July 17, 2025 • 32 mins
ESPN National NFL Analyst Ben Solak joins Will McFadden to get deep in the weeds on Atlanta Falcons football. They cover everything from what throws Michael Penix Jr. needs to add to his arsenal this year to how the defense might look in Jeff Ulbrich's first year back to even adding more downfield laterals to the playbook. If you love football, then this episode is for you!
0:00 - Intro & Kirk Cousins
4:47 - Michael Penix Jr.'s next steps
11:45 - Bijan Robinson among NFL's best
17:35 - New look Falcons defense
22:20 - Jalon Walker & James Pearce Jr.
26:21 - 2025 Season outlook
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Dirty Birds.
Speaker 2 (00:00):
What's up?
Speaker 1 (00:01):
And welcome back to the Atlanta Falcons podcast Network. I'm
your host, Will McFadden. I am joined today by ESPN's
national NFL analyst Ben Solak. Ben, thank you so much
for taking the time to join me.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Yeah, of course, man, thank you.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
So you are kind of doing I guess the rounds
this offseason, collecting a lot of information and you happen
to be here in Atlanta on the day that a
story publishes on ESPN talking about potential Kirk Cousin trades
and you had an offer in there. I've got it
right here in front of me. The Falcons would get
a twenty twenty six sixth round draft pick, which would
(00:34):
potentially become a fifth rounder with considerations, and they would
the Steelers would be involved in this trade. So Aaron
Rodgers not going to Pittsburgh in your scenario, Yeah, they
would get Cousins and cash considerations. So kind of what
is your take on the Falcon situation and do you
still believe that kind of the best interest is for
(00:56):
a deal to get worked out.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
Yeah, I think you're an expected deal to get worked out.
It very much seems like wants to be somewhere else
wants to have a starting opportunity and kind of finish
his career in that way. If you're the Falcons, you
have this rookie quarterback in PANICX, you think he's going
to be your future, so you want to have that
cap flexibility. Biggest building advantage you can have for a
team over the last ten fifteen years is having the
rookie contract quarterback. He's so cheap and you're able to
pour money elsewhere in order to get there. You have
(01:18):
to get the Kirk contract off of your books, right,
It's got to be what comes next, and so I
would so expect there to be a move. But whenever
we have quarterbacks that are stuck on rosters in June July,
you're kind of always expecting another domino to fall and
then to dictate where that quarterback goes. I remember when
the Eagles had Sam Bradford and he was just kind
of sitting on the team. This is like the Chip
Kelly era, like we don't know what we're gonna do
with this guy. And then the Viking's Teddy Bridgewater gets
(01:40):
injured in camp, We're trading Sam Bradford. You kind of
have to wait for something else to give somewhere to
open up that opportunity. So will it be Aaron Rodgers
not signing with the Steelers in Pittsburgh? Will it be
Brown's camp? And the whole quarterback carousel is a total mess,
and they clearly need somebody. Right, you have to wait
for something to occur, So it's probably gonna be a
waiting game. You don't need to hold your breath. It'll
happen when it happened. But I think they're going to
(02:01):
get Kirk done. It's just going to depend on what
happens with some other franchises to figure out who exactly
the partner is and what does the actor that trade
looks like.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
You know, you're so right, And it's funny. We talked
about that exact same thing kind of playing out with
Albert Breer at the combine.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
It just okay.
Speaker 1 (02:14):
So let's say it doesn't happen before the draft, then
you planned a training camp and maybe you're waiting for
the leverage to kind of swing back in a different directions.
Somebody gets hurt, somebody under performing, what have you. But
if and his point was that that does come with
some risk, because let's say that other domino doesn't fall
and you do go into the season, and as the
(02:35):
Falcons have said, Kirk Cousins is your backup. So let's
assume that that does happen at this point and kind
of everything rolls out as it is currently. Do you
see any potential positives to that scenario for Atlanta?
Speaker 3 (02:49):
A lot of it depends on how Kirk would decide
to behave as the backup, right I think that your
expectation for Kirk to get into the building and be
a constructive member of the quarterback room right now is
pretty low, just because the way that he's communicated with
the team to this point. Something changed by September October
because he realizes there's not going to be another team.
You know, they hear through the league. Oh you know,
other acquiring teams are worried about the fact that you
haven't played, you haven't put on pads, you haven't practiced,
(03:10):
Like how rust are you going to be?
Speaker 2 (03:11):
So again other.
Speaker 3 (03:12):
Dominoes that might fall there can, of course, always be
a positive to having the young quarterback and then having
the mentor QB two. That's a nice construction given the
unique circumstances of how Penick joined the Falcons and how
Kirk lost the starting job. I really don't expect that
relationship to ever blossom here.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
But you don't know these.
Speaker 3 (03:30):
Things, right, I've not asked spoken to Kirk Cousins about
his feelings about the situation recently, Right, I'm just tea
leaves and secondhanding here. And so it can become positive.
I don't think you're holding your breath for that, but
it can.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
I think, you know, And there is a world where
Michael Pennick Junior has played three games, right, and he
gets out there like again, that growing that happens during
the course of your first full kind of seventeen game season,
I think is important. So having again another figure in
the room, and the Falcons have surrounded him with a
lot of former quarterback TJ. Yates, you know, DJ Williams,
(04:02):
Zach Robinson, Like he's got a great support system, but
being able to communicate it directly from a player perspective
is unique. Right, And then we look on the flip side,
Atlanta just drafted four defenders. If you have Kirk Cousins
out there and he's in practice going up against you know,
some of the younger guys, maybe that pays dividends too.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
Now, I do think that's a big part of it,
where your QB two and your scouting QB. If you
have that voice in the room. Yeah, he can help
some of those younger defensive players. It's a very very
good point, right, Like Jesse Bates and Kirk Cousins used
to talk all the time in Kirk's first year here,
right in terms of a film review and what are
you seeing?
Speaker 2 (04:35):
What are you doing?
Speaker 3 (04:35):
Kirk's got a lot of football knowledge. You'd love to
get that into the building if you can. I think
there's probably some bridges to be mended to get there,
but you hope to get there for sure.
Speaker 1 (04:43):
Yeah, I think about maybe that would like Xavier Watts, right,
kind of same thing, maybe a younger player. But let's
actually talk about Atlanta's starting quarterback moving forward. What was
your opinion of Michael Pennick Junior coming out of Washington
and then did you see anything in his three starts
that changed your opinion either.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
For or worse.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
Yeah, So out of Washington Panics was a very confident
throw of the football, willing to scent in the pocket,
grip in a repid who'll be aggressive thrown downfield, He'll
tack one on ones, He'll make reads, get to the backside,
He'll take a hit and still deliver an accurate football
like this is an NFL passer.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
The NFL arm is there. There's no question.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
The movement skills I think drained over the time from
Indiana to Washington because of some of the injuries. You
saw him mostly want to stay in the pocket at Washington.
So that's what you're expecting.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
Coming into the league.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
The first big box to check is will this confident
and aggressive passer wilt in the face of the NFL
defenses NFL speed or is he's still gonna be able
to play that way? And with panis it's like a
clear yes, right. I mean he's just ripping throws in
the red zone right the touchdown the pits against Washington
like that. These are these are high impact, high leverge.
So as he's giving Drake London and Kyle Pitts chance
to make big plays on the ball, those big bodied receivers,
(05:45):
that's that's maturity, that's NFL decision making. That's that's a
big deal. The concern out of Washington was some of
the accuracy, some of the spray, some of the big misses.
He's playing with three NFL wide receivers there right roma dunes,
say Jalen pol Chilen mcmill and that can that can
help a guy look a lot more accurate than he
might be because you have that sort of talent at
the college level. And I certainly think that you watch
that twenty four season, there's some great throws, there's some
(06:05):
big sprays, there's some big, big, big misses, and so
what you're hoping is he's.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Got some unique mechanics.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
Zach Robinson's gonna take a look at that TG, He's
gonn take a look that maybe we make some slight adjustments.
You don't want to mess with the guy too much,
so maybe we make some mechanical changes. Maybe he gets
a little bit more calm in the pocket in year two.
But you're hoping to minimize some of the big misses
simply because he's paying you off a lot of positive plays.
But then he's also he's leaving easy urs on the table.
He's leaving easy completions on the table because he's taking
(06:30):
those big downfield throws and he's got some of those
those difficult misses. So that's the developmental arc. We usually
say in quarterback development. That accuracy isn't something that improves
at this kind of preternatural. But we have a lot
of examples of the last five six years of either
players getting a lot better at it. You see Josh
Allen or coaching sas getting so good at figuring out
(06:51):
what a guy needs to see that they can color
it in the margins. Think about Sam Donald with the Vikings,
we're just you know, Sam's is who he is. Sam's
got has ward, Sam's got his issues, But the Vikings
found a way to build the whole ship out of
what Sam Donald can do well. And so there's there's
there's reasons for rosy projections on Penix because he has
the arm and he has the willingness. You can build
a good offense. You have a great, great catch rates
player in Drake London. You have the tools necessary to
(07:12):
build around him even as he's as he slowly figures
out some.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
Of the accuracy issues.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
I actually want to go back, so accuracy, what was
the belief that that's kind of preternatural natural and not
because I would assume that that is something that is
more technical that you could kind of work on a
refine and teach.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
Yeah, so accuracy is it sounds like it's one trait,
but it's really the conglomerate of a lot of things.
It's it's your your footwork and the throwing motion, your mechanics,
but it's also your your timing and how well you
are you reading the coverages. When we talk about acuracy,
we're not always talking about catchable football. We're talking about
how you place the ball relative to coverage, right, And
uncaught football can be very accurate because you threw it
away from the defender and just missed, just as a
(07:49):
caught football can be very inaccurate because you threw the
receiver back into the defender and he paid you off
with a great play. Again, talking about it, Drake London here, right,
It makes those opportunities for you.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
And so when you think about quarterback development, there's always
been a lot of ways to color in the lines. Right, Okay,
we want to take we want him to throw vertical balls,
not crossing routes. We wanted to throw crossing routes, not
vertical balls, right, exactly. Yeah, So there's ways to get
a guy's completion percentage up.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
But if there's if like Jimmy Garoppolo.
Speaker 3 (08:15):
The Niners was never good at leaning a nine route
down the field, so they just never throw it.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Right.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
We're just not going to ask him to do it.
Speaker 3 (08:21):
You could say, you have the one on one coverage,
you're making the correct read, it's brand Aayuki's very fast.
Just go ahead and throw it, and it just wouldn't
be accurate. It's just not a throw that he had
in his quiver. Right. There's a lot of different throws
on a football field, and all three levels, going vertical,
going horizontal, zone man coverage. Sometimes quarterbacks just just don't
see it well. And so a big part of coaching
your young quarterback is figuring out what throws he has,
what throws he doesn't have, what he's seeing on his
(08:43):
good throws, but he's not sitting on his good throws,
and how to present him with the information he needs.
Bryce Young with the Panthers twenty three to twenty four
is a big example of this. Right, they just started
throwing all these isolated fifteen yard outbreakers. Because Bryce is short,
he can't see over the middle of the field. But
if you just point him to half of the field
he can see, he can grip. He can rip it
all of sudd and the accuracy improves, even though it's
just shot selection. It's just where on your course are
(09:04):
taking your shots, and so there's a lot of ways
to fudge accuracy. It's generally very difficult to go from
I miss a lot of throws, so I make a
lot of throws. You're one big exception being Josh Allen
Man improvement kind of revolutionized the bills.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Yeah, okay, So if you were going to and maybe
this is the wrong way to think about it, because maybe,
as you just explained, like this isn't possible. But if
let's say we take a player like Pennix and who
is mostly outside of the hashes kind of go balls
deep down the field throws, and you're going to add
in your two two types of throws to his game
(09:37):
to make him take a little bit of that next
step forward.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
What would those two throws be?
Speaker 3 (09:42):
You really want to get the dig back right. There
was something that you threw a lot with Kirk, the
deep stop raut of the deep dig fifteen yard in
breaking route, and you see some willingness for penics to
throw it, and you see good throws on it.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
There's certainly good throws between the hashes.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
That's a throw you need though in the NFL today.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
And Zach Robinson offense too, especially. And the thing about London,
who I've talked about London like nine times here. I
love Crack London. He's such a good player. And the
discourse around London was very frustrating to me before this
twenty four season versus now because London actually is a
very good rout runn He's very good in the inbreaking routes.
He's not snapping guys off like Justin Jefferson is, but
he's just he's so big and he's so physical, and
he goes and gets every single football. He'll dig it
(10:18):
out of the ground, will catch it behind him. You
want to give that sort of a receiver those sorts
of routes. We talk a lot with those throws about anticipation,
and right now Penis is a little bit more see it,
shoot it, and you want him to be able to
anticipate it and throw. You throw it to a spot
in the field. You throw, you know, between the two
linebackers in front of the safety. It can't always be
a laser beam. He likes to throw those howitzers. You
(10:39):
want him to throw a little bit more touch, make
it a little more catchable of a football. That's a
throw that can be improved. That's a throw a quarterback
can get better at over his time in the NFL.
Is he just to NFL speed and where exactly that
route is going to hit? So that's a route that
you'd like to get back. You brought up the vertical stuff.
You brought up the outbreaking stuff. If I can get
a dig, if I can get a deep comeback, I
can get a vertical. The last thing I want is
(11:00):
to be able to hit the big post. And I
do think that in Darnell Mooney and Rarey mclod you
have guys who are speed guys. But now that one
of those dudes are great on that big post route,
and that's kind of a little bit of a of
a question mark.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
He also talked about the.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
Scene and kind of maybe on to get Kyle Pitts
more involved there. But I'd like to be able to
get Pennix to take some more of those trebuche shots,
those big shots, thirty plus forty plus harts down the field,
not always outside the numbers. Those the hardest catches to make.
Those are the lowest percentage throws. Yeah, but the ones
in the middle of the field after I manipulate that
post safety, that's going to require good pass protection, and
then it's going to require the receiver who can make
(11:33):
those sorts of plays, and in theory, that should be Mooney.
And you've seen Mooney do that a couple of times
and a lot more of his success on the outbreaking stuff.
If you can get Mooney to be a little bit
more viable there, it's going to be a big part
in expanding your offense.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
One other player who you know then remiss to not
even mention until now, but who could also be a
factor in this is Jean Robinson. And you know, we
think back to the Washington game. They have that miss
throw where he is running that wheel route kind of
down the left side, and then Carolina there's a wheel
route where he's running down the right boundary and it's
actually kind of a mistake on Bajon's part. He eats
(12:06):
up his own cushion and he doesn't leave Pennix any
any chance to really complete that pass, even though he
drops it right where it should be. But that could
be another factor. And where do you think Bajon kind
of falls in the hierarchy right now of the league's
best backs. Because here in Atlanta, obviously we're like man
Bajon just like can do no wrong. But when you
(12:28):
start talking about Saquon Barkley and you start talking about
Derrick Henry and Jimi or Gibbs because he's been on
a higher profile team over the last couple of years, Like,
where do you personally kind of fit Bijon with the
Christian McCaffrey's and that Dereck Henry's and those guys.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
Yeah, So I think if you ask right an average
NFL fan, you know, best running back in the league,
who would do list?
Speaker 2 (12:46):
I don't think many.
Speaker 3 (12:47):
It would say Jon Robins name, they would say Saquan,
they would say Jamiir Gibbs, they would say Dereck Henry.
Because of the seasons those players just had, Bijon deserves to
be mentioned exactly what those guys. I think Bajon is
as likely as any other player in the league to
have the most productive running back season this year period, right,
And like Saguon Derrek Henry, they're coming off very high
volume seasons, and Bajan was certainly very high volume. But
he didn't have like the playoff runs and the kind
(13:08):
of those additional weeks, and so he expect him to
recover a little bit better. He's younger, so you expect
them to recover a little bit better. Like I thought,
Bijon was a great dark horse pick for Offensive Player
of the Year last year. I'll say the exact same
thing again this year. It's worth noting that Bijon from
a success rate perspective, So just is the play positive yesterday?
Speaker 2 (13:24):
Now we're not looking at.
Speaker 3 (13:25):
Explosive, We're not looking at you know, just just was
it a positive play they'd create? Expect the points out
of your team. Bijon in the Falcons running game last year,
it was like historically good, right, they just they just
kept Bijeon's ability to turn a one yard playing to
three yards and three yards into five and five and
eight is positively like the highest floor running back. He's
so so so good and and and Panix will be
(13:48):
your your your big name, and London is gonna have
the big contract coming and so you're gonna talk about
these guys. That's what we started with. The core of
the Falcons offense is Bijon. He is He is the
engine that makes it go. The first priority of the
offensive coach staff's gonna have every single Monday when they
walk into the room is okay, how are we getting
Bajon's twenty plus touches this week?
Speaker 1 (14:06):
Right?
Speaker 3 (14:06):
Do we want to be running it this way or
that way? Are we evolving him in the in the
pass catching game? Remember when they played Denver, right and
it was Denver's gonna be a big blitz team. We're
gonna involve Bejon in the passing game quick and early
and by design, and he pays you off for it. Bajon,
from a talent perspective, can have a season just like
Saquan just had, like McAfrey had in twenty twenty three,
like that that is one hundred percent within his range
of outcomes. He's also, like you in a little bit
(14:27):
of way, done it in like kind of of a
quieter way, just not as big of a deal. The
ceiling is the moon with Bijon. He's He's an absolute delight.
Speaker 1 (14:35):
Yeah, you mentioned it's so interesting because yeah, you talk
to anybody, any coach in the building, like they'll say
the exact same thing. But they also have a very
clear way for him to improve in year three, and
it is those explosives because if you look at the
number of I think twelve plus yard runs on true media,
he's fourth right behind kind of like all those guys
we just mentioned. If you put that up to twenty
plus yard runs, he falls to seventeenth. So we talked
(14:57):
about this incredible, incredibly high floor. But I think now
they're working on, Okay, how do we get you those
forty yard runs, those sixty yard runs? His longest run
last season was thirty seven yards, right, and he was
also had the highest mile per hour at the line
of scrimmage of any player in the league last season.
So it's like, you got the acceleration, you got the tools.
(15:17):
Now how do we get that last home run ability
out of you?
Speaker 2 (15:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:21):
So one thing I will say is that outside zone,
which the Falcults ran last year more than any team
did and one of the highest rates last few years,
is not as good a play for the eighty yard
house call as it seems, and as you might you
hope it would be Derek Henry here being the exception
of the proofs of rule, Derek Henry would run a
lot outside zone with the Titans and then get in
the third level and then no one stopping Derek Henry.
(15:41):
Bijon does not have that tool in his toolkit. Nobody
has that tool in the toolkit besides Derrick Henry, because
of the size, because of the speed. But Bijeon ran
so much outside zone last year, and you're picking your
spots and you're flowing through and you're finding little gaps
and you're in, you're finding alleyways, you're getting to the
third level. But because the play works to one side
of the field so heavily, the entire defensive flow is
(16:02):
there the backside safety of the corner, they're in pursuit
and you have more guys to solve.
Speaker 2 (16:05):
If you can, yeah, if you can. If you go
and you watch them.
Speaker 3 (16:08):
Those twenty plus yard runs, you'll certainly see some outside on,
no question. You'll see a lot of plays that happened
between the tackles because big bi big explosive runs are
the result of good interior blocking that gets a running
back to the third level Vertically, we don't waste time
going horizontal, letting the defense figure out what's happening. And
we're all on you quick, right, we're upfield on you. Now,
(16:28):
that's how you get flat footed safeties. That's how you
get corners who are still looking at receivers and now
you can actually, you know, get that that big explosive run.
So you know, Bijeon's got to do his work, you know,
put the parachute on, get the speed, you know whatever,
do do the mile per hour work. Absolutely, you want
that third level speed, but a lot of getting more
explosive Bijon runs.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
So it's real.
Speaker 3 (16:45):
Twenty plus yard house calls is going to be on
Zach Robinson and on the coaching staff to find more
variety in the running game. And I think that's something
that they know they want to do. I think that
because of kirks athletical limitations last year, they had to
be a little specific in their running game and under
center Pistol the dropbacks, how are we gonna run the football?
So I think with Penick, you're gonna see that blossom.
You're gonna see that the diversity and the running game widen,
and I promise you'll see a couple of beuge on
(17:07):
house calls.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
They'll be there.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
That is something. Actually you mentioned Pistol. I'm curious to
see how much that remains in the offense too, because
we can see Michael Pennox obviously has more of the
athleticism to do those play action boots and rollouts and
things like that. But you go back a couple of
years ago, the Rams were one of the highest pistol
teams in the league. The Falcons were one of the
highest pistols under Arthur Smith as well. So it's like,
is that just a staple of the offense or was
(17:29):
that the nature of the quarterback the ad in place
last year? Something I'm just curious to see as the
season unfolds. But let's flip over and talk defense, because
that's really been the story for Atlanta this offseason. What
do you think of the reunion with Jeff Holbrick and
Rahee Morris kind of coming together before this season?
Speaker 3 (17:45):
Yeah, I'm Raheem at this point, like doesn't have DNA
as a defensive play caller, right, they do so much
stuff and he's under Dan Quinn and then he's Sean
mcvay's running the Brand and Staley stuff and the two high,
one high, you know, defensive structure they are is extremely
very gated. He's got a lot of different pages in
the playbook, and so you bring in a Jeff Olbrick guy. Okay,
(18:06):
so Robert solid disciple, and you know it's gonna be
all this four to three and then we kind of
you know it's gonna be cover three to quarters and
we kind of know the DNA of this team. I
think you're gonna continue to see hodgepodg stuff that they
they do a lot of work here to make sure
that they acquire smart players.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
On defense.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
You talk about Jesse Bates, you talk about aj To Wright,
talk about what katan Neellis has been at linebacker for
this team. You had a player now in Jalen Walker
who's a notoriously like versatile.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
Guy who can eat a lot of the playbook.
Speaker 3 (18:29):
So there's going to be weeks that they just look
like the Jeff Olbricks team. You might expect the Jeff
Oulbrick defense to look like it's gonna look like the Jets.
It's gonna be four down or all gain in upfield,
and like this is pretty you know what you're getting.
We're just really good at it. Rememb there's gonna be
weeks whether they're highly headed versaal, there's gonna be weeks
were on first and second down they look very vanilla
than on third down.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
It's the Raheem Moore.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Splits package stuff that you know he popularized with the Rams,
and so I trust Raheem as a defensive coach just period.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
I trust his ability to maximize his players and get
them in the right spot.
Speaker 3 (19:00):
They were right to pour resources into the defense and
to add more players and to try to plug some
of those gaps so as to be a more productive
pass Roushkin, have a better coverage, you know, a good
safety running mate to Jesse Baits, stuff like that. So
they're adding more tools for the toolbox. But I trust
Raw from an ex as and O perspective every time.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
I'm really curious to get your thoughts on this question.
I was trying to think of, you know, a good
one to throw at you, and given the Falcons kind
of pingponging back and forth between defensive coordinators over the
last four or five years, by nature of that, the
guys they've drafted and kind of the guys they brought
in free agency, it's a little bit of a hodgepodch
of different attributes and different body types and things like that.
(19:37):
So as you're going about building a hybrid style defense,
as the Falcons say, they want to deploy. Do you
think the best version of that is a defense filled
with jack of all trade, hybrid versatile types of players,
or a defense that contains players who may fill single roles.
But you have the ability to go to the best
(19:59):
version of multiple different looks because you may have one
guy who's a great nose tackle for that three to four,
one guy who's a good base end for that four
to three. They can't do both, but like you can
deploy the lines as you need them.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
So you always hear defensive coordinators talk about being multiple, right,
It's their favorite word. And the dirty little secret about
being multiple is that in that second scenario you bring
up where I have a really good nose tackle from
my lot of fronts and I have a really good
base end for my even fronts, is that I'm the
offensive coordinator in the opposing box and I just have
a guy watching who you're putting in. Right, Here comes
the nose tackle. I know what you're in. Here comes
(20:33):
the base end. I know what you're in.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
Right. Your ability to.
Speaker 3 (20:36):
Disguise what you want to do is limited by the
fact that you have role players, right, and I know
what the role players want to do is now I
can call expecting the pitch I'm gonna get from you,
as opposed to in a truly versatile defense, there are
eleven players on the field and we can do just
about anything we want with them. Right. We have a
guy in Jalen Walker who you don't know if he's
going to stack or if he's gonna come on line
of scrimma. If you have a safety and Jesse Bates,
(20:56):
who if we put him in the deep middle, you're
scared of him, and if we put him in the box,
you're scared. I mean, you do everything in between. We
have a player and aj Trell who can travel with
your wide receiver one or we can zone them off
and we feel comfortable doing that. True versatility means you
get a highly versatile guy and then you get a
second one, and then you get a through win, and
then you get a fourth one.
Speaker 1 (21:12):
Souse.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
If you have if you have ten role players in
one versatile dude, he can't be versatile. He's got to
fill the eleventh role, right, He's limited by things the
other ten. Yeah, and this is something that I think
Raheem knows very well. Like again Raheems with Dan Quinn
it was very here are our roles. And then he
was in Los Angeles with the Rams and it was
very Okay. We have a lot of guys who can
do a lot of different stuff, and I think you
(21:33):
see them swinging towards the second thing, and that's the
correct way to swing. Now, there's problems with that, right,
which is, if you're gonna have a whole menu, sometimes
you're gonna call something bad off the menu. Right, you
go to a restaurant you've never been before, there's four
met pages of that menu. You might not order what
actually was going to be your favorite thing on that menu, right,
as opposed to if you have a call sheet this big,
I'm getting the burger. The burger is gonna be good, right,
And so there it is an admirable pursuit and it
(21:56):
can be very good for you long term. Right. Your
defensive ceiling to be highly multiple. It usually takes years
to build that, and you can run into some problems
with it. Right. You get to an offense that's so
good at getting heavy running the football and you just
don't have the solutions for it. Right, You've all these
jack of all trades guys, you just don't have a
dude who can just plug right like that two gap
in nose tackles. So it's not perfect, but defense never
is in general. Though, the way they're building it by
(22:18):
adding more more versati players is the way you want
to go about it.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
So keep mentioning Jalen Walker is kind of that example
of versatility, and rightfully so, the Falcons have said they
plan to use him in more of a specific, narrowtifined
edge rusher role in your one A. Do you believe
him in that B? Is that the right way that
you would approach.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
This, Yeah, that's exactly what I would say, and then
I would see what he can do right. Like you
want him to be an edge, he's built more like
an edge and he's built like a linebacker. You' have
a bigger needed edge than you have a linebacker. But
this last year kay Nellis had seventy five tackles and
five sacks. He's the only player in football who did
this right. They had a player who they said, okay,
he's a stack linebacker for us, but on every third down,
we're gonna get him up on line of scrimage.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
We're gonna loop and we're gonnatut them. We're going to
crash him.
Speaker 3 (22:58):
We're gonna, you know, blitz him from depth like this
is We're going to build our blitz packages around the
fact that this is a unique player. So then they
draft a guy of Jail Walker. They say, we're gonna
play amt edge all the time, Like you're not like
you you'd be foolish too, and you're not foolish, right,
So you give him the edge playbook. You see how
he does during no TA, you see how he does
during training camp. You find a way to get him
on the field. You get him his pass rush impact.
(23:19):
It's where you need the most help. But you're never
going to let a player like that play ninety five
percent of the snaps just off of one edge. It
just doesn't make sense or who he is. They're gonna
walk out and third down in week one and he's
gonna be standing up in the A gap, right. And
you can do that with all the guys who are
definitely true edges who've never played linebacker before, but you
specifically want to do it with a player in Jalen Walker.
So again they're saying, absolutely, it's what you say, right,
(23:40):
But there's no way this staff drafts that player and
just lines him up at a defensive end, It's not
gonna happen.
Speaker 1 (23:46):
Well, And that's why when you mentioned Raheem doesn't have
a DNA, it's you can see the elements of Brian
Flores and you can see the elements of Vic Fangio.
Like it's it's such an interesting kind of collision of
a lot of the very common I think styles of
defense in today's end NFL. What are your thoughts on
the other pass rusher, James Piers Junior that the Falcons
drafted in.
Speaker 2 (24:04):
The first round.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
Yeah, I did not think that we were going to
see a big trade up for James Piers Junior in
the first round. That was a big surprise to me.
And the twenty three season for Pierce Junior obviously described
to the ceiling. I think in twenty twenty four with
the volunteers, you saw some of the floor can look like,
what some of the awards can look like. There was
a big discussion and the pre draft process about Pierce
Junior in terms of how interested is he in football,
what's the hustle like, what's the effort?
Speaker 1 (24:26):
Like?
Speaker 3 (24:27):
Those conversations happen with every single player. Right you're checking
your notes on that if you feel good about it
as a team, you pull the trigger, and if you don't,
you don't with Falcons because they feel good about it.
And so we have our guy in the building. We
have a good room around, and we have good coaches,
like you know, the Falcons are a young and a
very firebrand you sort of a coaching staff. We think
we're gonna be able to get this guy's head where
we want it to be. If you get the good
James Spears Junior, you have a guy who can created
(24:47):
a pressure and under two point five seconds one of
the most valuable things that a defense can have in football.
As a guy who wins, but doesn't just win, he
wins quick right, He's able to immediately create pressure. You
only get one read as a quarterback as opposed to
guys who have to go through you and pass rush moves,
and it takes a little bit long. So if you
get the good James Pierce Junior, it makes a lot
of sense. And I appreciate the urgency with which they
approached we gotta get sacks, man, like we've now got
(25:08):
sacks in a de QO off seasons, they.
Speaker 1 (25:10):
Were like, we need a quarterback two of them. We
need pass prushures two of them.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
Yah, we got we gotta get some sacks in the building.
So I appreciate the urgency. I'm very curious to see
what Pierce Junior looks like as a pro, because there's
there's a wide range of opinions on him from the
league in a pre draft process, and depending on what
film you put on from his volunteers day, you can
get a wide range of opinions on him as a player,
just playing and simple and so I was surprised to
see it. I didn't have it on my bingo card.
(25:33):
But it's happened that the Falcons has been very willing
to be aggressive in the draft as we as we
well know, and we'll see where the chips fall.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
Yeah. One other note on that was really fascinating. Talking
to Raheem Morris on Monday, he mentioned kind of just
some mentorships as they start to develop over, you know,
naturally at this time. But they're pairing him with aj'srel
and he said that was something he identified. He was
here obviously when AJ was drafted in twenty twenty, and
as was I, and he was kind of a serious
rookie that first introductory press conference we did, it was like, Yeah,
(26:01):
this feels like a guy who just played Jamar Chase
and Justin Jefferson in the National Championship three months ago.
And James Pearce is kind of the same way, you know,
serious kind of quiet, goes about his business, that kind
of demeanor. So I thought it was interesting that Raheem
identified that and kind of like paired him together to
try to, you know, get that connection going. Two more
(26:22):
for you, what is kind of your thought on Atlanta
in the NFC South and in the NFC landscape at large.
Speaker 3 (26:30):
Yeah, I think the Buccaneers are going to be very very,
very very good. Buccaneers are were turning eleven out of
eleven starters on offense, right, Liam cone Leaves was their
previous office coordinator. Josh Grizzard takes over, and if Josh
Grizzard's got you know, three brain cells rup together, which
it seems like he does, then the plan for Buccaneers
offense is pretty simple. You know what works with Mike
Evans Riscott when Baker May through Bucket Irving like that
(26:51):
group is still together, there's still strongly attitude in the
first round that offense was the top ten offense by
pretty much every metric you look at last year. I
expect them to be so again. Defensively, it was one
of the worst Todd Bowles defenses we've ever seen, right,
And they deal with a ton of injuries in the
back seven, and they're different alignment some guys every single week.
And they were playing a very high risk, high reward
style of defense because they knew they didn't have the
coverage players. I do not think Todd Bowles, who's got
(27:14):
a long history of being a solid defensive coach, I
do not think Todd Bowles is going to let that
defense fall like that again. Right, the bad injury luck again.
But they added a lot of defensive backs in the
draft against Sarbassia Dennis back. They added Hassan Reddick off
the edge, like they they put the pieces out there where.
I think the floor that defense is gonna rise. I think
it's gonna better than it was. So we're talking about
(27:35):
a top ten offense with an average too above average defense.
That's usually how contenders are built. If you can get
both top ten, you're lucky. But generally in the NFL,
we talked about top ten offense and then the defense
that's passable, So I think the Buccaneer is going to
be very good. Atlanta should be there in that wildcard
route pursuit, right. They very much can challenge the Buccaneers,
They can beat them on any given Sunday. But I
more so expect them to be in that wildcard route
(27:55):
in that, you know, trying to push above five hundred,
trying to get those one of those three remaining spots.
Would not be surprised if Carolina.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
Is also there as well.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
I have a lot of lingering doubts about Bryce Young,
and I want to see it for another season. But
they added just so many people because they they have
picks and they had so much money that that again,
that defense is going to improve a ton and they
got Bryce more weapons there second year with Dave Canalis,
I think they're gonna take a step. So I would
expect Atlanta to be fighting along with Carolina in that
NFC South for that second spot, fighting, you know, trying
(28:23):
to put pressure on the Bucks there at the top
of the division and fighting for.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
One of the wild card positions.
Speaker 3 (28:28):
It's it's year three now for Rahim, right, you two
your two excuse me, it's your two for him, it's
your five for Terry, right, and so yes, yeah, so
if you're if you're you know Falcons have them been
in the playoffs since twenty sixteen.
Speaker 2 (28:39):
Right, seventeen seventeen, right, this it's been eight years.
Speaker 3 (28:41):
So if you're if you're Terry, you would really like
to be able to get one of those spots. This
is a big season for the team that you've built, right,
You've made the top ten picks. Drake Clinebijon Robinson compits
like that, this offense is the offense that you brought together.
Speaker 2 (28:54):
So it's an important year.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
Yeah, they've been right there knocking on the door every
single year, which honestly is only kind of it's almost
been like worse, right, like sometimes taking that full step
back to then take that step forward. People see the
build and they they kind of the year of a
year improvement. But to be right there at kind of
eight and nine, nine to eight, like it's tough, but
again kind of credit to they are firing everything they
(29:18):
can to solve the problems they have. So last one
is a little bit more league wide for you. What
kind of scheme trends are you anticipating us seeing this fall.
We kind of saw the proliferation of cover four last year.
We saw some of the orbit cheap motion kind of
year before with the Dolphins. Like anything fun that you're
really looking forward to.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
I think it's a it's always cyclical.
Speaker 3 (29:36):
I think last year was a big return to the
running game, and I think you just see more running game.
Last year is a big return to under center. I
think you just see more under center. Defenses are light,
they're thin, they're built us off the pass. Let's just
get heavy and running at these guys right. And the Falcons,
going back to the Arthur Smith days, have been wanting
to be on that on that precipice right and being
able to just handle the football off. And like I said,
the Falcons were a great handoff team last year. I
(29:58):
think that's a very good sign for the future. And
so I think you're gonna still see have your personnel
start to be the move and the pendulum start to
swing back, and we're gonna run the ball more, get
under center and and not need to be as pass oriented.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
Right.
Speaker 3 (30:09):
What was the big panic and freak out in the
first two weeks last season, It was all the passing
numbers are down football's ruined two highs running football. The
reason for that is is that the running game, which
is really good now right because of the way that
the defense have adjusted. So to me, like that that's
gonna be what you what you continue to see. I
think the first month of the season training camps, you
know you're not getting nearly as much practice as you
used to. Guys aren't ready for football in the same way.
(30:29):
So if you can just be big and out running
guy for for for four quarters, you can just win
those those early games because you control the ball, you
control possessions, you don't turn the football over. So to me,
it's all running game. That's that's where I expected to
go on next few years. Gotcha, I I lied.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
I got one more for it because I played rugby
in college, so I'm a big advocate of I think
more teams should lateral the ball down the field. Yeah,
I think there should be a playout. I thought it
was going to be a touch push. No, no, no,
I'm going because I think the touch push we're thinking back.
I'm trying to pay ahead. I'm thinking of the future.
Ben Johnson like my king because of all the cool,
cool stuff they're doing. Do you think we'll ever next season,
(31:03):
do you think to or do you expect to see
maybe an expansion on some of the stuff we have
seen over the last couple of years with the Chiefs,
with the Lions, some of this like, yeah, we're getting
a little risky and loose with the football, but it's
paying off for us, and we're going to continue to
try to do that.
Speaker 3 (31:16):
Yeah, I wouldn't expect to see expansion in the sense
of we're lading lateraling in more places, doing it more ways.
I definitely think that like the o'mana Saint Brown, that
Jamior Gibbs lateral that they scored on against the Cardinals,
right where it's just crazy. It's just a crawl route
backs out of the back folds of the flat we
just tossed to him.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
He went to the corner.
Speaker 3 (31:34):
Like teams are gonna that's an easy copy paste, right,
And the way a lot of this stuff works is
by copy paste. And so I think you'll see more
teams be willing to do the simple lateral stuff. I
don't know how much more aggressive like the lines of
the Chiefs. Obviously with Kelsey do it a bunch will
get in like lateraling in in specific spots, you really
really really really really really have to trust the guy
(31:54):
who catches the ball in the later You have to, right,
And that's that's that. Kelsey has earned that over you know,
a decade there with the Chiefs. Sayt has earned that.
It's a very cerebral player, is very hard working player
like Saint has earned that for the Lions.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
But in general, you've got to be careful, right.
Speaker 3 (32:10):
You can't show up and be like, all right, this
is in our playbook, who's our toss guy right now?
You need to know for sure that that player is
worthy of being the toss guy. So I think that's
probably the limiting factor on that sort of a play.
Speaker 1 (32:21):
I disagree. Let's throw the football backwards this lateral all
day long. That That's what I'm going to keep pushing
for because it's just more fun that way. But Ben,
thank you so much for joining me today. Everybody please
go check out his awesome work at ESPN and continue.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
To support the show here.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
But we will see you guys next time.
Speaker 2 (32:39):
Bi
Dirty Birds.
Speaker 2 (00:00):
What's up?
Speaker 1 (00:01):
And welcome back to the Atlanta Falcons podcast Network. I'm
your host, Will McFadden. I am joined today by ESPN's
national NFL analyst Ben Solak. Ben, thank you so much
for taking the time to join me.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Yeah, of course, man, thank you.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
So you are kind of doing I guess the rounds
this offseason, collecting a lot of information and you happen
to be here in Atlanta on the day that a
story publishes on ESPN talking about potential Kirk Cousin trades
and you had an offer in there. I've got it
right here in front of me. The Falcons would get
a twenty twenty six sixth round draft pick, which would
(00:34):
potentially become a fifth rounder with considerations, and they would
the Steelers would be involved in this trade. So Aaron
Rodgers not going to Pittsburgh in your scenario, Yeah, they
would get Cousins and cash considerations. So kind of what
is your take on the Falcon situation and do you
still believe that kind of the best interest is for
(00:56):
a deal to get worked out.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
Yeah, I think you're an expected deal to get worked out.
It very much seems like wants to be somewhere else
wants to have a starting opportunity and kind of finish
his career in that way. If you're the Falcons, you
have this rookie quarterback in PANICX, you think he's going
to be your future, so you want to have that
cap flexibility. Biggest building advantage you can have for a
team over the last ten fifteen years is having the
rookie contract quarterback. He's so cheap and you're able to
pour money elsewhere in order to get there. You have
(01:18):
to get the Kirk contract off of your books, right,
It's got to be what comes next, and so I
would so expect there to be a move. But whenever
we have quarterbacks that are stuck on rosters in June July,
you're kind of always expecting another domino to fall and
then to dictate where that quarterback goes. I remember when
the Eagles had Sam Bradford and he was just kind
of sitting on the team. This is like the Chip
Kelly era, like we don't know what we're gonna do
with this guy. And then the Viking's Teddy Bridgewater gets
(01:40):
injured in camp, We're trading Sam Bradford. You kind of
have to wait for something else to give somewhere to
open up that opportunity. So will it be Aaron Rodgers
not signing with the Steelers in Pittsburgh? Will it be
Brown's camp? And the whole quarterback carousel is a total mess,
and they clearly need somebody. Right, you have to wait
for something to occur, So it's probably gonna be a
waiting game. You don't need to hold your breath. It'll
happen when it happened. But I think they're going to
(02:01):
get Kirk done. It's just going to depend on what
happens with some other franchises to figure out who exactly
the partner is and what does the actor that trade
looks like.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
You know, you're so right, And it's funny. We talked
about that exact same thing kind of playing out with
Albert Breer at the combine.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
It just okay.
Speaker 1 (02:14):
So let's say it doesn't happen before the draft, then
you planned a training camp and maybe you're waiting for
the leverage to kind of swing back in a different directions.
Somebody gets hurt, somebody under performing, what have you. But
if and his point was that that does come with
some risk, because let's say that other domino doesn't fall
and you do go into the season, and as the
(02:35):
Falcons have said, Kirk Cousins is your backup. So let's
assume that that does happen at this point and kind
of everything rolls out as it is currently. Do you
see any potential positives to that scenario for Atlanta?
Speaker 3 (02:49):
A lot of it depends on how Kirk would decide
to behave as the backup, right I think that your
expectation for Kirk to get into the building and be
a constructive member of the quarterback room right now is
pretty low, just because the way that he's communicated with
the team to this point. Something changed by September October
because he realizes there's not going to be another team.
You know, they hear through the league. Oh you know,
other acquiring teams are worried about the fact that you
haven't played, you haven't put on pads, you haven't practiced,
(03:10):
Like how rust are you going to be?
Speaker 2 (03:11):
So again other.
Speaker 3 (03:12):
Dominoes that might fall there can, of course, always be
a positive to having the young quarterback and then having
the mentor QB two. That's a nice construction given the
unique circumstances of how Penick joined the Falcons and how
Kirk lost the starting job. I really don't expect that
relationship to ever blossom here.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
But you don't know these.
Speaker 3 (03:30):
Things, right, I've not asked spoken to Kirk Cousins about
his feelings about the situation recently, Right, I'm just tea
leaves and secondhanding here. And so it can become positive.
I don't think you're holding your breath for that, but
it can.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
I think, you know, And there is a world where
Michael Pennick Junior has played three games, right, and he
gets out there like again, that growing that happens during
the course of your first full kind of seventeen game season,
I think is important. So having again another figure in
the room, and the Falcons have surrounded him with a
lot of former quarterback TJ. Yates, you know, DJ Williams,
(04:02):
Zach Robinson, Like he's got a great support system, but
being able to communicate it directly from a player perspective
is unique. Right, And then we look on the flip side,
Atlanta just drafted four defenders. If you have Kirk Cousins
out there and he's in practice going up against you know,
some of the younger guys, maybe that pays dividends too.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
Now, I do think that's a big part of it,
where your QB two and your scouting QB. If you
have that voice in the room. Yeah, he can help
some of those younger defensive players. It's a very very
good point, right, Like Jesse Bates and Kirk Cousins used
to talk all the time in Kirk's first year here,
right in terms of a film review and what are
you seeing?
Speaker 2 (04:35):
What are you doing?
Speaker 3 (04:35):
Kirk's got a lot of football knowledge. You'd love to
get that into the building if you can. I think
there's probably some bridges to be mended to get there,
but you hope to get there for sure.
Speaker 1 (04:43):
Yeah, I think about maybe that would like Xavier Watts, right,
kind of same thing, maybe a younger player. But let's
actually talk about Atlanta's starting quarterback moving forward. What was
your opinion of Michael Pennick Junior coming out of Washington
and then did you see anything in his three starts
that changed your opinion either.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
For or worse.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
Yeah, So out of Washington Panics was a very confident
throw of the football, willing to scent in the pocket,
grip in a repid who'll be aggressive thrown downfield, He'll
tack one on ones, He'll make reads, get to the backside,
He'll take a hit and still deliver an accurate football
like this is an NFL passer.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
The NFL arm is there. There's no question.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
The movement skills I think drained over the time from
Indiana to Washington because of some of the injuries. You
saw him mostly want to stay in the pocket at Washington.
So that's what you're expecting.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
Coming into the league.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
The first big box to check is will this confident
and aggressive passer wilt in the face of the NFL
defenses NFL speed or is he's still gonna be able
to play that way? And with panis it's like a
clear yes, right. I mean he's just ripping throws in
the red zone right the touchdown the pits against Washington
like that. These are these are high impact, high leverge.
So as he's giving Drake London and Kyle Pitts chance
to make big plays on the ball, those big bodied receivers,
(05:45):
that's that's maturity, that's NFL decision making. That's that's a
big deal. The concern out of Washington was some of
the accuracy, some of the spray, some of the big misses.
He's playing with three NFL wide receivers there right roma dunes,
say Jalen pol Chilen mcmill and that can that can
help a guy look a lot more accurate than he
might be because you have that sort of talent at
the college level. And I certainly think that you watch
that twenty four season, there's some great throws, there's some
(06:05):
big sprays, there's some big, big, big misses, and so
what you're hoping is he's.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Got some unique mechanics.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
Zach Robinson's gonna take a look at that TG, He's
gonn take a look that maybe we make some slight adjustments.
You don't want to mess with the guy too much,
so maybe we make some mechanical changes. Maybe he gets
a little bit more calm in the pocket in year two.
But you're hoping to minimize some of the big misses
simply because he's paying you off a lot of positive plays.
But then he's also he's leaving easy urs on the table.
He's leaving easy completions on the table because he's taking
(06:30):
those big downfield throws and he's got some of those
those difficult misses. So that's the developmental arc. We usually
say in quarterback development. That accuracy isn't something that improves
at this kind of preternatural. But we have a lot
of examples of the last five six years of either
players getting a lot better at it. You see Josh
Allen or coaching sas getting so good at figuring out
(06:51):
what a guy needs to see that they can color
it in the margins. Think about Sam Donald with the Vikings,
we're just you know, Sam's is who he is. Sam's
got has ward, Sam's got his issues, But the Vikings
found a way to build the whole ship out of
what Sam Donald can do well. And so there's there's
there's reasons for rosy projections on Penix because he has
the arm and he has the willingness. You can build
a good offense. You have a great, great catch rates
player in Drake London. You have the tools necessary to
(07:12):
build around him even as he's as he slowly figures
out some.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
Of the accuracy issues.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
I actually want to go back, so accuracy, what was
the belief that that's kind of preternatural natural and not
because I would assume that that is something that is
more technical that you could kind of work on a
refine and teach.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
Yeah, so accuracy is it sounds like it's one trait,
but it's really the conglomerate of a lot of things.
It's it's your your footwork and the throwing motion, your mechanics,
but it's also your your timing and how well you
are you reading the coverages. When we talk about acuracy,
we're not always talking about catchable football. We're talking about
how you place the ball relative to coverage, right, And
uncaught football can be very accurate because you threw it
away from the defender and just missed, just as a
(07:49):
caught football can be very inaccurate because you threw the
receiver back into the defender and he paid you off
with a great play. Again, talking about it, Drake London here, right,
It makes those opportunities for you.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
And so when you think about quarterback development, there's always
been a lot of ways to color in the lines. Right, Okay,
we want to take we want him to throw vertical balls,
not crossing routes. We wanted to throw crossing routes, not
vertical balls, right, exactly. Yeah, So there's ways to get
a guy's completion percentage up.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
But if there's if like Jimmy Garoppolo.
Speaker 3 (08:15):
The Niners was never good at leaning a nine route
down the field, so they just never throw it.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Right.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
We're just not going to ask him to do it.
Speaker 3 (08:21):
You could say, you have the one on one coverage,
you're making the correct read, it's brand Aayuki's very fast.
Just go ahead and throw it, and it just wouldn't
be accurate. It's just not a throw that he had
in his quiver. Right. There's a lot of different throws
on a football field, and all three levels, going vertical,
going horizontal, zone man coverage. Sometimes quarterbacks just just don't
see it well. And so a big part of coaching
your young quarterback is figuring out what throws he has,
what throws he doesn't have, what he's seeing on his
(08:43):
good throws, but he's not sitting on his good throws,
and how to present him with the information he needs.
Bryce Young with the Panthers twenty three to twenty four
is a big example of this. Right, they just started
throwing all these isolated fifteen yard outbreakers. Because Bryce is short,
he can't see over the middle of the field. But
if you just point him to half of the field
he can see, he can grip. He can rip it
all of sudd and the accuracy improves, even though it's
just shot selection. It's just where on your course are
(09:04):
taking your shots, and so there's a lot of ways
to fudge accuracy. It's generally very difficult to go from
I miss a lot of throws, so I make a
lot of throws. You're one big exception being Josh Allen
Man improvement kind of revolutionized the bills.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Yeah, okay, So if you were going to and maybe
this is the wrong way to think about it, because maybe,
as you just explained, like this isn't possible. But if
let's say we take a player like Pennix and who
is mostly outside of the hashes kind of go balls
deep down the field throws, and you're going to add
in your two two types of throws to his game
(09:37):
to make him take a little bit of that next
step forward.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
What would those two throws be?
Speaker 3 (09:42):
You really want to get the dig back right. There
was something that you threw a lot with Kirk, the
deep stop raut of the deep dig fifteen yard in
breaking route, and you see some willingness for penics to
throw it, and you see good throws on it.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
There's certainly good throws between the hashes.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
That's a throw you need though in the NFL today.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
And Zach Robinson offense too, especially. And the thing about London,
who I've talked about London like nine times here. I
love Crack London. He's such a good player. And the
discourse around London was very frustrating to me before this
twenty four season versus now because London actually is a
very good rout runn He's very good in the inbreaking routes.
He's not snapping guys off like Justin Jefferson is, but
he's just he's so big and he's so physical, and
he goes and gets every single football. He'll dig it
(10:18):
out of the ground, will catch it behind him. You
want to give that sort of a receiver those sorts
of routes. We talk a lot with those throws about anticipation,
and right now Penis is a little bit more see it,
shoot it, and you want him to be able to
anticipate it and throw. You throw it to a spot
in the field. You throw, you know, between the two
linebackers in front of the safety. It can't always be
a laser beam. He likes to throw those howitzers. You
(10:39):
want him to throw a little bit more touch, make
it a little more catchable of a football. That's a
throw that can be improved. That's a throw a quarterback
can get better at over his time in the NFL.
Is he just to NFL speed and where exactly that
route is going to hit? So that's a route that
you'd like to get back. You brought up the vertical stuff.
You brought up the outbreaking stuff. If I can get
a dig, if I can get a deep comeback, I
can get a vertical. The last thing I want is
(11:00):
to be able to hit the big post. And I
do think that in Darnell Mooney and Rarey mclod you
have guys who are speed guys. But now that one
of those dudes are great on that big post route,
and that's kind of a little bit of a of
a question mark.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
He also talked about the.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
Scene and kind of maybe on to get Kyle Pitts
more involved there. But I'd like to be able to
get Pennix to take some more of those trebuche shots,
those big shots, thirty plus forty plus harts down the field,
not always outside the numbers. Those the hardest catches to make.
Those are the lowest percentage throws. Yeah, but the ones
in the middle of the field after I manipulate that
post safety, that's going to require good pass protection, and
then it's going to require the receiver who can make
(11:33):
those sorts of plays, and in theory, that should be Mooney.
And you've seen Mooney do that a couple of times
and a lot more of his success on the outbreaking stuff.
If you can get Mooney to be a little bit
more viable there, it's going to be a big part
in expanding your offense.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
One other player who you know then remiss to not
even mention until now, but who could also be a
factor in this is Jean Robinson. And you know, we
think back to the Washington game. They have that miss
throw where he is running that wheel route kind of
down the left side, and then Carolina there's a wheel
route where he's running down the right boundary and it's
actually kind of a mistake on Bajon's part. He eats
(12:06):
up his own cushion and he doesn't leave Pennix any
any chance to really complete that pass, even though he
drops it right where it should be. But that could
be another factor. And where do you think Bajon kind
of falls in the hierarchy right now of the league's
best backs. Because here in Atlanta, obviously we're like man
Bajon just like can do no wrong. But when you
(12:28):
start talking about Saquon Barkley and you start talking about
Derrick Henry and Jimi or Gibbs because he's been on
a higher profile team over the last couple of years, Like,
where do you personally kind of fit Bijon with the
Christian McCaffrey's and that Dereck Henry's and those guys.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
Yeah, So I think if you ask right an average
NFL fan, you know, best running back in the league,
who would do list?
Speaker 2 (12:46):
I don't think many.
Speaker 3 (12:47):
It would say Jon Robins name, they would say Saquan,
they would say Jamiir Gibbs, they would say Dereck Henry.
Because of the seasons those players just had, Bijon deserves to
be mentioned exactly what those guys. I think Bajon is
as likely as any other player in the league to
have the most productive running back season this year period, right,
And like Saguon Derrek Henry, they're coming off very high
volume seasons, and Bajan was certainly very high volume. But
he didn't have like the playoff runs and the kind
(13:08):
of those additional weeks, and so he expect him to
recover a little bit better. He's younger, so you expect
them to recover a little bit better. Like I thought,
Bijon was a great dark horse pick for Offensive Player
of the Year last year. I'll say the exact same
thing again this year. It's worth noting that Bijon from
a success rate perspective, So just is the play positive yesterday?
Speaker 2 (13:24):
Now we're not looking at.
Speaker 3 (13:25):
Explosive, We're not looking at you know, just just was
it a positive play they'd create? Expect the points out
of your team. Bijon in the Falcons running game last year,
it was like historically good, right, they just they just
kept Bijeon's ability to turn a one yard playing to
three yards and three yards into five and five and
eight is positively like the highest floor running back. He's
so so so good and and and Panix will be
(13:48):
your your your big name, and London is gonna have
the big contract coming and so you're gonna talk about
these guys. That's what we started with. The core of
the Falcons offense is Bijon. He is He is the
engine that makes it go. The first priority of the
offensive coach staff's gonna have every single Monday when they
walk into the room is okay, how are we getting
Bajon's twenty plus touches this week?
Speaker 1 (14:06):
Right?
Speaker 3 (14:06):
Do we want to be running it this way or
that way? Are we evolving him in the in the
pass catching game? Remember when they played Denver, right and
it was Denver's gonna be a big blitz team. We're
gonna involve Bejon in the passing game quick and early
and by design, and he pays you off for it. Bajon,
from a talent perspective, can have a season just like
Saquan just had, like McAfrey had in twenty twenty three,
like that that is one hundred percent within his range
of outcomes. He's also, like you in a little bit
(14:27):
of way, done it in like kind of of a
quieter way, just not as big of a deal. The
ceiling is the moon with Bijon. He's He's an absolute delight.
Speaker 1 (14:35):
Yeah, you mentioned it's so interesting because yeah, you talk
to anybody, any coach in the building, like they'll say
the exact same thing. But they also have a very
clear way for him to improve in year three, and
it is those explosives because if you look at the
number of I think twelve plus yard runs on true media,
he's fourth right behind kind of like all those guys
we just mentioned. If you put that up to twenty
plus yard runs, he falls to seventeenth. So we talked
(14:57):
about this incredible, incredibly high floor. But I think now
they're working on, Okay, how do we get you those
forty yard runs, those sixty yard runs? His longest run
last season was thirty seven yards, right, and he was
also had the highest mile per hour at the line
of scrimmage of any player in the league last season.
So it's like, you got the acceleration, you got the tools.
(15:17):
Now how do we get that last home run ability
out of you?
Speaker 2 (15:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:21):
So one thing I will say is that outside zone,
which the Falcults ran last year more than any team
did and one of the highest rates last few years,
is not as good a play for the eighty yard
house call as it seems, and as you might you
hope it would be Derek Henry here being the exception
of the proofs of rule, Derek Henry would run a
lot outside zone with the Titans and then get in
the third level and then no one stopping Derek Henry.
(15:41):
Bijon does not have that tool in his toolkit. Nobody
has that tool in the toolkit besides Derrick Henry, because
of the size, because of the speed. But Bijeon ran
so much outside zone last year, and you're picking your
spots and you're flowing through and you're finding little gaps
and you're in, you're finding alleyways, you're getting to the
third level. But because the play works to one side
of the field so heavily, the entire defensive flow is
(16:02):
there the backside safety of the corner, they're in pursuit
and you have more guys to solve.
Speaker 2 (16:05):
If you can, yeah, if you can. If you go
and you watch them.
Speaker 3 (16:08):
Those twenty plus yard runs, you'll certainly see some outside on,
no question. You'll see a lot of plays that happened
between the tackles because big bi big explosive runs are
the result of good interior blocking that gets a running
back to the third level Vertically, we don't waste time
going horizontal, letting the defense figure out what's happening. And
we're all on you quick, right, we're upfield on you. Now,
(16:28):
that's how you get flat footed safeties. That's how you
get corners who are still looking at receivers and now
you can actually, you know, get that that big explosive run.
So you know, Bijeon's got to do his work, you know,
put the parachute on, get the speed, you know whatever,
do do the mile per hour work. Absolutely, you want
that third level speed, but a lot of getting more
explosive Bijon runs.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
So it's real.
Speaker 3 (16:45):
Twenty plus yard house calls is going to be on
Zach Robinson and on the coaching staff to find more
variety in the running game. And I think that's something
that they know they want to do. I think that
because of kirks athletical limitations last year, they had to
be a little specific in their running game and under
center Pistol the dropbacks, how are we gonna run the football?
So I think with Penick, you're gonna see that blossom.
You're gonna see that the diversity and the running game widen,
and I promise you'll see a couple of beuge on
(17:07):
house calls.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
They'll be there.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
That is something. Actually you mentioned Pistol. I'm curious to
see how much that remains in the offense too, because
we can see Michael Pennox obviously has more of the
athleticism to do those play action boots and rollouts and
things like that. But you go back a couple of
years ago, the Rams were one of the highest pistol
teams in the league. The Falcons were one of the
highest pistols under Arthur Smith as well. So it's like,
is that just a staple of the offense or was
(17:29):
that the nature of the quarterback the ad in place
last year? Something I'm just curious to see as the
season unfolds. But let's flip over and talk defense, because
that's really been the story for Atlanta this offseason. What
do you think of the reunion with Jeff Holbrick and
Rahee Morris kind of coming together before this season?
Speaker 3 (17:45):
Yeah, I'm Raheem at this point, like doesn't have DNA
as a defensive play caller, right, they do so much
stuff and he's under Dan Quinn and then he's Sean
mcvay's running the Brand and Staley stuff and the two high,
one high, you know, defensive structure they are is extremely
very gated. He's got a lot of different pages in
the playbook, and so you bring in a Jeff Olbrick guy. Okay,
(18:06):
so Robert solid disciple, and you know it's gonna be
all this four to three and then we kind of
you know it's gonna be cover three to quarters and
we kind of know the DNA of this team. I
think you're gonna continue to see hodgepodg stuff that they
they do a lot of work here to make sure
that they acquire smart players.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
On defense.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
You talk about Jesse Bates, you talk about aj To Wright,
talk about what katan Neellis has been at linebacker for
this team. You had a player now in Jalen Walker
who's a notoriously like versatile.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
Guy who can eat a lot of the playbook.
Speaker 3 (18:29):
So there's going to be weeks that they just look
like the Jeff Olbricks team. You might expect the Jeff
Oulbrick defense to look like it's gonna look like the Jets.
It's gonna be four down or all gain in upfield,
and like this is pretty you know what you're getting.
We're just really good at it. Rememb there's gonna be
weeks whether they're highly headed versaal, there's gonna be weeks
were on first and second down they look very vanilla
than on third down.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
It's the Raheem Moore.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Splits package stuff that you know he popularized with the Rams,
and so I trust Raheem as a defensive coach just period.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
I trust his ability to maximize his players and get
them in the right spot.
Speaker 3 (19:00):
They were right to pour resources into the defense and
to add more players and to try to plug some
of those gaps so as to be a more productive
pass Roushkin, have a better coverage, you know, a good
safety running mate to Jesse Baits, stuff like that. So
they're adding more tools for the toolbox. But I trust
Raw from an ex as and O perspective every time.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
I'm really curious to get your thoughts on this question.
I was trying to think of, you know, a good
one to throw at you, and given the Falcons kind
of pingponging back and forth between defensive coordinators over the
last four or five years, by nature of that, the
guys they've drafted and kind of the guys they brought
in free agency, it's a little bit of a hodgepodch
of different attributes and different body types and things like that.
(19:37):
So as you're going about building a hybrid style defense,
as the Falcons say, they want to deploy. Do you
think the best version of that is a defense filled
with jack of all trade, hybrid versatile types of players,
or a defense that contains players who may fill single roles.
But you have the ability to go to the best
(19:59):
version of multiple different looks because you may have one
guy who's a great nose tackle for that three to four,
one guy who's a good base end for that four
to three. They can't do both, but like you can
deploy the lines as you need them.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
So you always hear defensive coordinators talk about being multiple, right,
It's their favorite word. And the dirty little secret about
being multiple is that in that second scenario you bring
up where I have a really good nose tackle from
my lot of fronts and I have a really good
base end for my even fronts, is that I'm the
offensive coordinator in the opposing box and I just have
a guy watching who you're putting in. Right, Here comes
the nose tackle. I know what you're in. Here comes
(20:33):
the base end. I know what you're in.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
Right. Your ability to.
Speaker 3 (20:36):
Disguise what you want to do is limited by the
fact that you have role players, right, and I know
what the role players want to do is now I
can call expecting the pitch I'm gonna get from you,
as opposed to in a truly versatile defense, there are
eleven players on the field and we can do just
about anything we want with them. Right. We have a
guy in Jalen Walker who you don't know if he's
going to stack or if he's gonna come on line
of scrimma. If you have a safety and Jesse Bates,
(20:56):
who if we put him in the deep middle, you're
scared of him, and if we put him in the box,
you're scared. I mean, you do everything in between. We
have a player and aj Trell who can travel with
your wide receiver one or we can zone them off
and we feel comfortable doing that. True versatility means you
get a highly versatile guy and then you get a
second one, and then you get a through win, and
then you get a fourth one.
Speaker 1 (21:12):
Souse.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
If you have if you have ten role players in
one versatile dude, he can't be versatile. He's got to
fill the eleventh role, right, He's limited by things the
other ten. Yeah, and this is something that I think
Raheem knows very well. Like again Raheems with Dan Quinn
it was very here are our roles. And then he
was in Los Angeles with the Rams and it was
very Okay. We have a lot of guys who can
do a lot of different stuff, and I think you
(21:33):
see them swinging towards the second thing, and that's the
correct way to swing. Now, there's problems with that, right,
which is, if you're gonna have a whole menu, sometimes
you're gonna call something bad off the menu. Right, you
go to a restaurant you've never been before, there's four
met pages of that menu. You might not order what
actually was going to be your favorite thing on that menu, right,
as opposed to if you have a call sheet this big,
I'm getting the burger. The burger is gonna be good, right,
And so there it is an admirable pursuit and it
(21:56):
can be very good for you long term. Right. Your
defensive ceiling to be highly multiple. It usually takes years
to build that, and you can run into some problems
with it. Right. You get to an offense that's so
good at getting heavy running the football and you just
don't have the solutions for it. Right, You've all these
jack of all trades guys, you just don't have a
dude who can just plug right like that two gap
in nose tackles. So it's not perfect, but defense never
is in general. Though, the way they're building it by
(22:18):
adding more more versati players is the way you want
to go about it.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
So keep mentioning Jalen Walker is kind of that example
of versatility, and rightfully so, the Falcons have said they
plan to use him in more of a specific, narrowtifined
edge rusher role in your one A. Do you believe
him in that B? Is that the right way that
you would approach.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
This, Yeah, that's exactly what I would say, and then
I would see what he can do right. Like you
want him to be an edge, he's built more like
an edge and he's built like a linebacker. You' have
a bigger needed edge than you have a linebacker. But
this last year kay Nellis had seventy five tackles and
five sacks. He's the only player in football who did
this right. They had a player who they said, okay,
he's a stack linebacker for us, but on every third down,
we're gonna get him up on line of scrimage.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
We're gonna loop and we're gonnatut them. We're going to
crash him.
Speaker 3 (22:58):
We're gonna, you know, blitz him from depth like this
is We're going to build our blitz packages around the
fact that this is a unique player. So then they
draft a guy of Jail Walker. They say, we're gonna
play amt edge all the time, Like you're not like
you you'd be foolish too, and you're not foolish, right,
So you give him the edge playbook. You see how
he does during no TA, you see how he does
during training camp. You find a way to get him
on the field. You get him his pass rush impact.
(23:19):
It's where you need the most help. But you're never
going to let a player like that play ninety five
percent of the snaps just off of one edge. It
just doesn't make sense or who he is. They're gonna
walk out and third down in week one and he's
gonna be standing up in the A gap, right. And
you can do that with all the guys who are
definitely true edges who've never played linebacker before, but you
specifically want to do it with a player in Jalen Walker.
So again they're saying, absolutely, it's what you say, right,
(23:40):
But there's no way this staff drafts that player and
just lines him up at a defensive end, It's not
gonna happen.
Speaker 1 (23:46):
Well, And that's why when you mentioned Raheem doesn't have
a DNA, it's you can see the elements of Brian
Flores and you can see the elements of Vic Fangio.
Like it's it's such an interesting kind of collision of
a lot of the very common I think styles of
defense in today's end NFL. What are your thoughts on
the other pass rusher, James Piers Junior that the Falcons
drafted in.
Speaker 2 (24:04):
The first round.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
Yeah, I did not think that we were going to
see a big trade up for James Piers Junior in
the first round. That was a big surprise to me.
And the twenty three season for Pierce Junior obviously described
to the ceiling. I think in twenty twenty four with
the volunteers, you saw some of the floor can look like,
what some of the awards can look like. There was
a big discussion and the pre draft process about Pierce
Junior in terms of how interested is he in football,
what's the hustle like, what's the effort?
Speaker 1 (24:26):
Like?
Speaker 3 (24:27):
Those conversations happen with every single player. Right you're checking
your notes on that if you feel good about it
as a team, you pull the trigger, and if you don't,
you don't with Falcons because they feel good about it.
And so we have our guy in the building. We
have a good room around, and we have good coaches,
like you know, the Falcons are a young and a
very firebrand you sort of a coaching staff. We think
we're gonna be able to get this guy's head where
we want it to be. If you get the good
James Spears Junior, you have a guy who can created
(24:47):
a pressure and under two point five seconds one of
the most valuable things that a defense can have in football.
As a guy who wins, but doesn't just win, he
wins quick right, He's able to immediately create pressure. You
only get one read as a quarterback as opposed to
guys who have to go through you and pass rush moves,
and it takes a little bit long. So if you
get the good James Pierce Junior, it makes a lot
of sense. And I appreciate the urgency with which they
approached we gotta get sacks, man, like we've now got
(25:08):
sacks in a de QO off seasons, they.
Speaker 1 (25:10):
Were like, we need a quarterback two of them. We
need pass prushures two of them.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
Yah, we got we gotta get some sacks in the building.
So I appreciate the urgency. I'm very curious to see
what Pierce Junior looks like as a pro, because there's
there's a wide range of opinions on him from the
league in a pre draft process, and depending on what
film you put on from his volunteers day, you can
get a wide range of opinions on him as a player,
just playing and simple and so I was surprised to
see it. I didn't have it on my bingo card.
(25:33):
But it's happened that the Falcons has been very willing
to be aggressive in the draft as we as we
well know, and we'll see where the chips fall.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
Yeah. One other note on that was really fascinating. Talking
to Raheem Morris on Monday, he mentioned kind of just
some mentorships as they start to develop over, you know,
naturally at this time. But they're pairing him with aj'srel
and he said that was something he identified. He was
here obviously when AJ was drafted in twenty twenty, and
as was I, and he was kind of a serious
rookie that first introductory press conference we did, it was like, Yeah,
(26:01):
this feels like a guy who just played Jamar Chase
and Justin Jefferson in the National Championship three months ago.
And James Pearce is kind of the same way, you know,
serious kind of quiet, goes about his business, that kind
of demeanor. So I thought it was interesting that Raheem
identified that and kind of like paired him together to
try to, you know, get that connection going. Two more
(26:22):
for you, what is kind of your thought on Atlanta
in the NFC South and in the NFC landscape at large.
Speaker 3 (26:30):
Yeah, I think the Buccaneers are going to be very very,
very very good. Buccaneers are were turning eleven out of
eleven starters on offense, right, Liam cone Leaves was their
previous office coordinator. Josh Grizzard takes over, and if Josh
Grizzard's got you know, three brain cells rup together, which
it seems like he does, then the plan for Buccaneers
offense is pretty simple. You know what works with Mike
Evans Riscott when Baker May through Bucket Irving like that
(26:51):
group is still together, there's still strongly attitude in the
first round that offense was the top ten offense by
pretty much every metric you look at last year. I
expect them to be so again. Defensively, it was one
of the worst Todd Bowles defenses we've ever seen, right,
And they deal with a ton of injuries in the
back seven, and they're different alignment some guys every single week.
And they were playing a very high risk, high reward
style of defense because they knew they didn't have the
coverage players. I do not think Todd Bowles, who's got
(27:14):
a long history of being a solid defensive coach, I
do not think Todd Bowles is going to let that
defense fall like that again. Right, the bad injury luck again.
But they added a lot of defensive backs in the
draft against Sarbassia Dennis back. They added Hassan Reddick off
the edge, like they they put the pieces out there where.
I think the floor that defense is gonna rise. I think
it's gonna better than it was. So we're talking about
(27:35):
a top ten offense with an average too above average defense.
That's usually how contenders are built. If you can get
both top ten, you're lucky. But generally in the NFL,
we talked about top ten offense and then the defense
that's passable, So I think the Buccaneer is going to
be very good. Atlanta should be there in that wildcard
route pursuit, right. They very much can challenge the Buccaneers,
They can beat them on any given Sunday. But I
more so expect them to be in that wildcard route
(27:55):
in that, you know, trying to push above five hundred,
trying to get those one of those three remaining spots.
Would not be surprised if Carolina.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
Is also there as well.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
I have a lot of lingering doubts about Bryce Young,
and I want to see it for another season. But
they added just so many people because they they have
picks and they had so much money that that again,
that defense is going to improve a ton and they
got Bryce more weapons there second year with Dave Canalis,
I think they're gonna take a step. So I would
expect Atlanta to be fighting along with Carolina in that
NFC South for that second spot, fighting, you know, trying
(28:23):
to put pressure on the Bucks there at the top
of the division and fighting for.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
One of the wild card positions.
Speaker 3 (28:28):
It's it's year three now for Rahim, right, you two
your two excuse me, it's your two for him, it's
your five for Terry, right, and so yes, yeah, so
if you're if you're you know Falcons have them been
in the playoffs since twenty sixteen.
Speaker 2 (28:39):
Right, seventeen seventeen, right, this it's been eight years.
Speaker 3 (28:41):
So if you're if you're Terry, you would really like
to be able to get one of those spots. This
is a big season for the team that you've built, right,
You've made the top ten picks. Drake Clinebijon Robinson compits
like that, this offense is the offense that you brought together.
Speaker 2 (28:54):
So it's an important year.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
Yeah, they've been right there knocking on the door every
single year, which honestly is only kind of it's almost
been like worse, right, like sometimes taking that full step
back to then take that step forward. People see the
build and they they kind of the year of a
year improvement. But to be right there at kind of
eight and nine, nine to eight, like it's tough, but
again kind of credit to they are firing everything they
(29:18):
can to solve the problems they have. So last one
is a little bit more league wide for you. What
kind of scheme trends are you anticipating us seeing this fall.
We kind of saw the proliferation of cover four last year.
We saw some of the orbit cheap motion kind of
year before with the Dolphins. Like anything fun that you're
really looking forward to.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
I think it's a it's always cyclical.
Speaker 3 (29:36):
I think last year was a big return to the
running game, and I think you just see more running game.
Last year is a big return to under center. I
think you just see more under center. Defenses are light,
they're thin, they're built us off the pass. Let's just
get heavy and running at these guys right. And the Falcons,
going back to the Arthur Smith days, have been wanting
to be on that on that precipice right and being
able to just handle the football off. And like I said,
the Falcons were a great handoff team last year. I
(29:58):
think that's a very good sign for the future. And
so I think you're gonna still see have your personnel
start to be the move and the pendulum start to
swing back, and we're gonna run the ball more, get
under center and and not need to be as pass oriented.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
Right.
Speaker 3 (30:09):
What was the big panic and freak out in the
first two weeks last season, It was all the passing
numbers are down football's ruined two highs running football. The
reason for that is is that the running game, which
is really good now right because of the way that
the defense have adjusted. So to me, like that that's
gonna be what you what you continue to see. I
think the first month of the season training camps, you
know you're not getting nearly as much practice as you
used to. Guys aren't ready for football in the same way.
(30:29):
So if you can just be big and out running
guy for for for four quarters, you can just win
those those early games because you control the ball, you
control possessions, you don't turn the football over. So to me,
it's all running game. That's that's where I expected to
go on next few years. Gotcha, I I lied.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
I got one more for it because I played rugby
in college, so I'm a big advocate of I think
more teams should lateral the ball down the field. Yeah,
I think there should be a playout. I thought it
was going to be a touch push. No, no, no,
I'm going because I think the touch push we're thinking back.
I'm trying to pay ahead. I'm thinking of the future.
Ben Johnson like my king because of all the cool,
cool stuff they're doing. Do you think we'll ever next season,
(31:03):
do you think to or do you expect to see
maybe an expansion on some of the stuff we have
seen over the last couple of years with the Chiefs,
with the Lions, some of this like, yeah, we're getting
a little risky and loose with the football, but it's
paying off for us, and we're going to continue to
try to do that.
Speaker 3 (31:16):
Yeah, I wouldn't expect to see expansion in the sense
of we're lading lateraling in more places, doing it more ways.
I definitely think that like the o'mana Saint Brown, that
Jamior Gibbs lateral that they scored on against the Cardinals,
right where it's just crazy. It's just a crawl route
backs out of the back folds of the flat we
just tossed to him.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
He went to the corner.
Speaker 3 (31:34):
Like teams are gonna that's an easy copy paste, right,
And the way a lot of this stuff works is
by copy paste. And so I think you'll see more
teams be willing to do the simple lateral stuff. I
don't know how much more aggressive like the lines of
the Chiefs. Obviously with Kelsey do it a bunch will
get in like lateraling in in specific spots, you really
really really really really really have to trust the guy
(31:54):
who catches the ball in the later You have to, right,
And that's that's that. Kelsey has earned that over you know,
a decade there with the Chiefs. Sayt has earned that.
It's a very cerebral player, is very hard working player
like Saint has earned that for the Lions.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
But in general, you've got to be careful, right.
Speaker 3 (32:10):
You can't show up and be like, all right, this
is in our playbook, who's our toss guy right now?
You need to know for sure that that player is
worthy of being the toss guy. So I think that's
probably the limiting factor on that sort of a play.
Speaker 1 (32:21):
I disagree. Let's throw the football backwards this lateral all
day long. That That's what I'm going to keep pushing
for because it's just more fun that way. But Ben,
thank you so much for joining me today. Everybody please
go check out his awesome work at ESPN and continue.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
To support the show here.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
But we will see you guys next time.
Speaker 2 (32:39):
Bi
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