In what was being dubbed as the “bowl of sadness” or “the top five pick game Stitched Brett Favre Jersey ,” only one team played like a bottom five team. It wasn’t the team considered as a Super Bowl contender going into the season. For the fourth consecutive week, the Falcons were in a game already decided when the fourth quarter began. It was the first game during this stretch that had them on the winning end of a one-sided beating. They looked focused, energized, and inspired in the last home game of the season. As gloomy as the crowd looked inside Mercedes-Benz Stadium going into the game, they left the stadium with something to be cheerful about.The Falcons desperately needed a win to inject some enthusiasm back into the organization. Beating a dreadful Cardinals’ team doesn’t reveal anything about the team’s capabilities. It does show their commitment and desire to fight for their embattled head coach. They recognized their opponents’ lack of overall talent on both sides of the ball and pounced on every flaw. Players, who have largely underwhelmed, had their best performances of the season. Younger players continued to receive more valuable playing time. What you wanted to see from a team out of the playoff race was on full display in a dominant victory.All-out defensive assaultDuring the last few minutes of the game, a remarkable stat about the amount of pressure Josh Rosen faced was shown. The Falcons produced seven sacks, nine hits, and 17 hurries. They only had five sacks in their first three games of the season. Based on how comfortable Nick Foles, Cam Newton, and Drew Brees looked in the pocket, it’s safe to assume that they didn’t record nine hits or 17 hurries in those three games combined. The front four was incapable of mustering any semblance of pressure. With Quinn set on his defensive philosophy, they didn’t attempt to blitz often. That allowed quarterbacks to pick apart their decimated and overmatched back seven without much resistance.After how things unraveled over the course of the season, Quinn is working with Marquand Manuel to be more aggressive and creative. That has translated into utilizing more blitzes at different angles. Allowing De’Vondre Campbell and Brian Poole to cause havoc gives them a better opportunity to get off the field on third down. They showed more of a willingness to blitz last week against the Packers, which resulted in four sacks. Two of them came off pure blitzes on third down. Arizona’s offensive line was equally as banged up as Green Bay’s group. With a rookie quarterback that struggles to play on the move and far less talent across the board, this was a matchup where the Falcons had to impose their will. They managed to do it with authority.Josh Rosen was left helpless on numerous occasions. As soon as he dropped back, pressure was being immediately generated. Grady Jarrett led the charge with two sacks. The always-reliable, perennially under-appreciated defensive tackle continues to play at a high level. On a defense lacking consistency, his ability to explode past guards with outstanding burst and hand usage gives them a significant lift. Only Deion Jones is more valuable within their defense. Jarrett’s strip-sack on third down set the tone for what was going to be an enjoyable day.How the coaching staff remained relentless by bringing a variety of blitzes was very encouraging. It’s the type of ruthlessness the Falcons have been lacking since Kyle Shanahan departed in 2017. To pinpoint an opposing team’s flaws and successfully exploit it for an entire game is one of the best feelings a coach can experience. They recognized Arizona’s horrendous offensive line was there for the taking. Combining their deficiencies with Rosen’s tendency of holding onto the ball for too long made for a golden opportunity. Quinn and Manuel didn’t look back in getting everyone involved on blitzes and twists. On Jarrett’s strip-sack, Campbell blitzed through the B-gap to create a mismatch. Poole got into the fray by coming off the weak side unblocked to sack Rosen. Their game plan worked to perfection.The defensive line deserves praise for their individual efforts. Steven Means impressed for the second consecutive game. He was expected to be the primary replacement for Derrick Shelby in the base package. Quinn decided to give him a chance as an interior pass rusher. It proved to be a wise decision with Means earning his first sack as a Falcon. Takkarist McKinley and Jack Crawford didn’t get in on the sack party, but they showed more than enough flashes in getting after Rosen. The front four has been manhandled for the majority of the season. For them to be the bullies, albeit for one week, is encouraging for a unit featuring several young players.Running game comes to lifeSimilar to the pass rush, the Falcons’ running game has looked considerably better over the past two games after weeks of being non-existent. It’s been an ongoing struggle between managing the problems up front and devising ways to get the most out of Tevin Coleman. There are no secrets about Coleman’s limitations as a runner. He struggles to run inside, while his inability to make defenders miss or run through contact often makes it difficult to use him in a featured role. The coaching staff recognized that by giving Ito Smith nearly the same amount of carries.Coleman is still a player defensive coordinators must account for. His breakaway speed and acceleration can blow past any defensive back at the second level. When someone as electrifying as Coleman gets into the open field, something major is bound to happen. How he exploded past Antoine Bethea on a 43-yard touchdown run was something only a handful of running backs are capable of doing. Following a beautiful jump cut, he found a gaping hole and didn’t stop running until he was completely off the field. The coaching staff made one noticeable adjustment to bolster the ground game. They used Ben Garland as an extra blocker on the right side. Pairing him alongside Ty Sambrailo gives them more support in a problematic area. It also allows them to use Garland on pull blocks, which is one of his biggest strengths. His presence must be acknowledged as Coleman’s performance garners all the headlines. The dynamic running back made Arizona’s ravaged front seven suffer on toss sweeps and cut backs. It was Coleman’s best performance of the season, which was needed given his disappointing production. He wasn’t the only big-name player who shined in what may have been his final home game as a Falcon. Vic Beasley makes his presence felt There haven’t been many recent games where Beasley’s name could be used with that phrase. Despite possessing all the physical gifts coaches crave from an edge rusher, Beasley hasn’t been able to put it all together. Not being able to convert speed to power is a major limitation to go along with his subpar hand usage. These issues correspond with him being a non-factor in countless games.When Beasley gets his timing down and uses his blistering speed effectively, he is extremely dangerous. Most offensive tackles can’t react quickly enough when his get-off is on point. Arizona’s collection of overmatched tackles witnessed it first hand by getting repeatedly beat around the edge. Beasley continuously got past them with his first step. It took some time for him to join the sack extravaganza, but the former first round pick eventually got on the stat sheet to make it two consecutive games with a sack.What ultimately made Beasley’s best game of the season more impactful was what he did outside of rushing the passer. The 2016 sack king has a knack for tipping passes at the line of scrimmage. With Rosen trying to get the ball out quickly to David Johnson, Beasley wisely got his hands up to deflect the pass. The ball just so happened to fall into the waiting arms of Atlanta’s most valuable defensive player. That play started a 40-point swing for the Falcons. Beasley added another batted pass to his collection, along with an impressive tackle for a loss on a jet sweep. This kind of all-around performance will get the coaching staff’s attention. While Beasley isn’t going to receive the mega contract extension he envisioned two years ago, the organization may still view him as a capable contributor on the defensive line.Looking AheadWith two divisional games remaining, it will be interesting to see how the team fares against familiar opposition. Can they play with the same intensity that had been lacking for so long? Will players like Isaiah Oliver and Deadrin Senat receive more snaps? These are the biggest questions heading into the final stretch. The opportunity to knock a divisional rival out of the playoffs could also be something on the players’ minds. After sending three teams to the playoffs last year, the NFC South can only have two playoff teams at most. The Falcons can make sure only New Orleans returns with another win over Carolina. That’s one way for them to finish the season on a high note. This offseason, Atlanta’s #1 priority is to get a new contract for Grady Jarrett. It won’t be cheap and it likely won’t be easy, but Jarrett has been very good since he arrived in Atlanta and capped off a career-best season that will ensure he gets paid. He’ll only be 26 years old in 2019 and the Falcons are dependent on him as they re-build a largely disappointing defensive line, so there’s no way they can afford to let him get away. The problem for the Falcons and Jarrett is how to agree on his value. Jarrett is going to be looking for a deal that makes him one of the highest-paid defensive tackles in football, and the Falcons are going to have to find a way to make him happy and retain some sort of long-term flexibility. How deserving of a big contract is Jarrett, and what might his deal look like? Where he stacks upThere’s a habit in the NFL of stacking good or even great players up against the absolute platinum standard at their position, as he has happened with Grady Jarrett and Aaron Donald. Jarrett is not and never will be Donald, a once-in-a-generation defensive tackle who utterly dominates everyone and is probably underpaid. Jarrett is not Donald, but a year ago Youth Brett Favre Jersey , he was one of the best defensive tackles in football. He tied for 12th in sacks from a defensive tackle with six despite playing only 14 games, finished tied for 8th in quarterback hits, tied for 2nd in forced fumbles, and tied for eighth in tackles overall, which is a testament to how active he is at the line of scrimmage. He enjoyed one of the best run stop percentages from a defensive lineman in the entire NFL, and was top three for defensive tackles. By any credible measure and at his age, he was one of the ten best defensive tackles in football last year. Per Pro Football Focus, here were the top five defensive interior linemen in 2018: 1.Aaron Donald2.Fletcher Cox3.DeForest Buckner4.Damon Harrison5.Grady Jarrett Given that, the Falcons don’t appear to have an enormous amount of leverage over Jarrett. He’s young, coming off a year that would lead to him drawing huge interest on the open market, doesn’t have any significant health concerns to point to, and is a high-character player and one of the most consistently accountable men in the locker room. About the only opportunity they have to push back is by stacking his raw production as a pass rusher against Donald, Cox, and Buckner, because there’s not much else working against him. Jarrett and his representation can and will argue for youth—he’s two years younger than both Donald and Cox—but obviously his production has yet to match those two. He fares much better against Geno Atkins, PFF’s third-highest 4-3 DT by salary and the #20 DT last year and a man headed for his age 31 season in 2019, Kawann Short (#4 in contract, 30 years old and #19), Marcell Dareus (#5 in contract, 29 years old, #27), Gerald McCoy (#6 in contract, nearly 31, and #29, about to be cut), and finally Jurrell Casey (#7 in contract, 29, and #17). He has a credible case to be the second-or-third highest-paid player at his position in the NFL, depending on how far his youth compared to Cox takes him, and at the end of the day the on-paper annual average is likely to reflect that. Where will his contract end up? The Falcons will do their level best to balance Jarrett’s deserved pay hike after four years on a rookie fifth-rounder contract with the long-term needs of a team about to hand out significant extensions to other key players. That will mean getting creative with structure, as the Falcons often try to do, to ensure they’re not taking massive cap hits every year of Jarrett’s new deal.The annual average for this deal is going to wind up being $16-18 million, if I had to wager, and could go higher if the Falcons are comfortable with it. That will be enough to put Jarrett somewhere between the second-highest and fifth-highest paid defensive tackle in the NFL, which is a more than fair spot for him even if the numbers make you wince. The Falcons will likely carefully weigh their free agent needs this offseason before deciding whether they want their cap hits to be fairly balanced or if they want to heavily front load this deal to try to lessen the impact and guaranteed money as Jarrett marches toward his 30s. It’s fair to expect a 4-5 year deal that will, one hopes, allow both parties to walk away from the negotiating table happy, though ideally the Falcons would be able to lock up Jarrett for six years and hopefully see him play out the entire contract. All told, then, I think the template here is a little north of Cox’s deal, which gave the gifted defensive tackle $102 million over six seasons, with an annual average of $17.1 million when he signed it back in 2016. Jarrett’s youth and the expanding cap should allow him to get closer to $17.5 or $18 million per year, and the Falcons will probably want to avoid structuring the deal like Cox’s given that the dead money doesn’t dip below $13 million until 2022, when Cox will be 31 years old. But if they can hammer out something that makes Jarrett the second-highest paid defensive tackle in the NFL and allows them to continue to lock up key guys like Deion Jones and Keanu Neal in the years ahead, the signing and this offseason will both feel like a success. What do you think Jarrett’s contract will look like?