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Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports
Deserving honors for players vital to Atlanta’s success. The Atlanta Falcons have plenty going for them heading into the 2024 season, in spite of recent years’ results. If they’re going to be as successful as we hope this year, Jessie Bates and Chris Lindstrom will be at the forefront for this team.
The 2023 crown jewel of free agency and the team’s first pick in the 2019 NFL Draft, Bates and Lindstrom have emerged as leaders and vital men on their respective sides of the ball. Bates had a career season in his first year in Atlanta, cementing his reputation as one of the best safeties in the NFL, and Lindstrom endured a couple of rough stretches but turned in another terrific year on balance. If Bates is great and Lindstrom is his usual self, it will go a long way toward the Falcons finally getting back on track as a team.
In this year’s edition of the Pro Football Focus top 50 players in the league, 31-50 have already been unveiled, and Bates and Lindstrom show up at #37 and #38, respectively.
Here’s the Bates writeup:
A true ballhawk at safety, Jessie Bates III showed last season that he can take his talents to a new defense and still ball out. He notched six interceptions for the Falcons, earning a 90.2 PFF coverage grade to narrowly exceed the best mark of his Bengals career at the first time of asking. Bates is an elite coverage safety with the range to punish ill-advised passes.
And here’s Lindstrom:
It’s getting harder and harder to argue against Chris Lindstrom as the best guard in football after the past few seasons. He backed up a spectacular 2022 with a 2023 season almost as good, allowing just 15 total pressures and earning an 87.5 PFF run-blocking grade. He was one of only two guards to post 74.0-plus grades as both a run blocker and a pass protector.
Both are deserving, not just because they stand out among their peers—Lindstrom is often referred to on PFF as one of the best guards in football, for example—but because of their importance to this football team. Atlanta only won seven games last year for a variety of factors, but swap out Lindstrom for a generic right guard and Bates for a lesser safety and they likely don’t even come close to that total. Bates, in particular, won multiple games with herculean efforts more or less by himself. They’re among the top 50 or so players in the league and among the most vital and talented players the Falcons have.
The hope is that there are other Falcons on this list, even if it’s just for vanity’s sake. The bigger hope is that these players find themselves higher on the list next year because they somehow reach new heights on an ascending Atlanta squad.
<img alt="NFL: Indianapolis Colts at Atlanta Falcons" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/2zVZ2K3fc3vIcs8Ek03KCbcMjKg=/0x0:4676x3117/1310x873/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/73466816/usa_today_22171520.0.jpg">
Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports
Deserving honors for players vital to Atlanta’s success. The Atlanta Falcons have plenty going for them heading into the 2024 season, in spite of recent years’ results. If they’re going to be as successful as we hope this year, Jessie Bates and Chris Lindstrom will be at the forefront for this team.
The 2023 crown jewel of free agency and the team’s first pick in the 2019 NFL Draft, Bates and Lindstrom have emerged as leaders and vital men on their respective sides of the ball. Bates had a career season in his first year in Atlanta, cementing his reputation as one of the best safeties in the NFL, and Lindstrom endured a couple of rough stretches but turned in another terrific year on balance. If Bates is great and Lindstrom is his usual self, it will go a long way toward the Falcons finally getting back on track as a team.
In this year’s edition of the Pro Football Focus top 50 players in the league, 31-50 have already been unveiled, and Bates and Lindstrom show up at #37 and #38, respectively.
Here’s the Bates writeup:
A true ballhawk at safety, Jessie Bates III showed last season that he can take his talents to a new defense and still ball out. He notched six interceptions for the Falcons, earning a 90.2 PFF coverage grade to narrowly exceed the best mark of his Bengals career at the first time of asking. Bates is an elite coverage safety with the range to punish ill-advised passes.
And here’s Lindstrom:
It’s getting harder and harder to argue against Chris Lindstrom as the best guard in football after the past few seasons. He backed up a spectacular 2022 with a 2023 season almost as good, allowing just 15 total pressures and earning an 87.5 PFF run-blocking grade. He was one of only two guards to post 74.0-plus grades as both a run blocker and a pass protector.
Both are deserving, not just because they stand out among their peers—Lindstrom is often referred to on PFF as one of the best guards in football, for example—but because of their importance to this football team. Atlanta only won seven games last year for a variety of factors, but swap out Lindstrom for a generic right guard and Bates for a lesser safety and they likely don’t even come close to that total. Bates, in particular, won multiple games with herculean efforts more or less by himself. They’re among the top 50 or so players in the league and among the most vital and talented players the Falcons have.
The hope is that there are other Falcons on this list, even if it’s just for vanity’s sake. The bigger hope is that these players find themselves higher on the list next year because they somehow reach new heights on an ascending Atlanta squad.
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