For Atlanta to even make the NFL Playoffs this season, they’ll need a handful of rookies to make some serious contributions throughout the year. We can argue all day long that preseason games are useless, but I would argue that they aren’t for the best teams in this league.
Every opportunity to compete, is an opportunity to get better. Needless to say, an opportunity for the Falcons to get better, is something that will only help them, not hurt them, on their path towards Super Bowl 53 and their first Lombardi Trophy.