Way back in the summer of 2012, a tiny lifetime and a significant amount of hair loss ago for me in particular, The Falcoholic asked fans who the year’s breakout player would be. It was more or less unanimous at the time that it would be one Julio Jones, then a second-year wide receiver on a loaded offense.
I wrote at the time that “Jones is the one player on the Falcons today with a limitless ceiling,” something that was obvious to just about everybody. Jones was coming off a 54 grab, 959 yard rookie season with eight touchdowns, and he made the leap into superstardom in 2012 for a great Falcons team, reeling in 79 catches for 1,198 yards and 10 scores, an improvement of 25 receptions, over 200 yards and two touchdowns.