With news breaking on Monday that the Atlanta Falcons would be sending their best quarterback in franchise history, Matt Ryan, to the Indianapolis Colts in exchange for a 3rd round pick, the former 3rd overall pick in the 2008 NFL Draft’s long and storied tenure in the Peach State came to a close. While in Atlanta, Ryan racked up 59,735 passing yards and 367 touchdowns, putting him eighth all-time in yards and ninth all-time in touchdowns while a Falcon. With all those stats, Ryan also racked up countless incredible moments in Atlanta, but here are the three best moments in his time there.
1. First NFL throw
We begin where Ryan’s career began. It’s Week 1 of 2008, the Falcons are at home against the Lions, who, of course, would go on to lose all 16 games that season, and Matt Ryan steps up to take his first regular-season snaps in the NFL. The ball is at the Falcons’ 38-yard line, and it’s a simple play call. It’s a jumbo set, so the entire defense is thinking Ryan is going to hand the ball off to Michael Turner for the third consecutive play since Turner has already gained 12 yards on this drive, but no, Ryan drops back and finds Michael Jenkins deep across the middle, who takes it the rest of the way to give Ryan not only his first pass attempt, not only his first completion but also his first touchdown, all in one. All in all, Ryan would only throw the ball 13 times in this game, completing nine, but the first is easily the most memorable.
2. First playoff win
Matt Ryan had a pretty hefty monkey on his back after his first four seasons in the NFL. He'd made the playoffs three times, but hadn't, to that point recorded a win in the postseason. His losses included a 2011 NFC Wild Card defeat to the New York Giants where the Falcons managed only two points. Ryan himself had not been great in any of the three games, failing to reach 200 yards in any of them, though he did reach 199 yards twice. However, things were different in 2012. After a very impressive regular season, going 13-3, the Falcons played host to the Seahawks for the 2012 NFC Divisional round. It was a Seahawks team with a phenom of a rookie quarterback in Russell Wilson, who had just dispatched Robert Griffin III and Washington a week earlier. That mattered little to Ryan and the Falcons, who jumped out to a 20-0 lead after Ryan's second touchdown pass of the game. However, the Seahawks would go on a 28-7 run after this, and it came down to Ryan to lead his team to victory. With the ball at the 28-yard line and 25 seconds to play, the Falcons needed to get in range of Matt Bryant's leg to win the game. First, Ryan found Harry Douglas 22 yards downfield to bring the ball to the 40. After a timeout, it was again Ryan's arm that found Tony Gonzalez for a gain of 19, setting up a game-winning field goal from Bryant and a trip to the NFC Championship.
3. 2015 NFC Championship
In the final game ever played at the Georgia Dome, Ryan and his Falcons took the field for the 2015 NFC Championship with one thing on the mind, a trip to Super Bowl LI, and a formidable opponent trying to keep them from it, Aaron Rodgers and the Green Bay Packers. However, you'd have thought the Falcons were playing the 2008 Lions mentioned earlier, as Atlanta absolutely stomped the Packers. On their first nine drives, the Falcons scored on eight of them, gaining 325 of their 493 total yards in the first half alone, building a 24-0 halftime lead, and leading 31-0 after their first drive of the second half. The game would finish with a score of 44-21 in favor of the Falcons, and Ryan finished completing 27 of 32 passes, for 392 yards and four touchdowns to three different receivers. Falcons fans would assure you that this was the final game of the 2015 season, and if that had been true, it would have been quite the capstone.
4. 350th touchdown pass
Ryan elevated himself to a statistical level rarely seen in NFL history in his 14 season run in Atlanta, and on September 26th of last year, against the New York Giants, on a four-yard pass to receiver Olamide Zaccheaus, he became only the tenth quarterback in league history to reach the milestone of 350 touchdown passes. In the years after that NFC Championship game, Falcons fans didn't have much to root for in the win-loss column, but they did have a quarterback to make them proud.
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