Petrino Slithers Out of Atlanta

It's been a rough couple days for the Atlanta Falcons. Former quarterback Michael Vick was sentenced to nearly two years in jail Monday, which was followed by a classic beat-down at the hands of the New Orleans Saints on national television that very night. And on the following day, their head coach quit on them.

It just doesn't get a whole lot worse for a franchise than that.

If you haven't heard by now, the Falcons suffered the first coaching loss of the season when freshman head coach Bobby Petrino resigned after being offered a job by the University of Arkansas. Petrino succeeds Houston Nutt, who left Arkansas two weeks ago to become the head coach at Mississippi.

And the situation seems to have left a bad taste in the mouth of owner Artur Blank, who Wednesday told the media the organization felt "betrayed and let down" by the way this situation unfolded with Petrino. He also indicated that at no time was he contacted by the University to seek permission to talk to his head coach.

In a way, you can't blame Petrino for wanting to leave. The quarterback he was brought in to mentor is probably gone for good... from the Falcons anyway, if not the entire NFL. The team appears to be in shambles and his own players appeared to be turning on him. And it didn't appear as if things were going to get better in the near future.

The way Petrino made his exit from Atlanta, however, doesn't reflect favorably on him as a professional. According to FOXSports Jay Glazer, Petrino didn't address his team at all regarding his departure and that he spent all of 10 seconds telling his assistants he was moving on. Keep in mind these are coaches whose lives were uprooted, along with their families, to come to Atlanta at Petrino's request.

And just 13 games into his initial campaign, they were abandoned by the guy that brought them in.