PALM BEACH, Fla. — It was summer in South Florida, Matt Ryan was still the Falcons’ quarterback, and after the team’s joint practice with Miami, Dolphins general manager Chris Grier went to his new Atlanta counterpart, Terry Fontenot, to give the first-year GM the proverbial pat on the back.
You guys are going to be better than people think.
Grier was right. The Falcons found a way to win seven games, and if you looked hard enough at how the season went, you might’ve come out of it convinced that Atlanta was indeed closer than people had thought six months after that conversation. They even beat that Dolphins team, one that sure looked like the more talented group in August, two months after Grier offered Fontenot that small piece of encouragement.
