According to a report by Herb Zurkowsky the Montreal Gazette, the Falcons were impressed during a recent workout with CFL kicker Damon Duval. Duval reportedly worked out for the team yesterday along with two other CFL kickers: Sandro DeAngelis and Justin Medlock. Duval made all of his kicks during the Falcons workout and the team was impressed enough to offer him a contract. According to the report, Duval could sign with the team dependent on the signing bonus offered.

Zurkowsky reports that Duval in an option year with the Montreal Alouettes could earn as much as $150,000 in Canada. However, the NFL’s minimum salary for a player of Duval’s experience would earn at least $325,000 this season. It was first reported by the Vancouver Sun more than two weeks ago that the Falcons were interested in Duval.

As for the other two kickers, this is not Medlock’s first stint in the NFL. He was a fifth round draft choice of the Kansas City Chiefs in 2007, and played in 7 games that year with the Chiefs. He only made one of his two field goal attempts. He made 40 of 46 field goals while playing with the Toronto Argonauts this past year, his first in Canada. He also handled punting duties, averaging 42.3 yards on 120 punts. DeAngelis, a Canadian native, has spent the past five seasons kicking for the Calgary Stampeders, making 83.8% of his 218 total field goals.

The Falcons interest in these kickers indicates that the team may not be satisfied with their current kicking situation. Matt Bryant handled the duties for the team after Thanksgiving, but due to a later injury the team was forced to add Steven Hauschka to the roster. Both Bryant and Hauschka are signed through this upcoming season. It is rare for NFL teams to carry three kickers into training camp, although more common for two. If the Falcons were to sign Duval, presumably one of the kickers currently on the roster would be cut at some point this off-season.

Roddy White

The league announced today that Falcons receiver Roddy White has been added to the NFC’s Pro Bowl squad, as a replacement for Minnesota Vikings wide receiver Sidney Rice, who withdrew on Monday.

White led the Falcons with 85 receptions for 1,153 yards and 11 receiving touchdowns. It will be White’s second appearance in the Pro Bowl after making it for the first time last season.

No Falcons were selected to be part of this year’s Pro Bowl initially.

The AJC reports that the Falcons have hired a new secondary coach in Tim Lewis. Lewis will replace Emmitt Thomas, who was not retained from last year’s staff.

Lewis most recently served as defensive backs coach with the Seattle Seahawks. Prior to that, he spent two seasons with the Carolina Panthers in the same capacity. He was the New York Giants defensive coordinator for three years prior to that and defensive coordinator with the Pittsburgh Steelers before that. Lewis interviewed with the Falcons twice for their vacant head coaching position in 2004. He was the only other person besides Jim Mora, who eventually got the job, to do so.

Pro Football Talk reports that former Browns head athletic trainer Marty Lauzon will be soon joining the Atlanta Falcons.

Lauzon would likely be replacing Ron Medlin, who served for the past sixteen years in that role with the Falcons. Earlier this week, the AJC reported that the Falcons and Medlin were parting ways. Per that report, the reason for the split was “philosophical differences.”

Lauzon himself resigned from his position in Cleveland this past June, citing person and family reasons for his decision. Lauzon had been with the Browns since their return to the league in 1999, and had served as their head trainer since 2005.

The AJC reports that Falcons quarterback coach Bill Musgrave, who was garnering interest from other organizations to join their coaching staffs as offensive coordinator including the Houston Texans and the University of Virginia, will be returning to the Falcons for another season.

ESPN.com reports that former Kansas City Chiefs defensive coordinator Clancy Pendergast might land in Atlanta as a replacement for assistant head coach Emmitt Thomas, who didn’t have his contract renewed with the team.

Pendergast spent one season with the Chiefs after spending five seasons as the Arizona Cardinals defensive coordinator.  This past season the Chiefs defense finished 29th and 30th in scoring and total defense, respectively. Pendergast also worked with the Chief secondary, which finished 22nd in pass defense this year.

Thomas had spent the past eight seasons with the Falcons, mainly in charge of the teams defensive backs during his tenure. But he also served as the team’s interim head coach for the final three games of the 2007 season after the departure of Bobby Petrino. Thomas was inducted to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2008.

Randy Covitz of the Kansas City Star blogs that the Chiefs should hire Thomas to replace Pendergast, making the potential for a swap of assistants between the two teams.

The Vancouver Sun reports that the Falcons will work out Montreal Alouettes kicker Damon Duval next week.

The Falcons were plagued with inconsistency at the kicker position throughout the 2009 season, and signed Matt Bryant and Steven Hauschka over the course of the season. Duval helped win the Grey Cup for the Alouettes this past November by hitting a game-winning 33-yard field goal. Duval made 55 of 63 field goals during this past season and also punted 109 for an average of 44.8 yards. Duval has been a member of the Alouettes since 2005.

If the Falcons choose to sign Duval, it won’t be the first time he played for the team. Duval was a member of the team for most of the 2004 off-season. He was cut by the Falcons at the end of training camp in August 2004. Duval played at Auburn and was an undrafted free agent with the Jacksonville Jaguars in 2003.

The Houston Chronicle reports that due to the expected departure of current offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan, the Houston Texans are in the process of looking for a replacement and a potential candidate could be Falcons quarterback coach Bill Musgrave.

Shanahan is expected to join his father, Mike’s staff upon his official hiring by the Washington Redskins at some point in the near future.

Musgrave is a candidate that makes a lot of sense for the Texans. He played two seasons with the Broncos (1995-96) when current Texans head coach Gary Kubiak was the offensive coordinator. He also coached current Texans quarterback Matt Schaub his first two seasons at the University of Virginia, working as the Cavaliers’ offensive coordinator. He would coach Schaub for a season as a pro, when he was first hired by the Falcons as quarterbacks coach in 2006. Schaub was traded to the Texans in March 2007 and came highly recommended by Musgrave.

Musgrave has spent the past four seasons as the Falcons quarterback coach, working closely with Matt Ryan for the past two seasons. He has previous experience working as an offensive coordinator, last serving in that role with the Jacksonville Jaguars for two seasons (2003-04) before arriving in Atlanta. He also was a coordinator for the Carolina Panthers (2000) and Philadelphia Eagles (1998).

We’re launching FalcFans Draft Central today now that the season is over. For much of the past few years this site’s off-season coverage has been filled with draft coverage. And we figured this year that it was time to give the draft more focused coverage, something that we needed a separate site to do so.

The past two years we’ve published draft guides for the site as well. But instead of having huge PDF files for folks to download, this year we’re deciding to post all the information that the draft guide will contain on our new Draft Central site. We think the information will be much easier to obtain and organize that way.

Player profiles, mocks, and more will be posted on the site. Also all future updates of the Mock Muncher will be posted on that site as well.

As draft news rolls in, be sure to check back frequently for Falcons draft-related updates.

At the beginning of September, I added two posts to the site that dealt with predictions in terms of league standings and playoff teams, as well as predictions that were Falcons-centric. Predictions are fun to do and it’s fun to look back and see where you went wrong. First, the Falcons predictions.

I predicted a 9-7 record for the Falcons, and was only wrong on 4 games in my predictions. I flipped the Panthers games, having us win in Week 10 instead of Week 2. It was the other way around. I predicted a loss to the Bears in Week 6 and a win over the Saints in Week 8 as well.

The Falcons offense was a major disappointment from my predictions. I predicted them to finish 4th in both scoring and total offense. They wound up 13th and 15th respectively. But the defense was about on par with my expectations. I predicted 15th and 26th respectively in scoring and total defense, and they finished 14th and 22nd. They were slightly better.

My statistic predictions weren’t on, but many weren’t too far off. Matt Ryan finished about 600 yards short of his passing yards benchmark, averaging 208 yards per game instead of the 220 I predicted. Turner averaged about 87 yards per game in the 10 games he played the majority of, while I predicted him to average about 82 yards per game to reach 1317 rushing yards. Roddy White finished about 100 yards short of the 1200+ receiving yards I predicted. Turner had 10 touchdowns instead of the 12 I predicted. Curtis Lofton had 130 tackles instead of the 118 I predicted. John Abraham had half as many sacks (5.5 vs. 11) as I predicted. Erik Coleman had 0 interceptions and did not lead the team with 3. But the guy that was the free safety, Thomas DeCoud did have 3. But Brent Grimes led the team with 6 picks.

The Falcons had no Pro Bowlers, instead of the 4 I predicted (Ryan, Turner, White, and Gonzo). I had Gonzo catched 71 passes for 838 yards and 8 touchdowns. He wound up 83 catches for 867 yards and 6 touchdowns. Not too far off. Mike Peterson I predicted to finish 2nd on the team with 88 tackles. He did finish 2nd but with 109 tackles. I predicted 29 sacks allowed for our offensive line, with 4 coming on Chris Redman. It was actually 27 actually with 8 coming on Redman. I predicted Jerious Norwood to have 147 total touches in terms of carries and catches, he wound up with only 95, which was less than the number of carries I expected. I did expect Jonathan Babineaux to be among the lead leaders in tackles for loss, predicting 9 and he finished with 8.5. But he had nearly twice as many sacks (6) as I predicted (3.5). Jamaal Anderson was underwhelming. I predicted 8 starts and 2.5 sacks for him. He had 13 starts and 0.5 sacks. Kroy Biermann I thought would have half as many sacks as he wound up with (5.0), and Chauncey Davis only had 1 sack instead of the 3 I predicted.

My rookie predictions were pretty off. Jerry and Moore weren’t the factors I expected due to injuries. Owens I predicted to hae 20 tackles and a pick. He had 26 and 2 picks, and got more playing time than I expected down the stretch. Reynolds, Adkins, and Walker weren’t that far off. Although Walker got more playing time than I expected, although I was right in that it was prompted by injuries.

Now on the to the league-wide predictions:

In the AFC, Cincinnati was the only playoff team I didn’t predict, making it instead of Pittsburgh.

I missed on Philadelphia and New Orleans in the NFC, predicting Chicago and Carolina to go instead.

I predicted the right order of finish in both the AFC and NFC East. I nailed the Browns, Jaguars, Falcons, Cardinals records exactly. And was within 1 win of 5 other teams. And was within 2 wins of 11 other teams. I was most off with the Bears, who won 6 less games than I predicted of 13. The Patriots were next off, by winning 4 less games than I predicted. The Bengals, Colts, and Saints all won 4 more games than I predicted.

Of course I had the Steelers and Bears meeting in the Super Bowl, and neither team made the playoffs.

My league MVP was Brady, and it appears most likely to be Peyton Manning or Drew Brees who will win the award. I said DeMarcus Ware would win Defensive MVP, but it seems that either Charles Woodson or Darrelle Revis will win that.

I picked Sanchez and Raji for my rookies of the year. I almost picked Cushing, but decided not to. But it looks like Cushing and Percy Harvin will be the rookies of the year.

Tomlin was my coach of the year pick, but I’m thinking this will go to Jim Caldwell, Sean Payton, or Norv Turner.

Wow, I was way off on a lot of these predictions.