Hell of a game last night, no?

Unfortunately, with the end of the Super Bowl comes about two weeks with absolutely nothing going on. The NFL Combine begins on February 22nd, but between here and now there's not a whole lot going on besides speculation and gearing up for free agency and the draft.

Of course, we'll be landing analysis and running features all throughout that time, so there will still be plenty going on here at The Falcoholic. But I'd also like to know what you want to see, if there's any historical moments in Falcons' history you'd like re-visited or any looks ahead you'd want us to do. No time like the present to dig up some gems, given how dead it's going to be in the world of the NFL.

So the floor's open. What features would you like to see as we make our way through the next couple of weeks?

The playoffs are over for the Atlanta Falcons, in case you were hiding in a fridge and missed the nuclear blast of anger that followed the Giants loss. Obviously, that reduces the collective interest of Falcons fans in playoff football by a good 600%.

Yet there's still reason to watch today's slate of games. More than one, even. Here's my brief list of reasons to tune in:

1. The Saints might lose.
2. The 49ers might actually advance to within one win of the Super Bowl playing defense. Crazy, I know.
3. Tim Tebow. Because he's America's most popular athlete, you know.
4. A playoff team down to its rookie, third-string quarterback could go to the AFC Championship Game.
5. The Giants-Packers game seems likely to devolve into a game where Eli Manning and Aaron Rodgers throw for 600 yards apiece.
6. A chance to look at the various strengths and weaknesses of NFC contenders and see how the Falcons can counter them down the line with their shiny new coordinators and such.

Okay, that's only six reasons. Not all of them are great. But hey, it's still football. You'll miss it when it's gone.

Check back in this afternoon for our live game threads.

I’ve never really done any kind of in-depth look at opposing teams before, but I’m going to give it a shot. Between this, some of our talented readers’ FanPosts, a visit to Windy City Gridiron and our usual matchups to watch on Saturday, you should know the Bears pretty well by the time the game rolls around.

The big question with the Bears, of course, is whether they can repeat last year. Bolstered by sporadically dominant performances by quarterback Jay Cutler, a potent pass rush and excellent special teams play, the team made it all the way to the NFC Championship Game. Unfortunately for Bears fans, the team then got soundly thumped by the Green Bay Packers.

The Bears followed that up with an interesting off-season. They jettisoned talented tight end Greg Olsen—tight ends are Mike Martz’s perpetual nightmare, after all—and drafted talented defensive end Stephen Paea to add potentcy to their already quality front seven. They picked up Brandon Meriweather off waivers to bolster the secondary—though I’ve seen Meriweather play, and he’s a bit overrated—and brought in Roy Williams to help the passing game. You can argue that these moves didn’t catapult the Bears up to the very tippy top of the NFC, but they certainly didn’t hurt the team badly, either.

For that reason and more, it would be a bad idea to take the Bears lightly. They’ve traditionally played the Falcons very close and have a nasty habit of coming up with a big play when they need it. In addition, they have a handful of dominant players at positions that can give the Falcons fits in this one, which we’ll touch upon more after the jump.

Read my questions for the game and my prediction, and weigh in with your own.

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UPDATE 1:25 EST: The 49ers cut loose inside linebacker Scott McKillop, and the Panthers let go of guard Duke Robinson. Both quality players with some question marks. 

Cuts were coming in fast and furious yesterday and they'll continue throughout the day today. The Falcons, as you know, still have five players to cut. 

Each team is trimming from roughly 90 to 80, so there's a little bit of intrigue here. A handful of guys who are household names—or at least infamous ones—will probably see the axe. 

Some notable names who found themselves getting all Marie Antoinetted yesterday:

• Vernon Gholston. The super bust from New York winds up cut after just a month with the Chicago Bears.
• Tank Tyler. Talented yet troubled defensive tackle will get a shot somewhere. Also dumped by the Bears.
• Andre Gurode. Famous for getting his face stomped on by Albert Haynesworth, Gurode also happens to be a pretty effective center. He'll latch on somewhere.
• Brett Ratliff. Considerable upside but he's never done anything with it. When you get bounced from the Titans and Browns, that might be it. 

So I had mega writer's block and promised Dave a post, and was stumped for a few minutes until it occurred to me that I watched the entirety of the Panthers game last night (because I live in North Carolina. Woo!)

Yes, I watched super-hyped QB Cam Newton put in some work, I also watched Jimmy Clausen do some stuff, and by the time Derek Anderson entered the game, I no longer cared.

However, the Panthers look like they might be something worth batting more than an eyelash at this year. After the jump, a brief opinion of what the Panthers might have in store for opponents this year.

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At long last, the collective bargaining agreement has been ratified. For the next ten years, we should be free of the kind of labor strife that robbed us of precious months of interesting off-season time. Blasted negotiations!

Regardless, the last domino has fallen and we're now officially back in the swing of things. Restricted free agents like Brent Grimes can sign their tenders and get back to practice, free agency is still going and pre-season is just around the corner. It's like emerging from a bunker into heaven.

In addition to being a ten year agreement without an opt-out clause, the new CBA reportedly contains HGH testing. It also keeps Roger Goodell's iron fist squarely around the league's personal conduct policy, which the players must love. Maybe they convinced him to tone it down a little bit.

Oh, and to circle the wagons back, Brent Grimes has signed his tender and is on the field exactly when he was supposed to do. That whole thing was needlessly dramatic, but at least we know he'll be lining up in the secondary in 2011.

Celebrating tonight?

UPDATE: NFLPA exec committee OKs deal. Unanimously. Next is a vote from the 32 player representatives.

UPDATE UPDATE: The player reps have also unanimously approved the deal, meaning Brady et al must now sign off on the deal, which is expected. Almost completely and totally over!

Big thanks to Jason for being a boss and linking you first to the almost official end to the lockout.

Dave, however, INCORRECTLY PREDICTED the start of training camps and it makes me wonder whether or not Dave spends his time listening to this when he writes his posts.

(Ok, I'm done)

In any case, this is fantastic - the day we've all been waiting for, if you will. Everything will pretty much be started immediately, according to Breer, so long as everyone agrees. Free agents will begin contact with teams (not limited to just their own) on Tuesday, with signings starting on Friday. This could also be hilariously ugly. (On Tuesday) "Yeah, I'll sign with you, Atlanta." (On Friday) "I just signed a big deal with the Bengals!"

....Let the bamboozling begin.

Brady, Peyton, et al must also send good word to the Minnesota court system to continue with the process. While training camps would be opened, the CBA would not be officially officially official until the players re-unionize. However, they'll still be allowed to go to camp and can then hash out things like drug testing and conduct.

But the gist of this article is that football is back. Yesssssssss!

A man can dream, can't he? A man can dream.

It appears the playing are going to work throughout the weekend to get to the point where they feel comfortable voting on the owners' proposal. The owners have already passed it, as you'll recall, so once the player vote is out of the way, everyone just has to put together the formal agreement and do a shazload of interviews.

The logical target date at this point is definitely Monday, for a couple of reasons. One, the chances of the players getting something done over the weekend are basically nil. Two, they get to look like they gave it serious weight and even mulled rejecting it, just to send a little message to the owners. But I do think we're looking at a passage of a new deal early next week.

By my best calculations, that puts free agency on track to start by later in the next week. It also should allow a bunch of wheezing, out-of-shape NFLers to take part in pre-season. We'll have some sense of normalcy back at last.

That concludes the latest in our interminable series of labor updates. Let's hope this is the second-to-last one.