re: Safe to say the Falcons still aren't very impressive

I definitely am. The Saints saw a huge surge after Brees arrived and you became competitive. Katrina was obviously a rallying point as well. But prior to these incidents, your fan support was pretty sad. The upsurge was reinforced in 2009.

Smith and the Falcons are basically in the same mode now. We had typical mediocre fan support which has now led to pretty high demand with more prolific players and better results. Getting over the hump in the playoffs, especially if that continues, will likely put us in a pretty similar place.