If social media had any say in whether Arthur Smith remains the head coach of the Atlanta Falcons, he would have been left in Phoenix airport terminal on Sunday night.
The 25-23 loss to the Arizona Cardinals dropped the Falcons to 4-6 this season. Smith’s squad has fallen in six of the past eight games since starting the season 2-0. They are also currently on a four-game losing streak.
But social media, obviously, has no say in who will coach the Falcons for the rest of 2023. The Athletic’s Jeff Schultz wrote on Monday that the man who does have a say, owner Arthur Blank, will not be making a midseason coaching change.
“There has been no ‘Win now, or else’ mandate from Falcons owner Arthur Blank to coach Arthur Smith in recent days,” Schultz wrote. “There shouldn’t be. Smith is not going to get fired this week, or next week, or anytime soon.
“In fact, the only way Smith isn’t back as the team’s coach in 2024 is if there’s evidence players are tuning him out (hasn’t happened), or the team completely unravels (not there, yet), or Smith suddenly embraces the reality that he could climb the corporate ladder at Federal Express, really, really, really fast.”
It’s extremely difficult, though, to argue Smith’s coaching seat in Atlanta isn’t getting very toasty.
Through two and a half seasons, Smith has gone 18-26 as Falcons head coach. He led the team to a pair of 7-10 seasons to begin his tenure.
However, expectations were much lower for the team in 2021 and 2022. Major cap issues contributed to the defense having significant holes. The team also transitioned away from all-time great quarterback Matt Ryan in 2022.
But this season, Falcons fans expected the offense to take off thanks to a collection of top 10 talent at the skilled positions. Fans anticipated the defense improving as well.
The defense has been better in a lot of areas. But the offense hasn’t. Actually, it’s been one of the least efficient offenses in the NFL.
The Falcons are ranked 15th in yards yet 24th in points. Giveaways and poor red zone offense has contributed to that discrepancy.
Smith’s offense has 16 giveaways this season. Only six teams have more. The Falcons are 17th in converting red zone possessions into touchdowns.
Atlanta’s offense is also 21st in passing yards. Against the Cardinals, the Falcons amassed just 70 yards through the air.
A roster with Drake London, Kyle Pitts, Bijan Robinson, Cordarrelle Patterson and Tyler Allgeier should never struggle so mightily through the air. That’s regardless of who is behind center.
That’s why there are cries for Smith to lose his job. They will fall on deaf ears for now, but time is ticking for Smith and the Falcons offense.
I get that the Falcons aren’t going to fire Arthur Smith, yet. But as a 50+ year fan of the Falcons (and I’m definitely nowhere near alone), we’re getting sick of the excuses. If they continue this poor performance I believe Mercedes will become more and more empty of Falcons fans. Ho hum…here we go again, is what most of us are saying. Why Art Smith continued to do nothing but run the ball against the 1-8 (now 2-8) Cardinals makes 0 sense. The Cards new what the Falcons were going to do on just about every play. Only when it was 3rd and long would he call a pass play, the obvious to everyone. Not mixing it up at all. I don’t think that Smith is the answer. He supposedly being an offensive minded coach and OC you’d think if any aspect of the game would suffer it’d be the Defense. But it’s the opposite. He and Terry Fontenot lived or died by Marcus Mariota and Desmond Ridder. And look at the offense now. One of the worst in the league. It begs the question “do they really know what they’re doing”? It doesn’t seem to they do. The last couple of years thanks to Dan Quinn and Thomas Demitroff they were buried in cap. I get that. But with all the talent they have this year, what’s the excuse now?
There is no excuse now Jimmy. You could say the Falcons don’t have the right QB for Arthur Smith, but that’s still on Smith. He’s heavily involved in personnel decisions. This team shouild be 7-3 at worst.