EXLUSIVE; Good job Done at atlanta falcons it is a nice record

The Atlanta Falcons came into the NFL as an expansion team in 1966 and don’t have the greatest win-loss record in the world. In fact, it’s one of the worst in league history. Despite that, the team has had some incredibly talented and exciting players over the years.

The Falcons only have 11 representatives in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and only one of them, Claude Humphrey, spent the majority of his career in Atlanta. That makes this list of the best Falcons players of all time quite interesting.

There are several players who had long, solid careers with the team, while others burned hot and fast but only spent a portion of their career in Atlanta. Michael Vick and Tony Gonzalez are two players who fit the latter mold and just missed this list because what they did specifically in the ATL didn’t quite cut it.

But let’s not spend time on players who didn’t make this list and focus on the five who did.

Matt Ryan

While the Falcons don’t have a ton of Hall of Famers, there is a good chance that they get at least two more in Canton over the next several years, starting with quarterback Matt Ryan. The Boston College product was the No. 3 overall pick in the 2008 NFL Draft and played 14 seasons for the Falcons.

Ryan recorded a 120-102 regular-season record as a starter and led the Falcons to six playoff appearances and Super Bowl 51. In that title game, of course, Ryan and the Falcons infamously held a 28-3 lead over the New England Patriots early in the third quarter but ultimately lost to Tom Brady and company 34-28 in overtime.

And that was Ryan’s biggest problem, in a nutshell. He was cursed to play in between two great generations of quarterbacks. Signal-callers such as Brady, the Manning brothers, Ben Roethlisberger, and Aaron Rodgers came before him and played long enough to pass the torch to the group that includes the likes of Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, and Joe Burrow. Ryan was stuck in the middle and suffered because of it.

Despite the problems with Ryan’s place in history, he is definitely the best QB who has ever played for the Falcons. His 5,242 completions for 59,735 passing yards with 367 touchdowns and 170 interceptions are all (by far) franchise records.

He is also fifth in NFL history in completions, seventh in passing yards, and ninth in passing touchdowns. Some may say Ryan is a borderline Hall of Famer due to the overall lack of team success, but those numbers should put him in Canton.

Julio Jones

If Matt Ryan does make the Hall of Fame, they should put his bust right next to Julio Jones whenever he gets there five years after he retires. That’s because Ryan wouldn’t be who he is if Jones wasn’t who he was with the Falcons.

Selected sixth overall in the 2011 NFL Draft out of Alabama, Jones lived up to the hype in the pros, missing a 1,000-yard season as a rookie by just 41 yards. The next year, he went for 1,198 with 10 touchdowns and made the first of his seven Pro Bowls.

A few seasons later, in 2015, Jones made the first of his two consecutive First-Team All-Pro squads by leading the league in receptions (136), receiving yards and yards from scrimmage (1,871), yards per game (116.9), and yards per touch (13.8).

From 2014 to 2019, Jones was one of the best WRs in the game and arguably the top dog. He had at least 1,394 yards or more in each of those six seasons, making the Pro Bowl each year and either First- or Second-Team All-Pro.

Jones’ final tallies in a Falcons uniform were 848 catches for 12,896 yards and 60 touchdowns. The catches and yards are franchise records, while the TDs are second, three behind his longtime partner in the Atlanta WR room, Roddy White

Claude Humphrey

At third on the list of the best Falcons players of all time, we get to defensive end Claude Humphrey, who is the one Hall of Famer who played the majority of his career in Atlanta.

Humphrey showed up in the red and black for the franchise’s third season of existence in 1968 as the No. 3 overall pick in the draft out of Tennessee State. With 11.5 sacks in his first season, he earned Defensive Rookie of the Year, the first and still one of only three Falcons (with Buddy Curry and Al Richardson) to ever win the award.

Humphrey would play a decade with the Falcons before finishing his career with the Philadelphia Eagles. The pass-rusher compiled 99.5 of his 130.0 career sacks in Atlanta and made all six of his Pro Bowls and both of his First-Team All-Pro appearances with the Falcons.

Deion Sanders

Now we get to the fun part of the best Falcons players on the all-time list with “Neon” Deion “Prime Time” Sanders.

Deion only played five of his 14 NFL seasons with Atlanta but made three of his eight Pro Bowls there and earned two of his six First-Team All-Pro selections with the Falcons. Sanders didn’t win his Defensive Player of the Year in Atlanta (that came in 1994 with the San Francisco 49ers) but he did have his highest interception total (seven) the season before with the Falcons.

Most importantly, Sanders brought a level of excitement and attitude to the franchise that it didn’t have throughout long stretches of its history.

When the Falcons took Sanders fifth overall in the 1989 NFL Draft, the team hadn’t made the playoffs since 1982. While Deion would be gone by the time the team made the Super Bowl in 1998, he did help the Falcons make its triumphant return to the postseason in 1991.

All told, with the Falcons, Sanders had 238 tackles, seven forced fumbles, six fumble recoveries, 24 interceptions, and three INT returns for touchdowns. He also racked up 3,388 kick return yards and three TDs and 789 punt return yards with two scores.

Plus, what’s more iconic in Falcons history than Deion in the black jersey and helmet high-stepping into the end zone?

Andre Rison

For the fifth and final spot on this list, there were a lot of players to consider, both long-term and shorter-term Falcons, like Vick, Gonzalez, White, Mike Kenn, Jeff Van Note, and Jesse Tuggle.

However, for a five-year stretch in the early 1990s, the Falcons had one of the best wide receivers in the league in Andre “Bad Moon” Rison.

With quarterback Chris Miller already in the building, the Falcons traded out of the No. 1 spot in the 1990 NFL Draft for a big haul that included the Indianapolis Colts’ promising second-year wide receiver, Rison.

Rison immediately made an impact in Atlanta, catching 82 balls for 1,208 yards and 10 touchdowns. In his five seasons with the Falcons, Rison had over 1,000 yards and double-digit touchdowns in four of them. He also led the league in receiving touchdowns with 15 in 1993.

The former Michigan State wideout made the Pro Bowl in four of those five seasons as well and was named to one First-Team All-Pro and three Second-Team All-Pro squads in that time