Atlanta signed Mariota to a two-year deal, and ESPN’s Adam Schefter reported it’s for $18.75 million. Mariota is extensively familiar with Falcons head coach Arthur Smith from when the two worked together in Tennessee. Mariota played for the Titans from 2015 through 2019. The Titans then pivoted to Ryan Tannehill, and Mariota signed with the Raiders. He spent the last two years with Las Vegas serving as Derek Carr’s backup.
Atlanta is on a run of four straight losing seasons, but Ryan has held up his end of the bargain, throwing a league-leading number of completions in 2019 and 2020 while being sacked over 40 times each year. The Falcons reached the playoffs in six of Ryan’s 14 seasons in Atlanta.
Ryan joins a Colts team that came within one win of making the playoffs last season, and many observers blamed the performance of now-departed quarterbackCarson Wentz for the team’s failure. The Colts’ odds to win the Super Bowl jumped from +3000 to +2500, per BetMGM.
Atlanta selected Ryan with the third pick of the 2008 draft, with the intent of rehabilitating the franchise’s image in the wake of the Michael Vick dogfighting scandal. Ryan started for the Falcons from the first day of his rookie season in 2008, and would miss only three games over 14 seasons.metasports
Just days after the Freddie Freeman era ended in Atlanta, the Matt Ryan epoch has come to a close as well … and for Falcons, the time of Marcus Mariota begins.