Mark Bradley: Are Falcons a bona fide contender? We'll soon find out.

ATLANTA — We perceived the Falcons’ schedule as front-loaded, and we weren’t wrong. Their first three opponents now lead their divisions. To their credit, the Falcons won in Philadelphia after losing their opener to Pittsburgh. In hindsight, starting 1-2 was an achievement.

We assumed the schedule would ease after that. We weren’t wrong there, either. The Falcons have won five of the past seven games, going 4-1 versus NFC South opposition. They’ll have to mess up not to win their division.

Thing is, the Falcons were favored in all seven games. The losses – by 20 points at home to Seattle, which entered on a three-game skid and hasn’t won since, and to New Orleans, which hadn’t won since Sept. 15 and had just fired its coach – left us wondering. Here’s Question No. 1: Are the Falcons just the best team in what again seems a lousy division?

Conveniently enough, the schedule should supply an answer. Back in August, the apparent ease of this closing run was why the Falcons’ schedule was deemed the NFL’s softest. From Week 11 on, they’d face no opponent that finished above .500 last season. Three of the seven had new head coaches, same as the Falcons. Four figured to have new quarterbacks, same as the Falcons.

But look now. Four of the seven are at/above .500. If the playoffs began today, those four would qualify, same as the Falcons. We know where this team stands in the NFC South. Come January, we should know how it stacks up in the NFL writ large.

First comes a Sunday date in Denver. The Broncos are 5-5 in Year 2 under Sean Payton, who for his dark deeds with the Saints was ranked Atlanta’s 12th-biggest sports villain by the ol’ Atlanta Journal Constitution. His quarterback is rookie Bo Nix, winless in starts against Georgia for both Auburn and Oregon. He’s the son of Patrick Nix, once Auburn’s quarterback and later Chan Gailey’s offensive coordinator at Georgia Tech. There are your local angles.

Like the Falcons, Denver is coming off an excruciating loss, having had what would have been a winning field goal blocked at 0:00 in Kansas City. The Broncos have dropped four one-score decisions and lost to three teams that also beat the Falcons. Against NFC South representatives, Denver is 3-0, having outscored the Bucs/Saints/Panthers by an aggregate 56 points.

After Sunday’s game, the Falcons will have Thanksgiving week off. They’ll return with a home date against the Chargers of Jim Harbaugh, who are 6-3. Their best victory was over Denver. They’ll have two difficult games – Cincinnati on Sunday night, then Baltimore – before they come here.

Then the Falcons will head to Minneapolis, where the Vikings are 7-2 with Sam Darnold as QB1. He’s on his fourth NFL team, having been signed by Minnesota after Kirk Cousins took his talents to Flowery Branch. Then, after a trip to Las Vegas and a home date with the Giants, the Falcons will visit D.C. to face Dan Quinn’s Commanders, who are 7-4.

Those four tests – Broncos, Chargers, Vikings, Commanders – should give us an idea of what to expect of the Falcons come the playoffs. (Yes, we’re talking playoffs.) Three will come on the road, which means the Falcons will likely be underdogs in all three. They’ve been favored in their past three road games, which came against NFC Southerners, which again says much about the NFC South.

Aaron Schatz’s much-referenced DVOA rankings have the Falcons as the NFL’s lowest-rated winning team. With only a Week 18 date with Carolina remaining on the intra-divisional calendar, we’ve come to Question No. 2: What happens when the schedule turns tough again?

I say the Falcons are good enough to win anywhere. I say they’ll bear up nicely. I have, however, been known to be wrong.

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