The Sports Xchange

FLOWERY BRANCH, Ga. — Atlanta Falcons president Rich McKay is set to meet with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell and other league officials about being reinstated to the league’s powerful competition committee, owner Arthur Blank said on Sunday.

McKay was suspended from the NFL competition committee as part of the team’s penalty for pumping fake noise into the Georgia Dome during the 2013 and 2014 seasons.

He was suspended effective April 1 and was eligible to apply for reinstatement after June 30.

“We’ve had some discussions with the league,” Blank said on Sunday. “Rich is scheduled to go up there in a few weeks and meet with the commissioner and others. Rich certainly has my support. He was a very valued member of the committee for 22 years and was mentioned last night by Bill Polian, who was an inductee into the Hall of Fame, as somebody who was important that he worked with for a number of years.”

The Falcons expect that he will be reinstated.

“I’m very optimistic that something will be worked out with Rich,” Blank said.

The NFL fined the Falcons $350,000 and took away its fifth-round pick in the 2016 draft as part of the punishment.

“We’ve dealt with an unfortunate set of circumstances,” Blank said. “One of which we probably could have avoided. Hence the penalty and hence we didn’t appeal it.”

NFL rules state that “at no point during the game can artificial crowd noise or amplified crowd noise be played in the stadium.”

McKay, an attorney, had been a longstanding member of the committee since 1998 and served as the chairman.

The NFL concluded McKay was unaware of the artificial crowd noise but bore “some responsibility for ensuring that team employees comply with league rules.”

A league investigation found that Roddy White, the former director of event marketing was directly responsible for the noise. The NFL said White would have been suspended for eight games without pay had he still been a member of the Falcons.

–Falcons coach Dan Quinn is a big boxing fan, but he is not big on fights in practice.

On Day 11 of training camp, there was one minor skirmish. Defensive end Malliciah Goodman got tangled up with some offensive linemen and center/guard Mike Person was seen running from the pile.

“If you’re even in the area when a fight goes down, you’re subject to a fine,” Quinn said. “If you throw a punch, you’re ejected.”

Quinn wants the players, even as they battle through a rough training camp in the summer heat, to show some poise.

“There are going to be times when you’re furious at a guy, but part of having that poise is knowing that I have another play to go,” Quinn said. “Do the tempers get out of control? Do we get sideways sometimes, when we are competing so hard, yeah. But it really comes back to that poise.”

–Offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan is trying to implement a new offensive scheme in his first season with the Falcons.

“It’s always a work in progress,” Shanahan said. “You throw a lot at them. You do it in OTAs. You do it again in training camp.

“It’s a lot easier in training camp than it was in OTAs because it’s not their first time hearing it. We are not where we want to be yet and you always want to keep getting better.”

–The offense suffered a setback when running backs Devonta Freeman and Tevin Coleman went down with hamstring injuries last Wednesday and Thursday. Both are expected to miss two-to-four weeks.

The Falcons will have Antone Smith, Terron Ward, Jerome Smith and Michael Ford at running back against the Titans.

Shanahan’s mission to improve the running game and balance out the offense took a major hit with those injuries.

“Obviously, you’d like to have all of your guys up,” quarterback Matt Ryan said. “When a guy goes down, you have to adjust. You want them on the practice field, but it is part of the deal. Sometimes you get nicked up. You have to adjust and adapt.”

Running backs coach Bobby Turner plans to develop all of the backs.

“They are still competing,” Turner said. “I want to get them all to a level where there is not a major, major separation. But Freeman has really been playing hard and outstanding.”

Turner was elated to see Antone Smith perform well at the team’s Friday Night Lights practice.

“He’s very important to the whole team,” Turner said. “He can contribute and help us on offense and that’s what we are trying to do.”