The Falcons are the Only Good Team in Atlanta

As the Braves and Hawks rebuild in their own ways, the Falcons are the only team with a playoff run on the horizon

Last night, the Atlanta Hawks traded Kyle Korver to the Cleveland Cavaliers for (essentially) a first-round pick. While I have many thoughts on this deal, I’d recommend going to Peachtree Hoops: there’s some great coverage there on what this means for the Hawks going foward.

One thing that it almost undeniably means, though, is that the Hawks are rebuilding. Not necessarily a tanking, “trust the process” rebuild, but a retooling of the current roster nonetheless. A playoff appearance is unlikely, and this team will certainly finish lower than it did last season.

The Hawks’ recent trade, coupled with the ongoing Braves rebuild, leaves the Falcons as the only major franchise in the city that is poised to win now. The Dirty Birds are primed to potentially go all the way (despite some past failures), and Atlanta fans should cherish this team’s success.

At the beginning of the fall, (if asked) I would have said that the Hawks were Atlanta’s best team. Even after losing Al Horford over the summer, and with all the uncertainty that an aging core normally prompts, I expected that they would be more reliable than a Falcons team that collapsed over the second half of last season. After the Hawks’ 9–2 start (compared with some of the Falcons bad losses) I would have felt even better about this prediction.

But now, that claim would clearly be wrong. The Falcons have an excellent chance to win the championship, something that not even the wildest Hawks predictions would have claimed. Perhaps even more encouragingly, this team should be good for a few more years. The Braves can conceivably be good in a year or two, but the Falcons are an elite team at the moment of this writing.

Perhaps the eve of the NFL playoffs is the best time to write an article like this. The Falcons won’t play this weekend, but they’ll wait patiently to play Green Bay, New York, or Seattle. Whichever team that ends up being, they’ll be facing Atlanta’s most successful franchise for the immediate future.