How Atlanta Falcons can expose Pittsburgh Steelers' offense in Arthur Smith's return

After Thursday Night Football going down to the wire at Arrowhead, Week 1 is officially underway! The 2024 NFL season starts at home for your Atlanta Falcons, as they host the Pittsburgh Steelers out of the AFC North. Not only do the Steelers never finish below .500 under Mike Tomlin, but they are also the new employer of Falcons fans' most reviled former head coach ever in one Arthur Smith.

I had a lot of questions that needed to be answered when it came to the Steelers ahead of this highly-anticipated matchup, so I called up my FanSided colleague Tommy Jaggi of Still Curtain to help me break down this marquee Week 1 game a bit. Tommy knows everything under the sun when it comes to this AFC North franchise. We had a great conversation for about 45 minutes, interrupted by a dog!

Besides the joy of getting to reconnect with another guy who loves ball, I think the biggest takeaway I had during our conversation on the latest episode of The Blogging Dirty Podcast is that we kind of view our respective teams to be in the same cluster of teams across the league. We are not covering Super Bowl teams, but certainly ones occupying the upper middle, ones that could make the playoffs.

Let's start by gauging the temperature of the room with both teams heading into the Week 1 game.

How Atlanta Falcons and Pittsburgh Steelers fans feel entering this game

While I will get back to how I feel about the Falcons heading into this one, I will summarize the impression that I got from Tommy when it came to the Steelers. He really likes this team's defense, believing it to be the driving force of this team's success going into this season. While it may not be a huge surprise, the upgrades the Steelers made on offense should help this team contend in-division.

Tommy seems to be approaching this game with cautious optimism, feeling it could go either way. Atlanta may have the edge, only because it is at home for the Falcons. I would have felt the same way if this one was in Pittsburgh. Though he is bullish on their first four draft picks, it is kind of wait-and-see when it comes to seeing how the offense will coalesce with so many new pieces joining the team.

As far as how I feel about the Falcons entering this game, we can only hope that Atlanta's increased talent will prevail, especially on offense. I think Atlanta can get to a level offensively that Pittsburgh may not be able to. They are a better team on defense than Atlanta, although the Falcons did make some big upgrades on that side of the ball. It may come down to coaching, which may be a concern.

We seem to like our respective teams' upsides for this season, but this game should be a close one.

How Atlanta Falcons and Pittsburgh Steelers fans feel about their QBs

Quarterbacks were a big part of our conversation. Tommy and I seemed to recognize our teams are better at the most important position in football after what we dealt with last year. The combination of Russell Wilson and Justin Fields should be better than Kenny Pickett and Mason Rudolph, just like Kirk Cousins and Michael Penix Jr. should be way better than Desmond Ridder and Taylor Heinicke.

Based strictly off vibes, I could sense that Fields is the one Steelers fans would rather see under center than Wilson. They are both on one-year contracts, but the Steelers did trade away a conditional pick to the Chicago Bears for Fields. Wilson may be able to run Arthur Smith's offense with a bit more control, but he might also be washed. The intrigue surrounding Fields is very palpable.

Tommy didn't seem to be overly concerned about Cousins' health because he knows the dude can play. I'm in that boat as well. He was mostly interested in the Penix pick and how Falcons fans feel about him. We love the player, but he is a 24-year-old rookie who played six years of college football. Still, the intrigue is very bit there with him, especially after how confident Penix looked vs. Miami.

Both situations are massively improved over last year, but Atlanta has the higher ceiling of the two.

What to make of Arthur Smith's Atlanta homecoming in Week 1 meeting

As no surprise, Tommy was most interested in my thoughts and opinions of his team's new offensive coordinator, my former head coach Arthur Smith. I did my best to remove any bias I had about Smith and said it should be in Steelers fans' best interest to be cautiously optimistic about their big hiring. Anything will be better for Pittsburgh than whatever scheme Matt Canada was running previously.

I think Smith will be closer to the great offensive coordinator he was with the Tennessee Titans than the mediocre head coach he was for the Falcons. The Steelers should be able to run the ball with conviction and play complementary football with their great defense backing them up. The offensive line will improve, but they don't have the weapons they need at wide receiver to really put up points.

Not to say the Steelers can only win one way, but they will probably resemble some of the better Mike Vrabel Titans teams with Smith as their offensive coordinator. I know Dirty Bird Nation and the local media are probably not the least bit thrilled to see him back in Atlanta, but that is just the way the cookie crumbles sometimes. Atlanta doesn't always hold up its own in revenge games such as these.

No, I don't think it will be a debacle like Dan Quinn's first game vs. Atlanta when he was with Dallas.

How Atlanta Falcons can expose Pittsburgh Steelers' offense on Sunday

This was the one thing that Tommy said that really caught my attention. Even though pass rush and defensive line dominance have never really been the Falcons' thing this century, Tommy is not in love with the Steelers' offensive line. It is a far less experienced group than what the Falcons have. He said there are guys like Broderick Jones playing out of position, as well as few rookies. It may be an issue.

While I will have absolutely no faith in the Falcons building and sustaining a sufficient pass rush until it happens, a new set of eyes defensively in coordinator Jimmy Lake, plus a few new pieces to the front-seven, could tip the scales in Atlanta's favor. Run defense will have to be paramount. If the secondary is as good as we think it is, this is a great game for the Falcons to show what they're worth.

Crowd noise isn't going to help, as I fully expect for the massive Steelers fanbase to have quite a presence at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Sunday afternoon. The good news is this is Kirk Cousins' favorite window to play in. We can only hope that the team and the new coaching staff are ready to play. The first five games of the season will be difficult, so you need to get a early win while you can.

Whoever plays more consistently in the trenches is going to win this game, probably quite decidedly.