News / Sports
Bobby Petrino Leaves Louisville to Become Atlanta Falcons New Head Coach
Coming off a dream season in which he led the Louisville Cardinals to a 12-1 record and a 24-13 victory over Wake Forest in the Orange Bowl, Bobby Petrino accepted the Atlanta Falcons offer to become their new head coach.
After news of the five-year, $24 million offer was accepted Atlanta Falcons owner Arthur Blank issued a statement saying “"This is an exciting day for the Atlanta Falcons franchise, Bobby Petrino is an extremely talented football coach who has done some tremendously innovative things as both an offensive coordinator and head coach.”
Petrino’s ability to handle a high-powered offense should come in handy yin Atlanta. It will be up to Petrino to reinvent a Falcons team that missed the playoffs for the second consecutive year after collapsing after the midway point of each season.
Petrino, who finished his career at Louisville with a 41-9 record, had just completed his first year of a 10 year contract with the Cardinals. He is taking over for Jim Mora who was fired a day after the Falcons season ended.
Mora took the Falcons to the NFC Championship in 2004, his first season as head coach, but he failed to get Atlanta into the playoffs the following two seasons. His inability to create a game-plan that super star quarterback Michael Vick could feel comfortable in led to trouble. It seemed that each week brought a new identity to the Falcons offense and Vick never felt comfortable from one week to the next.
The Falcons finished the 2006 season last in the NFL in passing and 25th in scoring, numbers that are expected to change with the hiring of Petrino.
