FLOWERY BRANCH, Ga. — Matt Ryan was long drawn to a calling, one that still beckons ever so gently.Or maybe, a decade since his MVP season as the Atlanta Falcons quarterback and a week removed from downhill mountain biking with his three boys in Jackson Hole, Wyo., such a beckoning wasn’t gentle at all. Essentially out of necessity, the Falcons’ 41-year-old president of football was ripping passes Thursday during a handful of individual periods in the team’s second practice of training camp.Quarterbacks Tua Tagovailoa and Michael Penix Jr. were unavailable to practice, so Ryan jumped out of the proverbial phonebooth and lent a hand. And a back.“My back was killing me when I came back last week,” Ryan said with a mix of levity and humility from his new office overlooking the Falcons’ practice field. “I’m thinking I’m like 20 years old, and I’m good to go down this (mountain).“So we might need a little help throwing just in some of these individual drills. I’m like, ‘My back’s killing me, guys!’ In a normal space where my back wasn’t bothering me, I’d say, yeah, it’s nice to scratch that itch a little bit and go out there and throw. But the last couple days, I’ve been grinning (through the pain).”Matt Ryan steps in at QB during Falcons training campJeff HoweRyan’s evolved calling, the one in his actual job description, has been a bit more appropriate for this chapter of his life. Falcons owner Arthur Blank redesigned the organization’s leadership structure following the 2025 season, its eighth in a row out of the playoffs, and hired Ryan on Jan. 10 to take charge of the football operations, while collaborating with Greg Beadles, who succeeded Rich McKay as the president and CEO on the business side. After a consulting firm determined the Falcons’ vision was too misaligned, Blank opted to make a necessary change and bring in Ryan.Ryan was instrumental in the Jan. 17 hiring of coach Kevin Stefanski and the Jan. 29 appointment of general manager Ian Cunningham. Stefanski, a two-time NFL Coach of the Year with the Cleveland Browns, was widely viewed as one of the best offseason candidates. Cunningham, the Chicago Bears assistant general manager since 2022, had been considered one of the top GM candidates in the league for a couple of years.Despite Ryan’s absence of experience in an executive role, the Falcons had an impressive hiring cycle and are poised to enter a new era, with Ryan once again leading the way.And to think, this was never part of the plan.‘I know how you’re wired’Ryan, the No. 3 pick in the 2008 draft, spent 14 of his 15 NFL seasons with the Falcons, and ranks ninth all-time in passing yards, 10th in touchdowns and seventh in both completions and attempts. He spent his final season with the Indianapolis Colts in 2022 and had been working as a CBS studio analyst in his retirement before Blank stoked a fire within Ryan that he didn’t know he had.Ryan and his family still live in the Atlanta area, and they’ve remained close with Blank and the organization. So when Blank call on Ryan, the owner strung a unique chord.“I didn’t have grand aspirations after finishing up playing of kind of getting into this,” Ryan said. “But that’s how life works. You don’t know what’s in front of you.”Ryan loved his job in TV and imagined he’d be over the moon to do it for another decade. He also enjoyed a friendly work-life balance with set studio hours, and he knew that would be the biggest sacrifice if he returned to competition.Ryan leaned on a handful of people for advice, including San Francisco 49ers GM John Lynch and Jacksonville Jaguars executive VP of football operations Tony Boselli. Ryan wanted to know how the former players transitioned into the front office. Ryan also soaked up knowledge from CBS teammate Bill Cowher, the longtime Pittsburgh Steelers coach, to get a feel for constructing a roster and how to lead a successful building.The more thought Ryan gave it, the more he felt compelled to seize a potentially once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. His wife, Sarah, also recognized Ryan needed to see it through.“The thing that just kept coming up in my head was like, ‘I think you’re going to regret this if you don’t go for it,’” Ryan recalled. “(Sarah) kind of felt the same way. She’s like, ‘I know you. I know how you’re wired, and I know being involved in this type of way is something, at the end of the day, if you don’t go for it, you might live with regret over that.’ That was the thing that really pushed it over the edge.”With Ryan on board and 10 teams searching for head coaches, the Falcons operated more swiftly on Stefanski. It was tabbed as the second-best hire of the cycle, according to The Athletic’s poll of executives and coaches around the league.Stefanski was the first Browns coach since Marty Schottenheimer in the 1980s to guide the team to the playoffs more than once. Though they lost more than they won in his other four seasons, the Browns’ most glaring issues stemmed from roster construction and salary cap management with quarterback Deshaun Watson. With a cleaner slate and potentially Stefanski’s most offensively gifted roster, there’s reason to be optimistic about his potential in Atlanta.Plus, as the Falcons will face their share of adversity, Ryan was drawn to Stefanski’s experience in navigating such murky waters.“There’s so much that’s learned through the ups and the downs, so I really view that as a strength of Kevin’s that he’s been through it,” Ryan said. “And he’s been through all of it.”Stefanski, 44, and Ryan both grew up in the Philadelphia area, and Stefanski’s younger brother competed against Ryan in basketball and ran in similar football circles. While Stefanski and Ryan weren’t close before joining forces with the Falcons, they were at least familiar enough with one another.Ryan’s presence strengthened the attractiveness of the job, Stefanski said. In prior hiring cycles, candidates privately expressed concern over the Falcons’ ambiguous vision and reporting structure, so Blank’s realignment piqued Stefanski’s interest.“I was extremely comfortable with the setup here, and obviously, Matt stepping into his new role was a huge part of this for me, understanding who he is, understanding what he’s about as a person,” Stefanski said. “He’s the type of person you want to partner with.”Ryan also had a close connection to Cunningham. Bears general manager Ryan Poles was Ryan’s college teammate and the best man in his wedding, so Poles’ pair of confidants have hit it off wonderfully.“I’ve always thought if your personal values align, you tend to see football the same way,” Cunningham said. “Now coming here, it makes complete sense why (Poles) and I connected. Because Matt’s values and similarities in terms of how he views football and how he treats people and what it’s about, it’s all the same. I feel like we’re just aligned across the board.”Cunningham’s front office roots came with the Philadelphia Eagles and Baltimore Ravens, two of the league’s premier executive branches, and he distinguished his reputation through the Bears’ rebuild. Cunningham, also 41, will carry the same team-building values to the Falcons.Inside a dysfunctional start for the Falcons at training campJosh Kendall‘That is gold, man’Ryan has maintained a core value since his playing days: TSVR. He used to blast it on the whiteboard, and it stands for “time spent, value received.”AKA: Work smarter, not harder.Ryan, like any quarterback, needed to outwork opposing defenses to find his edge as a player, so it might feel natural to cede daylight to the outside world while immersing himself in an endless amount of self-orchestrated assignments.It’s his first year on the job, after all. There’s no blueprint, no precedent.And with a first-time GM and a coach out to prove himself all over again, there’s no shortage of motivation in the building. It’s just important to harness that energy.“Let’s make sure we’re spending time on the things that are going to reap the most value, that we’re going to actually get bang for our buck,” Ryan said. “I didn’t know in February or March or April or May where I could provide value, so there is a lot of getting out over your skis in terms of spending time.“This first year is a lot of figuring out what the rhythm is for us. And I think I’ll be better with that balance. I’m hoping I’m better with that balance in a year. But I think like anybody taking on a new job, that there’s a lot of figuring out where the most value is.”Cunningham, with his scouting background, has loved watching film with Ryan. Cunningham will tell Ryan what matters from an evaluator’s perspective, while Ryan will convey what’s most important for a quarterback and everyone else on the field. The combination of intel has unlocked a new level of analysis for Cunningham.Ryan has also described how specific off-field attributes matter in locker rooms. He can also share insight about a player’s emotional intelligence, or what drove a teammate to greatness or why specific issues might have derailed teams.“That is gold, man,” Cunningham beamed.Stefanski has been the steadying presence. Ryan appreciated the way Stefanski meticulously crafted his coaching staff to complement one another, along with the way he mapped out the offseason program to maximize the runway to establish chemistry. Stefanski has also displayed a clear way of defining the types of players to acquire who will fit the vision of the team.On a macro scale, Ryan essentially establishes the guardrails within the football operation. It’s his responsibility to ensure everyone is working toward the collective goal, while Cunningham handles the day-to-day roster decisions, acquisitions and contract negotiations.With that, Cunningham and Stefanski grew close this offseason while living across the hall from each other in the team dorm. They were truly with each other around the clock, and that hasn’t exactly changed with Ryan, Cunningham and Stefanski all having their offices in the same corridor.Stefanski, who has worked to immerse himself with the Falcons’ history and alumni, has no better resource than Ryan.“There’s not much Matt doesn’t know about Atlanta or the Atlanta Falcons,” Stefanski said. “I enjoy rolling up your sleeves and going to work with people who like to work, and that’s Ian; that’s Matt. We’re all similar enough in how we view building a football team and those type of things. And we also challenged each other.”Like, when the quarterbacks need a little time off to recover, Cunningham and Stefanski might know a guy. And if that guy’s back hurts in the maddeningly frustrating way a 41-year-old’s back happens to hurt, maybe his friends find the words of encouragement to convince him to loosen the right wing.“He’s still got a little bit of juice,” Cunningham said as his face lit up. “How cool was that, man? Like, you get to come back, former MVP, spent majority (of his career here), and then now help lead this organization, and then be able to get back out there and get your juices going and throw around with some of the guys. It’s pretty cool to see him actually take it seriously.“But he’s getting a little old. I don’t think he’s Philip Rivers.”Ryan is back in the league — and with the Falcons — in another way. He has loved the new chance to compete at the highest level for an organization that has meant so much to his family.And if the chance to spin a few dozen passes happens to arise every now and again, even better.