Who are the 2025 Atlanta Falcons? | What we’ve learned in the five weeks

Who are the 2025 Atlanta Falcons? | What we’ve learned in the five weeks

Well, it’s week six and the Falcons are coming off of a week five buy and they’re two and two right now as they look towards Monday Night Football against the Buffalo Bills. And although it was an earlier buy, I thought this would be a great time to look back at the first four weeks of the season of what this Falcons team is so far. I brought my friends along with me, Dave Archer, DJ Shockley, Tory Mahaney in Ticket Master Studios. Thank you guys for joining me. So, let’s just actually start right there. I mean, four weeks of gains so far, two at home, two away. What have you seen from this team so far that impresses you for this 13game stretch down the road? Yeah, it’s been a mixed bag. I think that all of us would kind of There was a conversation coming into the season that this offense was going to be this and the defense was going to be this work in progress. I think it’s been flipped around. The defense has been all that and then some uh with Jeff running the show with some young guys making plays and the offense has been kind of trying to find its way and and uh so I think the script has been flipped. I think we’re very encouraged by what happened last Sunday against Washington where when you respond to the way week three went the way Atlanta did in week four. That’s encouraging and and I think that from the quarterback to everybody else that was involved uh in a disappointing weekend to come back with the resolve they had in week four against Washington was very encouraging. I’ll say the same thing. I I think the accountability from everybody within the organization I thought was huge. Obviously, week one was a tough one where you lose one. And then week two, you respond. And then week three, Arch mentions, hey, you get punched in the mouth and very unexpectedly and everybody’s on your back and everybody’s talking about how this team is this or that. And then you come back versus a really good Washington team and you respond. So, I think the accountability factor from every single person inside the organization, even, you know, coach Raheem Moore said, you know, we’re going to respond. We’re going to find a way to respond. We’re going to find a way to get this team back on the right track. And you saw from the first snap of that ball game, you knew offensively and defensively this team was going to respond in the right way. And I think you got to love that, especially so early in the season. You always want to know how a team going to respond, especially when they get hit in the mouth. Sometimes it it takes maybe six, seven weeks to find that. And I think you found that early in the year where three weeks in everybody’s like, okay, is this the unit that everybody thought it was going to be? How would they respond with a young team? And I thought everybody did that. I think for me it’s it’s one of those things as I look ahead more so than even looking at the first four games of the season is that we saw them play at a one and then we also saw them play at an eight or a nine against Washington. So who is this team? What is their identity? What are they going to be? Are they going to be the team that they looked like they were against Washington? I think that’s what moving forward looking ahead to the rest of the season. It’s a long season ahead. It’s who’s going to show up on Monday Night Football against the Buffalo Bills? Who’s going to show up in Germany? Who’s going to show up against the Saints later on? So, that to me is like where things stand right now. I still have a lot of questions about where this team goes, who this team is, but I like that at least you showed in week four against Washington a bit of what we expected from you. Let me ask you this though because there are so many questions about what this team’s identity could be on all three phases of the ball. But throughout the first four weeks, what have you come to continuously expect and what have they continuously given to you of like that’s who the Falcons are this year? So, it’s twofold. I’ll do the offense and the defense. The offense is Bjon Robinson. That is what they can rely on. That is who their identity is. He is this team. He is this offense. So, for for the offense’s identity, it’s Bjon. It’s running the ball with Bjon. It’s using Bjon in every way you could possibly use the guy. And I think that’s why you go and you do what you do and take him when you take him in the first round a couple years ago. So for for the offense, that’s what they are. They’re Bjon Robinson. Defense, it goes right back to everything that Jeff Olrich said in his introductory press conference that he wanted this defense to be with the heart, mind, and fist mantra that he identity that he wanted for this defense. That’s who they are. I sat down with him not too long ago in his office before the season even started and kind of talking about this heart mindfist identity and what it means and it was so great because he said you know initially the stats may not be there you know initially things may not look great and how it’s supposed to but you will know that we stand for something as a defense and I think that honestly and I would you know say to Brick like the stats are there you’re the number one defense in the league right now and it does look different and I can tell that you stand for something. And so for for me, it’s like the defense to Arch’s point is has been the light of what this this whole organization has been over the first four weeks of the season. And then of course like offensively again it’s Bjon. It’s just Bjon. Yeah. I can’t remember I’ve been doing these games a long time. I can’t remember a time where we had a four-ame stretch where defensively you held four opponents under 300 yards of offense. Yeah, I mean that’s incredible. You you you got to go a long way to do that. I mean, there’s going to be a blip on the radar at some point, I’m sure, during the season. Um, could happen this this next Monday night against against Buffalo, a very good offense, one of the best offenses in the league. But to be able to do that and and and the part that gets skewed on that is the offense is helping with that. Um, when you possess the ball at the number two rate in the National Football League, oh, by the way, the number one team is coming up on Monday night. You’ve got the top two teams in the league in time of possession. That helps your defense dramatically. You’re not on the field as much. Atlanta’s spending about 26 minutes a game on the on the field defensively. That limits an offense’s opportunities. So, make no mistake, Bricks team is getting it done and they’re making plays and they’re taking the ball away with the young guys in the back end, but the offense is contributing to that. Now, what your next step, and you may be getting to this, Taylor, the next step is you’ve got to finish on offense in the red zone. We will get to the offense in a second, but I do want to talk about the rookies on this brick defense because and not even just the rookies, but the younger guys on this defense because what was so interesting was last week, Brandon Doris was miked up for the Washington game and leaving that game, he walks over to Brick and Brick is like, “We miss so many sacks. We miss so many sacks.” Like, there’s probably five or six that we missed. we could have had like seven sacks all day and that that kind of mentality. The game’s not even over. He’s not even looking at film and he already knows that we have to get better. So, we talked about it a lot during training camp, a lot during preseason as well about how young this defense was going to be and the questions that we had about this defense moving forward. Through four weeks, like you guys have all said, they’re pretty impressive as a defense. For the rookies though, what have you seen from their development so far? And what excites you about the future for them? The big thing is we have guys that are absolutely going to be contributors. We’ve seen in each and every game, one play, two play, three, somewhere these guys are going to show up. And we know the two ball hawks in the back end have showed up. We’ve seen them step into the fold from day one and be those guys who we thought they were. And Xavier Wat already got two two interceptions on the year. Uh Bowman’s already got him one. Uh he’s having to go against some of the top tight ends, play in the box, play all over the place. and he’s been really impressive to watch. And then you look on the edge and you’ve seen Jaylen feel like he’s kind of figured out. You see James kind of figuring out as well. You can see his pressure rate go up throughout the the first few ball games. There are four guys on that defense who, you know, are going to be stalwarts for this defense for a long time. And you can see the vision that Brick and Raw had for both of those or all four of those guys when they brought them into this this defense. And you can see it kind of playing out as this season continues to go on. you’re going to see them used even more. And then you can see obviously early in the season, you watch Xavier watch and of course him being next to that guy Justin Bates back there helps tremendously. But you can see this guy has it already. He already has the mental fortitude to know there’s certain things going on with concept. There’s certain things going on within the defense and he can maybe play a little bit here but then oh I see something here. Let’s go get it. the ability to go and run that interception down in the last ball game uh that Marota threw in the end zone. Unbelievable job. I mean to go track that football from a defensive back standpoint. I mean Arch say it all the time. You know defensive back to play that position for a reason. And you don’t expect them sometimes as QBs we put those guys up the back because you’re like ah that guy not going to be able to go get it. He not going to be able to go run that one down. And to go find that football and go get it is an unbelievable trait. And I think the pass rushes on the end are only going to get better as they figure out the speed, as they figure out what they can do to certain tackles. And then the ability to use Jaylen in a lot of different roles. I think it’s been funny why. We’ve seen him in the spy. We’ve seen him off the edge. We’ve seen him stand up. We’ve seen them do a lot of things within this defense that you’re going to like. But all four of those guys are absolutely bringing tons of value. And I think when we came into the season, we said, “Okay, how much value would these guys bring to the defense? How early can they really make an impact?” and they’re doing it already. Tori, to Taylor’s point, we’re you said Brandon Doris, I think of the four guys that we got this year, but I think of Ruka Roaro and Brandon Doras as the six guys. How do you feel about that? I I mean, I agree. I think you have to look at it in totality, like this entire defense, how young it is. And you know, I think about what you’re talking about with Xavier Watts and there’s this level of instinct that I feel like a lot of these young guys have and they have such a good feel for the game. And it goes back to even what Jeff says in terms of his like teaching where he’s like, I don’t want to over complicate things for these guys. I want them to go win their one-on- ones when we get to game day. I want them to play out of their heads. Don’t be in your head. And that to me allows for some of these young guys to kind of have the pressure taken off of them a little bit. And I think someone like a Brandon Doris has been such an interesting topic of conversation. We didn’t see Brandon Doris hardly at all last season. We hardly saw Rukoro. And now you’re seeing kind of this new guard. I know I talked about it in our very first round table. You no longer have Grady Jarrett. You’re ushering in a new guard of these defensive tackles. and Rook and Brandon specifically, I think, are doing a lot whether it shows up in the stat sheet or not. They’re causing pressure. They’re wreaking havoc for opposing quarterbacks. And now looking at especially going up against the Bills on Monday night. How can you continue to improve and the next step is containing the pocket because you know Josh Allen is going to want to get out and run. Yeah, Zach Harrison, another name that comes to mind of the young guys. I mean I he played a lot a lot more than Rrook and Doris did probably combined last year, but to watch him and the evolution of him in his second year has been really impressive. Really quiet guy. Just comes in, does his job, and goes home and he’s had a couple sacks so far this season. But let’s go ahead and switch to the offense because I actually want to start with Michael. Um there were coaching um changes and and throughout the season in terms of um position and where they are at the game and we’ll talk about that in a second. But I do want to start with Michael especially with you two here. Michael in week three finished with around a 50% completion rate. In week four he came back and finished with 76% completion rate. Just blanketly asking how resilient is Michael in the second year. What have you seen from him so far? Yeah, the guy is belies his years certainly played a lot of college football. He went through a lot as a collegiate player from an injury standpoint, expectation standpoint. He was a highly recruited kid that went to Indiana, did some good things. Got hurt a couple of times and then gets his opportunity with Kaylin Debor in Washington and lights it up. Um, so I think there is there’s a great deal of of of poise that’s already built into him when he gets here. Had an opportunity to sit and watch a guy that’s a pretty good player in Kurt Cousins play. And so I think he absorbed that. That that’s the thing that I think is most impressive to me about him. I think we all knew he had the skill set, arm, you know, uh the ability to move, all those kind of things. I think his willingness to absorb information. I don’t know that they knew that about him. I don’t know that anybody knew that about him until you get around him and work with him dayto-day. I think his ability to absorb what you’re looking at on tape, your your ability to install a game plan that he absorbs and that he can implement on the field, change at the drop of a hat, shock, and I’ll tell you that that game the game’s played within a 3se second window and to be able to change things at the line of scrimmage, be able to get in the right stuff, whether it’s a protection or formation, um those things are tough. And we saw a little bit of some of the problems with that maybe in week three, but he came back and and and kind of resolved some of that. Maybe by coaching help, too. But I think that’s the thing that sticks out to me, Shock, about him is that he’s I think we always we knew he’s a student of the game, but maybe not to the depth we’re seeing. And I think the mental part of it that you mentioned is probably the most important to play this position in this league with everybody is so good. And you’re not going to have a 300 yard game every day. You’re not gonna go out there and throw for 75% every game. You got to find ways to get yourself through it. And I think he’s already figured out how to do that. And he came in, like Arch mentioned, as a guy who’s played a lot of football. So, he’s been through some of the tough times. And now he’s figured it out on this level. And I think one of the things that stuck out to me was, you know, talking with Zack Robinson, and you’ve you guys probably maybe heard heard me say this. He he talked about how he knew Mike was smart, but you never know how mentally a guy can hand how how much mental a guy can handle till he gets here and he gets into your system and he goes through stuff. And he said once he got here, he was so much more smarter than I thought. And there’s so many thing that goes into playing a position at this level. And a lot of people think, oh, sometimes he just turns around hands at the Bejian. Uh it’s a lot more to that. There’s sometimes, hey, you got to run to the three technique away from the safety that’s coming down and you got to make sure, you know, you snap it with the right motion. There’s so many things going on in a run play that people never remember or forget or even know about and he’s making those decisions, let alone what happens in the pass game. And you got Drake who wants the ball. You got Darnell who wants the ball. You got Kyle who wants the ball. You got to get the the ball to be in space. You got to have the right motions and shifts going. There’s so much stuff going on. So, I think it’s that’s why it’s so important, like you mental capacity to be able to get over things, but also to be able to handle everything that’s being asked of you within this offense. Yeah, I spoke to Kyle Pittz after the Washington game and I asked him the same question about the resiliency that he’s seen in Michael as his quarterback. And I mean, I think everyone in the league kind of knows how many quarterbacks Kyle Pittz has seen in his time here in Atlanta. And he said, you know, he came in on Monday, we watched the film, he said, “Listen, that game was on me. That was my fault. That’s my problem. and I’m going to be better for you guys against Washington. And he said, you know, and he did that. And to have a quarterback that comes in and says that and stands by his word means a lot to me. And so for those receivers and those pass catchers to be able to hear their leader of this offense say, “That was my fault and I’m going to fix it for you guys.” And then come back and throw for a for 300 yards and 76% completion rate the next week is is awesome. And I think that shows his leadership skills for this offense. But speaking of other leadership, Zach Robinson’s also taken a lot of heat recently and he said, “Look, that was on me, that Carolina game. I’m going to come down to the field. I’m going to start calling from the field.” Obviously, it seemed like it really worked for this Falcons offense. What have you seen from Zack Robinson in his second year of play calling and his ability to run and gun and and change some things to make sure that this offense can be as explosive as it should be? I think that there is still a lot left on the table for this offense. I think that again we saw kind of the glimpse of what the expectation for this offense should be. We’ve we’ve heard Michael Pennik, Zack Robinson, Bjan Robinson, all of these main pieces of this offense say we want to be explosive. And I think you finally saw that downfield threat against Washington specifically that we haven’t really seen manifest because whether or not the way that you know, let’s be real, the safeties have been playing Michael Penn Jr. over the course of even the first like one, two, three games. So I think for for me it’s like there’s still a lot left on the table for this offense. But I think that the decision making of the coaching staff to say, “Hey, you know what? We had some communication issues. We had some things we weren’t getting things out to Mike quick enough. And so we’re moving Zach down to have the open, honest conversations on the field, face to face with Mike. And talking to Michael last week, kind of following the the Washington game, he he made the comment he was like, I actually really liked that he was right there. He was like because whereas there’s and you guys probably can speak to this better than I can, but he was like we were able to talk about what we wanted to do on the next drive, what he was seeing, what I was seeing, how we tweaked things, how we go and we talk to the offensive line about what we’re trying to get them to do. And so I think like that small tweak ends up being a big tweak when you look at what they were able to do within those conversations and moving forward with them. It’s so much it’s it’s harder, I would say, when the guy’s up in the booth to really be able to express what he wants from his quarterback as opposed to sitting right there and I’m looking in your eyes and say, “All right, here’s a play. Let’s go through this and here’s the the guys we’re looking at.” And you can hear guys talk through it on the on the headsets and yeah, that happens. And you know, a lot of teams do have success from it, but there’s some to it. Zachary Robinson out on this practice field is right next to Michael Penn every single day. So, they’re used to him being right there giving them information and going through it. One thing that sticks out to me that I’ve seen in the first four games is Zach’s ability to scheme guys open. And you’re talking about from the formations to the motions to the shifts to understanding what coverages they’re going to play in certain downs and situations to get your playmakers the football and then for Mike’s ability just to let that thing go. Yeah. Because a lot of times you can have the perfect play call and oh maybe there’s a guy in his face, but we see Mike stand in there and rip few through the season and you’re like, okay, this guy’s willing to stand in there and and rip it and throw one. Uh I just love the fact that he gives his guys the opportunity to make plays. And sometimes there are coordinators who they’re all about their plays, but I love the fact he’s about his players and not his plays. I had a chance to sit in meeting rooms with Joe Gibbs. Uh, ironically enough, Washington’s great head coach. It won a couple Super Bowls with that team. And we would come in on a Wednesday and he had spent Monday and Tuesday in his office. I think he slept in his office, but he had four ways to get the ball to Gary Clark, four ways to get the ball to Ricky Sanders, four ways to get the ball to Art Monk, four ways to get Kelvin Bryant the ball. And when you begin to look at what Zach did last weekend with some of the formations and the way he set up Kyle and Drake on one side of the field or whether he stacked Darnell with uh with with Drake and with Bjon on the other side that I started seeing some of that that we hadn’t seen it in the first three games and all of a sudden here’s this thing that Washington’s trying to adjust to and he’s doing what you’re talking about finding ways to get guys the ball, finding ways to get the guy open. It’ll be interesting. It’s obviously a tough scenario. you got to continue to do that each week. But I saw some of that and that was pretty cool to see. You don’t think they wanted Bobby Wagner on uh Bjan Robinson? I don’t think they wanted I don’t think I don’t think they wanted that. Well, Bobby Wagner didn’t want to be on. Well, I think it’s pretty evident that this coaching staff, this organization as a whole is really trying to put the best 53 or the best 22, whatever you want to say, on the field at all times. Whether that’s on the defense in drafting as many defensive players that they did this year or on the offense with bringing Michael in eighth overall and and bringing Kirk Cousins in last year during free agency and then even on special teams they were saying well let’s what’s wrong here and how can we make this better? They obviously bring in and sign Parker Romo comes in has a couple good games one obviously with Carolina that wasn’t so great but now I mean 13week stretch here. How are we feeling about Parker Romo and really the special teams unit as a whole going for the rest of the season? Well, Shock, you had the best line. We were doing Falcons Audible, by the way. Check that out on Atlanta Falcons.com. But Shock said it six, not three. Um, yes, I I’m I’m okay with Parker Romo. I mean, for now, I guess it’s kind of one of those deals as kickers. We’re seeing a lot of kickers around the league kind of having some problems. Some of them are banging them in from 65 yards. So, it’s kind of being a hit or miss. The way you eliminate that is six, not three. And that’s something if Atlanta’s going to prove anything now as we get into this 13game grind, and it’s going to be paramount on Monday night, that you finish drives with touchdowns, not with field goals. And I think that that’s got to be something we got to address up. But as far as the kicker goes, I mean, I think you’re you’re good for now, right? Yeah. Yeah. I think it’s it’s always a work in progress when you bring a new guy in. and he’s figuring his way out and obviously he had his moments in Carolina but he responded the next week in Washington what you want. Um but there’s always going to be those moments in the game where we talk about all the time is the hidden yards on special teams and what game can you find where you return one out to the 45 or you know you you you get uh you get paid to drop one inside the 5 yardd line and you change the field position. Those are big moments in a ball game and I know Maris is, you know, doing his best and he’s one of the best in the league at working trying to get these guys to play at at their, you know, peak position. So, special teams is a huge part of the game as we know that third phase can win or lose your ball game and they pay as much attention to it as they do offense or defense. So, I’m fine with it. Uh, long as we keep knocking them through when we do get those opportunities, that’s a big part of it. But we mentioned going into Arch when we first started playing the Buffalo Bills on Monday night and that ball game, you got a team that’s scoring about 30 30 points. 66 points a game. Yeah. Top three in the league. Field goal is not going to do it for you. Now, you need them when you get there. Now, of course, you have good long drives, you got to make sure you finish with some kind of points, but in this ball game, you want six more than three. I think the other important thing is this Falcons offense has shown the ability to be able to do it in the run game. They also been shown to be in the pass game. So you come into a ball game, you’re Buffalo saying, “All right, which part of this offense do we want to take away because they can hurt you in multiple ways.” So they got some issues over there, too. Trying to worry about the guys we talked about our talked about yesterday on the podcast. Hey, yeah, we’re talking about We got to worry about Josh Allen. We got to worry about Shakir. Hey, they got five, six dudes on our squad that they got to be like, you know what, these dudes are dangerous and we got to know where they are. Yeah. Well, we’ve mentioned Buffalo a couple of times and we’ve even mentioned this 13game stretch that the Falcons will have for the remainder of the season. So, let’s kind of look ahead a little bit. I just want to read you the next couple of weeks that the Falcons have or the next few weeks. Uh, obviously Monday night against the Buffalo Bills, which will be hosted in Mercedes-Benz Stadium. Everyone, buy your tickets if they’re still available. Get in the house early. Make it loud for the Bills. Uh, then they will go to San Francisco and play Sunday Night Football. The following week, they will host the Miami Dolphins. They will go to the New England Patriots, and then they will go to Germany to take on the uh the Indianapolis Colts. kind of a strong couple weeks right there. So, obviously the Bills is the main, you know, that’s a huge matchup, but which matchups really stick out to you of these are games that will tell us a lot about what the Falcons are made of and these are potentially must-win games? Shock, I’ll start with you. you know, when you come into the season, you look at the schedule and obviously just as you know, you look at what teams did last year and you’re like, “Oh man, going to Germany, playing the coach, they weren’t really, you know, all that last year, you look up and they’re one of the top teams in the league.” Uh, you look at New England and obviously 10 new head coaches has it, you know, spinning over there. They just beat Buffalo obviously, uh, on Sunday night. Uh, I think those are pivotal games for you. Um, you think about two opponents who obviously they’re in the AFC, but you still have to find ways to win those ball games versus teams that coming into the season you probably felt pretty good about, but now they’re really games that are really critical, I think, to the success of the season. Now, obviously, game one is Buffalo. You got to take care of Buffalo in your own building, which is huge, but also going out and try to steal a few on the road also helps your cause when it comes late in the season. And you take care of home court. And we always say, you know what, you can split on the road, win all your games at home, you feel good about where you’re gonna end up at the end of the season. I think it’s the the next two. It’s really it’s Buffalo and it’s San Francisco. And it’s looking at, you know, if you want this team to make a statement, this is the time to make a statement. Making a statement against Buffalo on Monday Night Football. Making a statement against San Francisco on Sunday Night Football because I think those are the ones that those are the those two teams right now. And you know, you even can throw in the Indianapolis Colts when they go to Germany. like these are top 10 12 teams in the league right now and that’s I don’t think is going to change when the Falcons run up against these guys. So I think like those those three games and especially that Indianapolis game in Germany where you go on the road to the New England Patriots, you come back, you go to Germany, you play in Germany, you come back like it’s there’s a lot logistically over the course of those like seven, eight days. So, I think like those are the three that I’m kind of looking at. It’s it’s the the start of this fivegame stretch and it’s the end of it. And I I mean you got to go out and you have to if you’re this offense to everything we’ve been saying, you’re going to have to put up points. You’re going to have to score. You’re going to have to get in the end zone. And I think like that is the determining factor of whether or not this team can get where they want to go. Arch, before you go, I want to pose a question to you. Tori brought up a good point. next two ball games, prime time matchups, games that everybody around the country will see. And we’re always talking about changing the national p perception of what the Falcons are. Is that something that you think inside matters a lot that hey, we get a chance to do this on prime time with everybody watching and we could change the narrative of what everybody thinks about this organization? Secretly, the players care about it. Yeah, they’re not going to tell you they care about it, but certainly what everybody’s looking at on a Monday night or on a Sunday night, they know they’re being watched by their peers. Maybe not so much by the fans, but they know their peers are watching, their friends are watching, their families are watching. And so they yeah, they would like they would like to be able to put their best foot forward. But I think Raheem will work as hard as he possibly can. They’re not worried about Germany. They’re not worried about, you know, back-toback road games with one of them ending in Germany. They’re worried about Buffalo on Monday night. And that’s a short week to go to San Francisco on a Sunday night. So Buffalo’s number one. This is a team that everybody fancies as potentially the AFC representative for the Super Bowl. They got the venue MVP. He’s going to be a problem. There’s some things that he does that most quarterbacks don’t do. You know, when you rush for at him, he’s actually the secondary piece of it. You and I talked about this. He wants to run with the ball. He’s going to put the ball down and take off. And it’s actually a secondary call to what they do. He’s back to throw. Fourman pass rush. I’m going to go get six. I’m going to go get 10. You better get ready to defend that. And he’s 6’5, 240 lbs. So, you better bring all your pads with you, too, when you get there. Um, he’s as big as two of our of our edge guys. So, that’s a problem. So, my whole focus, and I’m still in player mentality, Monday night. Monday night. But, I do think behind the scenes in your heart of hearts, you want to show up on on a prime time game. Yeah. All right. Last question, then we’ll wrap things up. But as you look at these next five weeks, four of them are AFC teams. only one of them being in the NFC, which is San Francisco 49ers. Obviously, this team is 0 and2 in the division on all those the rest of those divisional games will come after those five weeks. How will these five games, Tori, I’ll start with you. How will these five games propel this Falcons team to the rest of their divisional matchups? I mean, if you can go out and you can win a few of these games against some tough AFC competition, it only helps you, I think, down the road in terms of the confidence that you feel playing against some of the NFC teams, especially knowing, let’s be real, the Bucks are playing kind of out of their minds right now. Baker Baker is doing a lot of good things down in Tampa Bay. And I I think that that’s the group to beat and that’s the one that you are chasing if you are the Falcons. And so yes, like we can kind of sit here and say like, oh, like if they drop a couple of these AFC games, it’s okay. It’s not the end of the world, but the Bucks aren’t really dropping anything right now. And if they’re setting the standard for the chase and the race of the NFC South, like you’ve got to stay in step with them and kind of hope that they they falter a little bit right now. So, for me, it’s like this stretch is important to get you to the point of facing the Bucks and the Saints and the Carolina Panthers once again because you got to get that confidence up, I think, because the last NFC team, the la or not the last, the last last NFC South team that you played was the Carolina Panthers. And that leaves a very sour taste in your mouth to go forward and show that that’s not who you are. who you were against the Washington Commanders. That’s that’s who you are and who you hope to be the next time you face some of these guys. Yeah. Shock, really quickly. Let me get your opinion. I’ll be honest. I think they all matter. Uh obviously, if you drop a few of these ball games, it puts so much more stress on you towards the latter part of the season, especially when you get into the NFC games. It makes it almost must-win games because now you’re fighting the win total. Obviously, winning inside the NFC is a big deal. you want to do that, but if you drop some games, you still feel like, you know what, these games are a must and I got to have them going down the stretch. And then you start kind of doing things probably outside of what you really would do, which is playing your style of ball. Perfect. All right. Well, we’ll see what these Falcons can do for the next five weeks. Of course, they are hosting the Buffalo Bills on Monday Night Football in Mercedes-Benz Stadium. If you don’t have your tickets yet, go ahead and get those. Be in the stadium early to cheer on your Atlanta Falcons. Thank you guys for joining me here in Ticket Master Studios today. We’ll see you guys next time.

Atlanta Falcons analysts and insiders, Taylor Vismor, Tori McElhaney, D.J. Shockley, and Dave Archer discuss team identity, Bijan Robinson’s performance, Michael Penix’s growth, offensive shake ups, defensive battles, and more.

00:00 – Intro
00:25 – What has impressed?
03:10 – What is the current Atlanta Falcons identity? Offense & Defense
06:50 – Rookie development
11:00 – Offensive evolution
20:00 – Special Teams development
22:55 – Looking ahead at the next few matchups

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