Prior to its first preseason game, when, like any newborn, a team begins to assume a personality, the Falcons have opted for little baby Sonny Liston.
They have taken a step out there on the ragged edge of civilized behavior, out there where the rules begin to break down and there is riot in the streets. Fights are popping up in training camp like summer showers, with center Joe Hawley playing the role of instigator. How fortunate the HBO Hard Knocks cameras are there to spread the word that these Falcons are no more the polite manservants of the NFL.
Mike Smith has been saying all the coachly things as these skirmishes have erupted — that fighting is misplaced energy; that during an actual game such a breakdown in discipline could be very costly. But I can’t help thinking that at the end of the day, in his office, Smith smiles at the thought of his guys coming to August all edgy and feral dog hungry. He sent the very message months ago that Flowery Branch was about to get a lot more thorny. His players are merely responding to his call for a tougher approach.
Fight doesn’t necessarily make right. None of this will automatically translate to a more physically imposing team. Indeed, it is a fine line to tread, between building toughness and courting chaos. On one hand, you have a group of flinty professionals. On the other, you have Thunderdome.
But admit it, you’d rather read about the flare-ups in camp — so long as no one is breaking anything important — than learning that the fellows are engaging in some meaningful sensitivity group sessions. This team forgot how to fight last year.
Let’s go back to Dec. 29, the final game of a 4-12 season. The Falcons lost another close one, to Carolina. It wasn’t the score that mattered so much as the way the Panthers rushed through the swinging doors of the Falcons offensive line. Nine times they sacked Matt Ryan, with numerous other unrecorded assaults. The Falcons were bullied and bruised, and seemed to have no answer beyond reaching a hand out, trying to help their quarterback off the ground.
A memory like that should create a little training camp tension. And if a rookie — Jake Matthews — who had nothing to do with the last season’s outrages wants to set a take-no-nonsense example, fine.
No one really wins a training camp fight. But at least it shows these Falcons intentions are suitably malicious.
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