Falcons fan optimism soars, with many believing team should’ve made coaching change sooner

Falcons fans enjoyed a rare delight on Sunday, getting just the 15th win in the last 48 Atlanta games on Sunday against the Vikings. That feeling has many fans feeling confident about some of the team’s recent moves and their long-term direction, but this week, they also had plenty to say about the decision to move on from Dan Quinn.

Let’s start there, actually. This week’s Falcoholic Reacts polled fans on their biggest takeaway from the blowout win over the Vikings, with three potential options. Strikingly, nearly 80% of respondents thought that the major takeaway was that the team should’ve moved on from Dan Quinn and made the switch to interim head coach Raheem Morris sooner. We did not have an option for which week this was going to happen in, but it’s safe to assume anywhere from early 2019 to early 2020 was an option.

The remaining respondents were split pretty evenly between “the Falcons can turn this around now” and the inevitable “just messing up the draft” takes. Perhaps because no one’s quite sure what to make of this team after just one win, neither of those forward-looking responses were all that popular compared to the hindsight option.

Concurrently, fan confidence went from 48% to 58%, marking the new high water mark for the season. That’s definitely buoyed by fans looking ahead a bit and thinking about the kinds of changes that might transform the season, but I think it’s also at least partially a pure expression of confidence from fans who finally got to see this team played the way they’re supposed to for one game and are feeling excited about it.

Will that excitement last? We’re a few days from seeing whether they can stretch it out at least one more week, which adds a little intrigue to what had become a dead season. If they do, expect that confidence to keep trending upward.