By: TJ Hartnett

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

Recently I wrote an article about the Falcons draft, suggesting that with their first-round pick of talented wide receiver Calvin Ridley, the rich got richer.

The rich being the offense in this scenario. Flash forward a few days and for one key member of that offense, it became literally true as Matt Ryan inked a five-year contract extension with Atlanta that includes a whopping $100 million guaranteed.

I’ll save you the research and tell you that this is the richest NFL contract in history and that Ryan will be the first quarterback to earn $30 million annually.

Matty Ice won’t be complaining, but neither should anyone else. Ten years into his career, Ryan has shown that he is the right guy to lead this Falcons team and the best chance they have of securing a Super Bowl win anytime soon.

Is he worth all that money?

Yes, it’s a lot of money and there are always going to be some concerns with a contract as huge as this one but here the benefits outweigh the literal costs.

There is, of course, some concern that devoting so much money to one player will handicap a team’s ability to spend on other areas of need in the future.

Let’s dig at that a little. Cap space is a much more complicated situation that simply looking at what the players on your team are being paid in any given year.

Teams move money around all the time, paying big bucks up front or deferring payments until later and cuts are being made constantly. Plus, that cap never remains the same – it rises. One big contract for a player like Ryan is not going to debilitate the Falcons’ spending ability. The process is too fluid to allow for that.

Besides, paying Ryan his market value is better than any alternative. Picture the Falcons resetting at QB with a draft pick; while maintaining the talented receiving core that they already have in place.

How many wins have they sacrificed because they didn’t want to pay up for established QB?

Building off of that, how would the Falcons even begin pitching an extension to the likes of Julio Jones if he’s faced with catching passes from an unproven rookie instead of recent MVP Matt Ryan? How much more difficult would it be to sign free agents?

Let’s also not overlook what Ryan has done for this franchise. He was drafted 10 years ago when the Falcons needed a PR win after Michael Vick’s legal woes.

In fact, you might argue that drafting this admittedly talented but pretty bland character out of Boston College was little more than just that; a PR move. But he took the reins of a team in turmoil and led the charge into relevancy.

The Falcons made the playoffs with him as a rookie QB and while they didn’t make the postseason the following year, Ryan led them to a 9-7 record which was the first time in franchise history that the Falcons posted back-to-back winning seasons. Then he led them to three more.

Think about that. Consider how important this guy has been to a Falcons team that in 43 years had never strung together two winning seasons before Matt Ryan showed up and put up five in a row.

The Falcons are as legit a team as there is in the NFL and it is thanks in large part to the league’s new $30 million man.

We’re ten years into the Matt Ryan era in Atlanta, with at least six more on the horizon. Is he worth the money?

Without a doubt.