Suddenly, Atlanta Falcons Quarterback Marcus Mariota Looks Underpaid

Take it from Forbes. At the top of the financial spectrum for NFL quarterbacks, you have Tom Brady of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers with his total earnings of $75 million, and near the bottom, you have Marcus Mariota of the Atlanta Falcons.

Here comes Mariota’s numbers, but close your eyes if your squeamish: The Falcons gave the guy a two-year deal before this season worth $18.75 million, which is chump change for Brady, along with Matthew Stafford ($61.5 million), Aaron Rodgers ($53 million), Patrick Mahomes ($51.5 million) and Josh Allen ($51 million), the other quarterbacks in Forbes’ top five.

Then again, Mariota was just glad somebody desired his frequently questionable right arm yet always dependable legs. He signed with the Falcons before this season to became a starter in the NFL for the first time in three years. He was a Raiders backup during the previous two seasons, and before, that he spent five years as a starter for the Tennessee Titans, but that was only technically.

Due to either injuries or a benching, Mariota never finished any of his seasons with the Titans as their starter.

Now, with Mariota pushing the Falcons (4-4) to the top of the NFC South this late into a season for the first time since 2016, when they went to the Super Bowl . . .

Give that man a raise.

“Yeah, well. The guy has been through a lot, right?” Falcons coach Arthur Smith said Sunday afternoon in Atlanta at Mercedes-Benz Stadium, where he reflected on his team winning one of the most outrageous games in NFL history after Mariota did enough to help the Falcons survive the Carolina Panthers and themselves for a 37-34 victory in overtime.

If you combine the fourth quarter with that overtime, the two teams scored six times, and you also had all of that other craziness.

“I’ve got to be better. I’ve got to be cleaner. I wasn’t executing. I could have taken a bad sack, or I could have thrown the ball away,” Mariota said after he contributed to some of that craziness when his interception in overtime should have led to a go-ahead field goal for the Panthers, but it didn’t.

Most infamously, there was Panthers wide receiver DJ Moore (ahem) winning the game with seconds left in regulation play after he caught a 62-yard pass in the end zone from PJ Walker, but then Moore yanked off his helmet, which is a penalty.

Which caused the Panthers to need to break a 34-34 tie in those final seconds with essentially a field goal instead of an extra point, which Eddy Pineiro missed, which sent the game into overtime, where Pineiro botched a real field goal after the Panthers got the ball from Mariota’s interception moments earlier.

Instead, moments later, Mariota showed off his legs with a 3-yard run to set up Younghoe Koo’s game-winning kick for the Falcons from 41 yards.

This was Mariota’s victory, though, and Smith kept rattling off reasons his quarterback has become so special these days: “You win the Heisman (trophy). You’re the No. 2 pick (overall by the Titans in the first round of the 2015 NFL draft). You sort of go through a million staff changes at Tennessee, and then going through a contract year (of 2019) gets benched. Can’t say enough how he handled that situation.

“You come back, and he goes out to Vegas (with the Raiders) and sits and watches. Didn’t think he would ever get another opportunity.”

Then Mariota did, and it was because of Smith, in the midst of his second year as the Falcons’ head coach after he served as the Titans’ offensive coordinator during the time of Mariota’s benching. Smith triggered a slew of changes with the Falcons. When they traded future Pro Football Hall of Famer Matt Ryan to the Indianapolis Colts before this season for a third-round draft pick, Smith needed somebody to help his team in its transition from now through wherever.

Enter Mariota, who was sought by Smith to manage the Falcons’ offense in the meantime, and if you’re into the modern NFL, that meant Smith wanted old-school ugly as in run, run and run some more. During each of the two games before the Panthers came to town, Mariota threw 13 times in a 35-17 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals and 14 times in a 28-14 victory over the San Francisco 49ers.

That’s not the stuff of Brady or the others.

So, it was a shock to the system among those in the Falcons Nation when Mariota heaved a bomb downfield on the second play of the game from his 25-yard line to the deepest parts of Panthers territory.

It was interception.

Between that turnover and Koo’s game-winning kick, there was a whole bunch of weird things from both teams, but there mostly was good from Mariota. With help from Smith’s playcalling, Mariota re-discovered the forward pass. He completed 20 of his 28 throws for 253 yards and three touchdowns. He also showed his feet remained swift with 43 yards on six carries.

None of those runs included the couple of times Mariota scrambled out of sacks for clutch third-down completions. He also turned 29, which made this some birthday gift: Converting a victory into a loss and then into a victory again.

You know, somehow.