Our roundtable breaks down the 2018 Falcons schedule, including record predictions

Eric Robinson

Hardest Game: Away vs. Pittsburgh (Week 5)

Easiest Game: Home vs. Arizona (Week 15)

Season Prediction: 12-4

While the schedule starts fairly daunting with games against playoff teams Philadelphia, Carolina, New Orleans, and Pittsburgh during the first five weeks of the season, the schedule overall is manageable for the talented Falcons. There are no West Coast trips and two games (Cleveland, Green Bay) that will probably fall under the “cold weather” games that warm weather teams usually dread every season. The first five games of the season will tell a lot. The Falcons have an opportunity to kick off the first three games against NFC opponents with a possible 3-0 record and 2-0 within the division. Which would be a very excellent start to the campaign. Oh, by the way, a Thanksgiving game in the Bayou against arch rival New Orleans will be a very unique scenario to the season.

Cory Woodroof

Hardest Game: Away vs. New Orleans (Week 12)

Easiest Game: Home vs. Cardinals (Week 15)

Season Prediction: 11-5

The Falcons have the easiest schedule in the NFC South, which is, uh, still good for 13th-hardest in the NFL. Who told you this thing was going to be easy? The Falcons stand to be more polished on offense, and more explosive on defense going in to 2018, and get a lot of their harder games out of the way before that “playoff seeding sweet spot” of late November/December ball begins. When you get nervous about seeing some heavy-hitters on the schedule, remember the team you cheer for. Ok, wise guy, get the jokes out. Atlanta is poised for a strong 2018. If that 2017 squad can go 10-6 and win a playoff game, a more-refined grouping of Birds should at least get a game uptick. Here’s to hoping it doesn’t snow in Green Bay in December, though.

Carter Breazeale

Hardest Game: Away vs. Pittsburgh (Week 5)

Easiest Game: Away vs. Cleveland (Week 9)

Season Prediction: 12-4

Seeing that the 2018 season kicks off in Philadelphia was somewhat jarring, but all things considered: this is a very manageable schedule. A slate of three consecutive home games right after the Philly affair gives the Falcons a solid shot of heading into Pittsburgh 4-0, and a Week 8 BYE is optimal. This is an extremely talented team on both sides of the ball, and with few real holes to address in the draft, I see no real reason why they can’t win 12 games.

Dave Choate

Hardest Game: Away vs. New Orleans (Week 12)

Easiest Game: Home vs. Cardinals (Week 15)

Season Prediction: 11-5

I swear I’m not copying Cory here, but I have to agree with this takes. The Falcons have a very tough Thanksgiving road matchup with the Saints, a very easy (on paper) home game against the Cardinals late, and have only a small handful of games that look like they should be penciled in as losses. Without knowing where they’re going in the draft or whether the offense will take the leap forward I think and hope it will, it’s hard to make a prediction, but I’m ever the optimist and think this is a schedule you can win with.

Torgo

Hardest Game: Away vs. Pittsburgh (Week 5)

Easiest Game: Away vs. Cleveland (Week 9)

Season Prediction: 11-5

I don’t sweat the schedule too much in terms of who you play and when. As always, the divisional games mean everything. The first goal is to win the division, and except for two games you play the same opponents as your rivals. So if the Falcons can take care of business in the six NFC South games, the rest will usually take care of itself.

The part of scheduling that I do care about is the extra stuff the league can do to stack the deck against you, such as a west coast trip following a Monday Night game, a week four bye, multiple west coast trips stacked together (or with a road game in between), or (something the NFL did to the Falcons in 2009) having four games against teams coming off of their bye weeks. But for the most part, this year’s schedule seems relatively harmless in that regard. We don’t have any games on the west coast, and our bye comes after our MNF game against the Giants, sparing us the short preparation week following that one.