Can the Atlanta Falcons fix rookie QB Michael Penix’s mechanics?

Can the Atlanta Falcons fix rookie QB Michael Penix’s mechanics?

will sitting the bench for two years help Michael pennix improve his mechanics and what are some of the Hallmarks of a ram style offense under new Falcons offensive coordinator Zack Robinson you are lockon falcons your daily Atlanta Falcons podcast part of the locked on podcast Network your team every day welcome back everyone to another illustrious episode of the locked on Falcons podcast your daily Atlanta Falcons podcast part of locked on Sports Atlanta your team every day and today’s episode is brought to you by FanDuel make every moment more right now new customers get $150 in bonus Bets with any winning $5 bet that’s 150 bucks with any winning five bet visit fanduel.com lockon to get started so guys if you don’t know me I’m your very humble host Aaron Freeman AKA Sirus Black aka Mr Drew aka the Jolly Green Giant aka the iron that sharpens the iron AKA Mister AKA and I of course been covering the Falcons for far too many years formerly at FAL fans.com rip still going strong in this illustrious podcast and I thank each and every one of you that goes strong with me as an every day that makes this podcast your first listen or First Watch of the day each and every day and so for you to become coming every dayer like this uster group of individuals all you got to do is subscribe or follow for free on YouTube or wherever you listen to podcast so today’s episode I am joined by Luke Braun of lock on Vikings right yesterday we talked with Cody Alexander of matchquarters to talk about raheem’s defensive scheme and Luke’s goingon to tell us a little bit of insight into Zack Robinson’s scheme because you know he’s covered the last sort of or one of the more recent Shawn McVey prot protes to uh get a head coaching gig and and build an offense around Kurt Cousins and that’s what we’re expecting from Zack Robinson right so we’ll get Luke’s insight into some of the Hallmarks of what a ram style offense looks like we’ll also talk about someone we haven’t talked about in a minute on this podcast Michael penx and uh we talked before about pin’s mechanics issues and accuracy issues those were question marks for pinx and Luke is going to shed some of his insight into those issues and we’ll get into that right now all right guys welcome back to another illustrious episode of the lock on Falcons podcast with an illustrious guest he is Luke Brun the host of locked on Vikings Luke my friend welcome back to lockon Falcons hey man it’s always a pleasure I wore red especially for you today I appreciate that I appreciate that um let’s talk about Michael pennick I know you wrote something up for Arif Hassan’s substack I think wide left about Michael pennick mechanics excellent piece highly recommend anybody who is subscribed to arief stuff to to go check it out but you know for the the podcast listeners out there they’re just like I I don’t got time Luke you know what’s the what’s the summary of what some of your issues that you had with Michael pennick as you watched the film and some of the mechanical issues yeah uh and you can also find patreon.com luk Bron NFL I did a video breakdown of penck before the draft too well before the draft like before he even played in the championship game I did that or like like it came out like the day after the Championship or something so my deal with pennic I I’m not going to be making any friends here I had him as a second round guy uh and my deal with him is okay sick deep ball and I love the way like he’s he’s an old quarterback you can tell he’s an old Prospect and I mean that in a complimentary way you can tell he knows what he’s looking at you can you can tell that he sees coverages in an advanced level one of the things I’m always looking for is are you throwing to receivers or are you throwing against Defenders are you just waiting for guys to be open and throwing to them and looking downfield for that or are you kind of can you find times where you see him look and say okay you know it’s cover one the the high safety you know worked off that way which means this thing this in Breer on the other side of that is going to be there and and sort of like that’s where a lot of an quote unquote anticipation throwing comes from is just like knowing right oh okay he’s there but the leverage isn’t right so I can throw this that kind of like more advanced thought process I love the way that penno’s brain works and I think that’s the thing that made him you know if for me anything below a second round quarterback is not a serious NFL quarterback you’re like lucky if that’s a backup right and so that’s what what brings penx over that threshold for me the concern uh I mean look there there’s the age thing right and for me like for a lot of people like age is kind of just a deal breaker like oh he’s old must be a bad draft pick and I think that’s really stupid right it’s context it’s okay what are the issues and you know it’s going to be harder to teach older prospects new things there’s actually like neurologically like that’s true but that’s also it’s like he’s been a college quarterback for five years if he didn’t learn it until if he didn’t learn it yet why didn’t he learn it right maybe he just doesn’t have it and that’s my concern um with the the knee injuries as well not necessarily that they’re going to slow him down but that this is who he is now and um what it leads to is a lot of inaccuracies he just he just misses a lot that’s just it sucks it’s just it had him just sailed it and the reasons behind that are numerous enough to give me a lot of pa uh for one the way he comes through so we’ll talk biomechanics right so the way you want to come through the the best way for the human body to generate throwing power forward motion on an object is torque twist yourself up and then untwist yourself like a towel you’re going to snap at somebody right um and so you need like flexibility and like this is Caleb Williams Caleb Williams is unbelievably flexible he he can turn and torque and everything it’s really cool uh penx doesn’t really torque it up as much as you want you don’t see his hips like come through it the way that you don’t see him wind up the way that you want and I think because of that a lot of the passes come through all arm and his arm comes through at like a like a sort of uh outward angle like what you want is for the elbow to essentially point where the the ball is supposed to go and then the arm should come up or like the the forearm should come up straight on top of that and it’ll look like like a trebuchet kind of but if you’re swinging your arm out wide that whole thing is now on an angle and it’s you have to let it go at the exact right time or you’re going to push it or pull it and so a lot of passes get pushed or pulled that way um the other thing is the way you want your your weight to transfer So you you’re probably 95% of your weight when you wind up to throw is on your back foot um and then you shift your weight forward to give it that power and like a lot of your power comes from shifting your weight from your back foot to your front foot he almost shifts it up uh and some of that I think is like especially on a deep pass you do want your motion to go up a little bit and be a little bit like kind of taller and floatier and I think he’s doing it too much to where his weight’s coming off the ground and he’s losing the power from that you can see the evidence of that in the front foot if you watch his front foot when he when he throws it’ll slide back on him and if all year Well 200 some pounds of him is on that foot that foot ain’t sliding so like that that that’s got to come back and my two concerns are one how much can you fix in a guy that you know is going to be what 26 when 25 when season starts how how much do you have to fix and he’s got two years to work so sure right uh but two will he ever gain that flexibility and rotational motion that he needs with all that scar tissue in his KNE like or is this just who he’s going to be and he’s just a quarterback that misses some but has a pretty good deep ball most of the time and can see it pretty well like I don’t know that feels like a guy that makes for a great you know 10year career as a backup QB but doesn’t has a chance to be a starter which is why I’m saying second round and not third round but I don’t know if I would put my eighth overall pick on it fair enough um yeah I mean a lot of the issues that you you’re poting out was say issues I I noticed on film My Hope Is that the two years that theoretically we’ll see right uh that he sits the bench like he can work on that stuff and he’ll have the time and go through the offseason training and and sort of rework the muscle memory a little bit and maybe there’s a chance that it it kind of sets a little bit more than you would if you were asking that player to play right away and and needed to fix those things and he would just kind of revert back once you know the live bullets so to speak are are flying in the NFL he would just revert back to how he’s always played it with the old muscle memory that’s my hope but again I think you’re right it’s fair to to question those things I’m just curious what are your thoughts on him sitting two years do you think that helps his chance hurts his chances what are your thoughts on that you know I I think if it can get fixed it wouldn’t take two years to do um you kind of you’re going to know before then I guess maybe as a way to put it I don’t know if that’s necessarily ideal a lot of people talk about the age with and I don’t know if I super care as much like yeah he’s got quarterbacks play tiller 40 if they’re good like if he’s good you’re not going to care that you you lost you got 12 years instead of 14 right um and if he’s bad then his age didn’t matter it’s more of an indicator of that right and I do think that like if he physically can put it together that’s more that way more than enough time to the point where now I’m worried about well you’re kind of like eating up all the rookie deal right isn’t that the whole point of drafting a quarterback in the top 10 is that you get a reasonably cheap rookie QB uh and if that guy is good it’s this huge value Advantage you get two years of that and the fourth year he’s already starting to cost like something and then you get the fifth year option where he’s basically making Market money like that I don’t know uh and not to mention the politics of of it with with Kurt Cousins who I I know Kurt Cousins is not going to be happy with that he’ll says the right things but it’s already kind of leaked a little bit I you know there’s I saw the reports and all that but from from covering Kirk here in Minnesota for six years oh man he hates that so like was all that worth it it’s just it feels like you’ve got to say well if this doesn’t happen and if that doesn’t happen and if this happen and if this happens maybe we’ve got a guy for two years still more to come on today’s locked on Falcons talking with Luke about some of the things that Kevin okano ported over from LA to Minnesota to build an offense around Kurt Cousins we’ll talk a little bit about some of the things that maybe Zack Robinson will do similarly to build an offense around Kurt Cousins here in atanta and we’ll get into sort of you know the value of the Run game and that’s all coming up on today’s locked on Falcons it is winter take all time at FanDuel where you can bet on the NBA and NHL playoffs and you can bring home a big win of your own because right now new customers get $150 in bonus Bets with any winning $5 bet that’s 150 bucks to bet on anything you like from spreads money lines player props so much more you can bet on some of the upcoming NFL season props like the Falcons over under wind tonel of nine and a half you can bet on defensive offensive Rookie of the Year ODS MVP odds Coach of the Year odds you can bet on player specials for Kurt Cousins in terms of how many yards he’s gonna throw for how many touchdowns he’s gonna how many touchdowns is bejan gonna get Drake London KY Pitts it’s all there at FanDuel as well as of course the upcoming NBA draft where the Atlanta Hawks hold the number one pick the odds seem to be heavily moving in in favor of Alex SAR being that number one pick do you want to bet on somebody else or whatever you want to bet on go and check out all the action available at fandel by visiting fanduel.com lockon FanDuel is America’s number one Sportsbook so Luke I want to pick your brain on Um Zack Robinson’s offense and I know you don’t know anything about Zack Robinson’s offense but you know a little bit about Kevin right yeah and I’m just curious because I’m sure I’m guessing when Kevin okano got the job in Minnesota a couple of years ago you went and watched the Rams offense and you were like here are the things that sha McVey does and here are the things I think Kevin okell will do and I guess my question is because at some point like I need to figure out what Zack Robinson is Gonna Do by watching sha mcvey’s offense but since you’ve been through that like what were some of the things the Rams stuff that you could say like this is a Ram’s offense that Kevin okon portered directly here to Minnesota so that that will kind of clue me into okay here are the kind of the core Rams things that Zack Robinson will probably Port here to Atlanta can you shed any light on that yeah so what I don’t know is what Atlanta ran last year in terms of Run game were they a Zone wide zone or a mid zone or a were they yeah wi Z team the most the most wide Zone team okay so the the big difference this this is it sounds really technical but it’s huge um is when you run outside Zone in a wide zone offense the playside tackle that front side tackle is reaching the edge rusher he’s got to get out and around the edge rusher and seal him off from the outside and work him inside right and then the running back’s supposed to go around it it’s a stretch run in mid Zone everything and every lineman is doing the same thing everybody reaches so it’s just big stretch sweepy run like you’d play in Madden in mid Zone everything is the same except the tackle has the encouragement I’ll say uh to kick that end out instead so he doesn’t have to go out and around and instead of this being a c Gap run outside the tackle it’s a b Gap run uh inside the tackle outside the guard in between tackle and guard um obviously with Zone all of this is subject to you know the running back’s whims and hey if you can get outside him you do get outside him right if you run mid Zone but the tackle decides to stunt inside of you you’re not just going to like ruin the play trying to stay to his inside or anything like that like take what he gives you um but that’s kind of the general principle and that changes a lot uh because for one it asks a lot less of your interior guys it changes where double teams are um I kind of think it asks for more power from your tackles but not quite as much uh movement from your tackles so if you’ve got like stronger tackles that’s really good Christian darasa really really thrived in that especially in 2022 uh and Brian O’Neal did great too even though he’s more of a mover than he or he’s more of a of a a mobile tackle than he is like a big Power guy he still got plenty of power uh and so like those two tackles have worked out really well there and then that kind of shapes the play action game I I could go on forever and ever about like the passing game too with you know there I I would say there’s kind of three buckets of the passing game there’s your classic dropbacks there’s movement which you would know as like rollouts your bootlegs whatever you want to call them they call it movement uh and and that’s probably what Zack Robinson will be calling it now and then your play pass which is like your more kind of straight back but it’s still play action where it’s like a long longer drop back but you throw a little play action there hopefully you can get a defensive end to hesitate or something like that but then they just like run out for a for a check down Route it’s fine um a lot of the reads in the classic dropback offense that’s really what Kevin oconnell brought was a lot more Reliance on the dropback offense like he he ran some play action but he basically like the Vikings just like do not care about the Run anymore like that do just enough to set up their play action plays and that’s kind of it they don’t care at all about the Run game um and instead they’re like major drop so you had Kurt Cousins passing 50 times a game and it was a great fit for cousins’ brain because uh he can get through it quick right like he can one two three four really really fast and that’s what you kind of get you get it’s it’s like on a lot of Concepts it’ll be like one two on one side and then one two on the other side so you have to really you know one two and then turn your eyes all the way to the other side of the field one two that’s difficult mentally uh and so and and I think you have the right quarterbacks for that I think that’s something that also kind of plays into penic that might be a reason they likes penic is because he can do that um and yeah the the I I guess the like I don’t know how how Zach Robinson will distribute everything I don’t know how he’ll allocate all of that stuff but that will probably be the flavor of things and what’s interesting is McVey himself moved completely away from all of this he’s like on a totally different planet now but all of his like ilk all of his little Offspring is still out there kind of running mid Zone movement off of mid Zone and then a lot of like sort of really precise timing really precise spacing kind of Route so you need your receivers to be smart too like you need your if you got like your whoever your Bozo receiver is that you know I don’t know who if if there’s anybody in Atlanta that’s known for making the idiot mistake that guy’s days are numbered we’ll see I’m trying to think who that guy is there was a couple of times Drake London did some Bozo stuff but I there’s no like Chase clay pool like that’s the kind of guy I’m talking about you know like the celebrate while you needed to be in a no in a no huddle kind of thing I don’t think we have that guy no kind of guy that like goes out of bounds when he’s not supposed to because he’s trying to run clock that thing yeah no no so guys there’s still more to come on today’s lockdown Falcons including if cirt cousins recovery from an Achilles injury is going to cause the Falcons to rely a little bit more heavily on the the Run game this year under Zack Robinson and since Luke is here let’s check out what the Vibes are like in Minnesota with their rookie quarterback JJ McCarthy we’ll get into all of that guys as we wrap up today’s lock on Falcons I’ve talked about I think the Falcons are probably going to be a little bit more run oriented than the Vikings were under Kevin okono because the Falcons PFF guy yeah I I expect because Kirk’s coming off his injury and they’re not going to ask him to throw the ball 50 times a game I think that would be something that you don’t want to necessarily drop immediately into I’m just curious what are your thoughts on that kind of feel like that’d be fine I I think he’s like so what you have to know about Kirk I don’t know if you watched the the Netflix thing that came out a couple years ago about Kirk Cousins uh but he he was hurt that whole year 2022 and the way he attacked it was I mean he went way above and beyond he did everything the Vikings had him do and he was with the trainers and all that stuff but he hired massage people he hired chiropractors he had every somebody in his home like every day working on it uh the the the work that he puts in like can accelerate that timeline in a in a quick way I think he’ll be fine when I was covering you know will he or won’t he come back to Minnesota I was always like you know like I don’t know like coming off an Achilles does add risk and it changes the value proposition but I think once he’s on the field I don’t think you need him on a pitch count I guess maybe that’s the way that I’ll put it like I don’t think you need him on a pitch count uh and I guess the question like if he if you have the Run game where you can just set him up with a whole bunch of second and fours and you can just like dish on super hesitant linebackers um then let’s go uh but he’s always been a guy that does all right when there’s a lot of volume like when he has to when he’s passed 400 times 500 times in a season like that has he’s been able to to make good on that in terms of like efficiency if you just want to talk like yards per attempt EPA and stuff like that he’s always been pretty good for that um and it’s just a matter of of you know incurring risk because of some Bozo stuff the chaos meter and such yeah okay we’ll see what’s what on that and luuka last little tidbit W ason you know what what are The Vibes like with JJ mcarthy you got a rookie quarterback F’s got a rookie quarterback what are The Vibes like so far uh The Vibes are pretty good in Minnesota I think everybody’s like pretty high on the Timberwolves right now as we record this we’re about to go to game seven with the with with the Nuggets uh it starts the day we’re recording this so we’ll see how that goes but the The Vibes of the last like two weeks have been very positive in Minnesota and I think that’s leaking over into Viking Land but it’s exciting right like it’s it’s the new wave we’ve we’ve had kurk cousins for six years didn’t work right won one playoff game in six years that’s not good enough um and it’s you know it’s it’s a new wave everybody gets to be super excited about the rookie QB you know Broncos fans are super stoked on B Knicks everybody’s stoked on May and Daniels and Williams and it’s what you get right you get to be uh it’s like you guys kind of have to wait for two years right before you get to be excited about penic um like you just have to kind of table that but everybody like hey there’s a World War J.J mcarthy starts week one I don’t think it’ll happen I think Sam darnold’s starting the season but I think by the time the Vikings play the Falcons week 14 I think I think he he he’ll be in by then unless he’s really not ready um but the yeah everybody’s super excited uh they loved him okell’s been following J.J McCarthy for two years he he has loved this guy so that’s the the the idea there’s some people in the Minnesota media that are like oh do they settle for qb5 no they absolutely adored this guy they were super caught off guard when the F took pennic they did not think that that was going to be that he was going to be qb5 um so yeah that we say he’s had rookie mini camp right so it’s still very like Kevin OK connell’s got a very big thing about like the spring is for learning we are not evaluating anybody nobody’s in a position battle nobody’s fighting for their job learn stuff we got to install all the playbooks you’d like improve just focus on getting better we’ll do all the evaluation the competition the super intense stuff that’s in the summer but for now it’s a very like lack it’s very lacad I I shouldn’t say la it’s very chill it’s very like it’s fine uh so you know no evaluations happening yet he’s just trying to get his head wrapped around everything okay well uh Luke I appreciate your Insight on uh Zack Robinson Kevin okono Kurt Cousins Michael pennick JJ McCarthy um you know you’re hitting all the hot button issues here on lock on Falcons all offseason long it’s a good title in there somewhere yeah so um let the people know what are some of the hot busing issues that you’re getting into on lockdown Vikings over the summer yeah well so I’ve been out for a couple of weeks um so I haven’t really done anything uh topical since the draft so we’ve got a couple of random signings to talk about and some post-draft just some like draft recap stuff I’m sure people want on mailbag episodes which are Tuesdays um and then we’re doing the Everyman series which is like a backstory kind of uh series that Focus on all the new Vikings and how they got to the NFL from you know the the challenges that they may have faced as a kid in high school in college injuries whatever how they got here what kind of people uh are coming in focusing a little more on The Human Side uh than you know just spending two months trying to argue about yards per attempt again you know okay that makes sense all right uh I wish I I was going to say something out of pocket about like human beings football players like no like you’re big man hit people like what what do you like just because Kurt Cousins is a robot doesn’t mean that they’re all robots okay fair enough well that’s going to do it for us here guys appreciate Luke for joining us providing his Insight I’m sure we will be talking later this year uh in a potential crossover so we will look forward to whatever the topics of discuss discussion are who knows where we’ll be then yeah who knows at this point so that is going to do it for us here guys really appreciate it till then so guys that’s going to do it for us here on today’s illustrious podcast go check out locked on sports today free and available on YouTube and your 247 streaming Channel as well as you know the free Amazon Fire TV channels app uh on whatnot and uh you know thanks to Luke Brun check out lockon Vikings if you want to get more insights into the Vibes in Minnesota you know go check out lock on t-wolves uh to get the Vibes on what’s going on with that team uh now that you know they’re in the in Conference Finals and you know I don’t think the Vibes are going quite as well against Dallas I say we’re going against Denver but we’ll see we’ll see how that goes go go check that out lock on nuggets maybe um if you’re into that no sorry not locked on nuggets um locked on uh Mavericks uh check that out I mean you can check out lock on NAS if you want to but anyway that is going to do it for us here tomorrow’s episode I believe will be a mailbag Q&A episode so if you want to submit questions for that you can do so via uh several outlets you can send an email to lockon Falcons mail.com you can hit me up in the lockon Falcons Discord at Link in the description below and of course if you are locked on Falcons Insider you get priority on upcoming mailbags uh and you can become a locked on Falcons Insider by hitting that link in the description below at joins.com lockon Falcons it is a 14-day free trial so you can try it out for two weeks and you know pepper me with mailbag questions and then after 14 days is up you can decide if you want to continue peppering with mailbag questions uh by paying $4.99 a month or you can drop it you know no hassle um and not only do you get priority on mailbags you will also uh be able to check out my film breakdowns I recently did a Brandon dless uh film breakdown looking at three games of his from the last uh two years and breaking down you know not only him as a interior pass rusher but as an edge rusher and a run Defender so you can get my sort of preliminary thoughts on Brandon Doris as a lockedown Falcons Insider probably a week or two ahead of when we do a full breakdown of him on on the podcast here so that’s one of the things and you also get access to all the other previous draft picks and always the upcoming Falcons draft picks as well as the pre-draft content on various prospects and as well the Falcons free agent and the extended all 22 reviews that we did last year where you get extra insight into you know the Falcons offense and defense and if you want to revisit if you want to go back down you know such Pleasant Memory Lane of you know watching the Falcons in 2023 they were not frustrating at all or anything like that so that’s all available as a locked on Falcons Insider but that guys is going to do it for us here check out tomorrow’s mailbag Q&A it’s all part of the locked on podcast Network your team every day

Atlanta Falcons rookie quarterback Michael Penix may have to rework his mechanics and footwork over the next two years sitting behind starter Kirk Cousins. Host Aaron Freeman and guest Luke Braun (@LockedOnVikings) discuss some of the issues that Penix will have to overcome in the coming years, including his age, injury history, and inaccuracy. Luke breaks down why Penix’s biomechanics need to be reworked and whether or not two years is sufficient time to do so.

Later, they discuss the potential hallmarks of the new Falcons offense under new offensive coordinator Zac Robinson. They discuss what Vikings head coach Kevin O’Connell took from his time under Sean McVay with the Los Angeles Rams as a template for things Robinson may borrow. They break down the Rams, Vikings, and Falcons run scheme and how it impacts their dropback and play-action passing game. Finally, they discuss the “vibes” surrounding the new Minnesota Vikings rookie quarterback J.J. McCarthy.

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