Dallas Cowboys among 5 sleeper teams to watch for in 2014

5. Atlanta Falcons:

I’m still trying to figure out what happened to the Falcons in 2013. Originally expected by most to compete for a championship, Atlanta hardly managed to do anything right last season.

So why were the Falcons — a team that went 13-3 in 2012 — so bad? Conventional wisdom makes it easy to pin it on injuries — Julio Jones, Roddy White, and Steven Jackson all missed significant time — or even the defense, which finished 25th in total yards allowed.

But, for me, the real culprit was none other than Matt Ryan. If Matt Ryan is an elite quarterback, as I constantly hear he is, then he has no excuse for 4-12.

Tom Brady, without his two-headed monster at tight end (Rob Gronkowski and Aaron Hernandez) and without several defensive starters, took the Patriots to the AFC Championship Game.

Andrew Luck, quarterbacking a team that lost 83 games to starters (including nine games that Reggie Wayne missed) and quarterbacking a team that ranked 20th in both total defense and rushing offense, led the Colts to an 11-5 regular season and to the Divisional round.

Aaron Rodgers, with a far-less talented Packers team, came within three points of beating the San Francisco 49ers in the Wild Card round.

Elite quarterbacks — see: Brady, Luck, and Rodgers — overcome team deficiencies.

Matt Ryan knows that. He also knows he can’t afford another 4-12 season in 2014.

I might be in the minority, but I’m still a believer in the Boston College product. I fully expect to see a driven, laser-focused Matt Ryan in 2014 — and I suspect it will show up both on the stat sheet and (more importantly) in the win column.

Bottom line: the 2013 Falcons were plagued by injuries, a cruddy defense, and a quarterback that hit his all-time low. There’s no guaranteeing the defense will improve much in 2014, but the injuries shouldn’t be as plentiful and Matt Ryan should be better.