The easy read on the today is the same as it looked last summer: a promising, well-rounded team with a question mark at quarterback.Atlanta is 7-8, having just matched its win total from each of the past two seasons, but the Falcons are a game back in the NFC South and need help to avoid extending their playoff drought to six straight years.So it's fair to ask a question that many people asked before the season began: Why were the Falcons content to go with as their starter?Atlanta has a defense that ranks in the top 10 in points allowed and yards allowed. Only five NFL teams can boast that this season, and the other four (, , , ) are all headed to the playoffs, with the help of four quarterbacks all making at least $40 million a year.ADVERTISEMENT Then there's the Falcons, who made a firm commitment to Ridder, despite him playing only four games as Steve McNair Jersey a rookie, needing until December to push off the field. Ridder has 10 touchdowns and 10 interceptions this year, twice losing his job to . Of the 24 NFL quarterbacks to throw at least 350 pa ses, only the ' has fewer touchdowns, and Ridder is tied for the eighth-most interceptions.Atlanta made sure Ridder was well-armed, equipping its offense with three straight top-10 draft picks in running back , receiver and tight end . Those three have combined for 12 total touchdowns. Atlanta paid well to make sure its offensive line returned intact from last season, but that wasn't enough to help Ridder make this a playoff team.Why didn't the Falcons aim for more? They had ample salary-cap space last offseason, enough to allow for them to make an ambitious push for the best quarterbacks available. They'd tried and mi sed a year earlier on , and that, of course, is arguably a ble sing in disguise, for as little as he's given the two years into a fully guaranteed $230 million contract.It's easy to wonder what the Falcons might be if they'd made an aggre sive push for , who is now challenging for what would be his second MVP award, having led Baltimore to an NFL-best 12-3 record and potentially the top seed in the AFC. Jackson is still only 26, has thrown for a career-best 3,357 yards this season, with 19 touchdowns against seven interceptions, while rushing for 786 yards and another five scores.Perhaps, they' Caleb Shudak Jersey ll say, Jackson was never really available, and for all the awkward public differences between team and superstar in the offseason, he was always going to re-sign with the . No package of draft picks could have swayed Baltimore to part with such a promising young player. We'll never know how hard the Falcons tried to pry him away, only that Atlanta had publicly bowed out of the sweepstakes in March, and Jackson didn't re-sign with Baltimore until May.Aggre sively adding an expensive superstar doesn't always work, of course. You see that all over the league, from the and to the and to prematurely overpaying for young quarterbacks like the and and even the and . But even the remote chance to bring in a player like Jackson would be a game-changer for the Falcons, who instead sit 15th in the league in attendance, filling their stadium to an NFL-low 92.8% of capacity.Atlanta Falcons included on Dave Helman's Naughty List Even taking Jackson out of the picture, the Falcons could have hedged their bet on Ridder and done so much better at bringing in a bargain veteran challenger. They gave Heinicke two years and $14 million to be a Demarco Murray Jersey backup to Ridder without any real competition. In the same division, the got for one year and $4 million, and he has 27 touchdowns as many as the Falcons offense has totaled all season. The got for $3.5 million as a bridge to pair with rookie , and Minshew has thrown for 14 touchdowns and has Indy tied for first place in another bad division.Benching Ridder and turning to Heinicke all but a sures that the Falcons' 2024 quarterback is not on the current roster. They're in position to pick 10th overall in the draft by the current standings. That could allow them to draft a second-tier quarterback like , or trade that pick in a -like package for a top-two pick, swinging for the fences with or ' Adoree' Jackson Jersey s .They could also turn to a new veteran perhaps they can lure on what will be a bargain contract, hoping he can show himself better than he's been in the past two seasons. It could be something more modest, like bringing in , who is 35 but made his lone Pro Bowl in 2019 when Arthur Smith was his offensive coordinator in .Save for the Bucs and Mayfield, the NFL teams that didn't spend on a big contract or a high draft pick at quarterback are generally disappointments this year. had a Ridder-like affection for second-year pro , who's thrown for a ton Chig Okonkwo Jersey of yards but also leads the league with 17 interceptions and is now, like Ridder, benched. The are still mathematically alive for the playoffs, but that's despite quarterback , who has 13 touchdowns in 24 career starts.There are positions in the NFL you can cut corners on, can save money and get by with le s, but quarterback is rarely one of them. And as the Falcons face the likely prospect of another year just outside the limits of postseason football, a big part of why they're there is putting a supreme confidence in a middling quarterback few others saw as a reliable NFL starter.It might not cost Arthur Smith his job, but in a season of near-mi ses, it's front and center as to why the Falcons aren't in a position to clinch anything this weekend. Their search for a quarterback in the post-Matt Ryan era starts anew in 2024.Greg Auman is FOX Sports' NFC South reporter, covering theBuccaneers, Falcons, Panthers and Saints. He is in his 10th season covering the Bucs and the NFL full-time, having spent time at the Tampa Bay Times and The Athletic. You can follow him on Twitter at @gregauman.