Michael Penix DELIVERS On the Road But Missed Kick DOOMS Falcons to 24-23 Loss to Patriots

Michael Penix DELIVERS On the Road But Missed Kick DOOMS Falcons to 24-23 Loss to Patriots

John Parker Romo, you gotta go. [Music] You are Locked On 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 the Locked On Podcast Network. your team every day. And today’s episode is brought to you by FanDuel. Right now, new customers can bet just $5. And if your bet wins, you’ll get $300 in bonus bets to use all across the app. Now guys, today we are doing our rapid reaction to the Falcons 24 to23 heartbreaking loss to the New England Patriots in week nine. The Falcons finally showed some fight. Uh, and we’ll talk about why that has me feeling better about this team coming off some of the losses despite today’s loss. We’ll talk about the biggest reason for that loss being the kicking situation as well as some of the other things that hurt the team. Talk about Michael Penn looking pretty good on the road and how this, you know, potentially was one of his best games of the year. Drake London’s big day, Jaylen Walker’s big day, some of the other guys in the secondary struggling. We’ll get into all of that. Uh, and of course I am here your humble host, Aaron Freeman, been covering the Falcons for 20 years, formerly at falfans.com. RIP. Still going strong on this podcast. And I think each and every one of you that despite the disheartening loss suffered by the Atlanta Falcons, you are still riding strong with me as everydayers. That means you make it your first listen each and every day. And all you got to do to become an everyday subscribe or follow for free on YouTube or wherever you listen to podcast. Oh, biggest reason for the loss, big story coming out of this game is the kicker. All right, John Parker Roma cost the Falcons dearly and I believe this will be John Parker Roma’s final game in an Atlanta Falcons uniform. He missed a point after touchdown that would have tied the game 24-24 uh in the closing five minutes of the game. Um and that proved ultimately costly in a 24 to 23 loss. Now, the Falcons did get the ball back again. uh unfortunately were not able to take advantage to move the ball down the field in that situation, but even if they had, would the Falcons have trusted Parker Romo to go out there and make the kick? Probably not. And so, we’ve been talking all season long since week one about the kicking situation. Young Wu missed a potential game tying kick against the Bucks that proved costly. The Falcons moved on from him uh after that week uh and then bringing in John Parker Romo. And it’s been up and down for Parker Romo uh in the weeks since. And I think t today was going to be the last straw when it comes to that. I think Jarvis Davis said it perfectly on the Falcons squad postgame show where Young Wu had built up enough equity that you gave him multiple opportunities to sort of win you back. John Parker Roma has not built up that type of equity. He’s basically had one good game against the Vikings and then a whole bunch of meh at best. Uh, and so I think this is going to be the end of it for um, you know, John Parker Romo. And I suspect that the Falcons will be replacing him this week as they head off to Germany. Will it be none other than German’s favorite kicker Lenny Cre um, we’ll see. The Falcons have two rookie kickers on their uh, practice squad. Ben Sals out of, you know, the greatest university in history of sports, the University of Pittsburgh, and then Lenny Creek, the German sensation. Uh, and I think it’s time to see what one of those guys has. And of course, you know, just the serendipity of heading on to Germany means it feels like this is the week to give Lenny Creek his chance uh going into this game and kicking in front of his home crowd. Um, but you know, famous last words, I I feel I feel like there’s no way uh Raheem is going to run it back with John Parker Roma this week, but you never know with the Atlanta Falcons. So, you know, mention the the drive after that missed PAT. You had another costly mistake on an intentional grounding for Michael Penn. Uh, you also had some questionable clock management in this game where the Falcons had another procedural issue on the road, which has been a far too consistent through line where they were forced to burn a timeout about midway through the fourth quarter. Uh, coming off of a um penalty, I forgot what what happened. It was a penalty, right? Um and then you know in order to avoid a delay a game uh the Falcons yeah there was a penalty on on Kvon Chaison on the previous play and the Falcons you know were just twiddling their thumbs on the sideline and then they had to burn a timeout to avoid a delay a game and that left them with one less timeout and that ultimately you know proved costly in the end where New England was able after uh the Falcons you know had that costly intentional grounding New England basically had to get one first down uh and they were able to do so on a rub route for Hunter Henry uh to sort of seal uh this particular game. But despite those issues in this game, by no means a clean game, I tend to look at this game as a glass half full type of performance, an improved performance for this team that has really struggled on the road, particularly when it came to the quarterback. We’ll talk more about Penn’s performance a little bit later when we get to the Penn meter, but it’s good to see the Falcons showing some fight for once. uh that has been far too consistent an issue where this team has gotten down and you know it’s just like well that’s it you know and they they were able to climb back um in this game understandably you know people are going to still be upset no one enjoys a loss um but you know unlike last week you’re not going to get a crash out from me this feels like a a quote unquote normal loss to me where the Falcons were competitive down to the wire and unfortunately too many of the breaks went against them um to to to come away with the victory. And I I told the insiders uh this locked on Falcons insiders, you can join at the link in the description below. You get my live updates during the game uh in addition to you know access to the extended all 22 reviews that we do every single week. Um but you know going as we were nearing halftime and the Falcons were down 21 to7 and the the Falcons had to turnover on downs after the two-minute warning and I basically told the insiders like yeah if if New England goes down the field and scores here and they go up three scores it’s it’s it’s a wrap there. There’s nothing that we have seen from the Falcons that shows that they’re capable uh of coming back down three scores. I know some people had a couple insiders being like, why didn’t why did the Falcons go for it on that fourth down instead of kicking the field goal? And basically my explanation was like, you know, being down 11 at that point doesn’t do anything for you. Being down seven does do a lot uh more for you. Uh so going forward in that situation, unfortunately, the Falcons did not convert in that situation. Um, but you know, with the Patriots getting the ball back, then Jaylen Walker gets the sack strip, James Pierce recovers it, and the Falcons set up uh Drake London’s second touchdown of the game, and they cut the lead to 21 to 14 uh for halftime. And that that to me was a huge momentum swing in the Falcons favor for once. And so, you know, if you’re ticked off at this game, you know, do you. I’m not going to tell you how to feel. Uh but it to me it was somewhat encouraging to see this team um showing some fight on the road um where they have shown almost no fight too often in the majority of these road games especially going up against a good Patriots team that is very likely to make the playoffs. So I take it a positive way. Um it’s not to sit here and say like oh the Falcons have won me back and we’re back on board and the season’s back. No, like as I told you guys last week, I I’m I’ve given up on on the hopes of this season, me and a playoff team, having a winning record. As I told you last week, it to me is at a point where, you know, it’s just really about evaluating some of the young players and and one of those young players is Michael Penn. Uh, and I liked what I saw from him. He almost had a two pump performance, but unfortunately, I feel like I have to uh fall on the sword because I felt like I jinxed that performance. And I’ll explain what I mean by that as we continue today’s uh locked on Falcons. Today’s show is brought to you by our friends over there at Pelaton. Look folks, it’s time to break through the busiest time of the year with a brand new Pelaton crossraining tread plus that’s powered by Pelaton IQ. It’s Pelaton’s most elevated technology and equipment yet that gives you real-time guidance and it gives you endless ways to move. Whether you want to work out by yourself or if you want to work out with your favorite instructor like my personal favorite, Alex Tousant, he always gets me fired up to tackle the day. 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So, let’s get into the Pennix pump meter, a weekly feature on this podcast. Not last week because of, you know, we had to go back to the Kirk Cousins chaos meter. Uh, but the Pennix pump meter where we have what, four different levels of pump to judge the performance of the Atlanta Falcons young quarterback. Zero pump basically means it was a very underwhelming performance for Michael Penn. One pump means it was a solid sort of game manager type performance. Two pumps is peak pennix, right? When that pump is fully on, three pumps is just one pump too many, right? where it goes into the negative side of things. Um, and to me, I’m I’m giving it a one and a half pump performance. We almost had a two- pump performance and then we had the intentional grounding, right? Uh, and that’s where I mean where I I feel like I jinxed it because, you know, telling the insiders during the game after that touchdown drive, uh, that should have tied the great game, I was like, I think we got a two pump performance and, you know, Parker Romo misses a kick and then Falcons get the ball back and uh, you know, it’s I forget what if it was a second and whatever it was, second and 10, I think it was. and the snap comes too early. Pennix isn’t ready for it, right? That leads to Javon Gwyn not getting out of his stance and so I can’t remember who the pass rusher if it was Milton Williams or Christian Bar. Uh but one one of their one of their D linemen was able to just run free and Pennix was forced to kind of have to dirt it and Pennix makes the mistake of dirting it I think to his right where Kyle Pittz is and Kyle Pitts is not close enough and if he darts it to his left to be where Bejan is they probably don’t throw the flag for intentional grounding and that one decision unfortunately cost us a two pump performance from Michael Penn which would have been the first of his on the road in his career. Uh, if I’m not mistaken, I think I gave him a two pump performance for the Washington game, but that was a home game um in that one. So, I I will I will take that L, guys. I I I got too big for my Bridges. Like, we got we’re going to get a two pump Pennix performance. And and the main reason was not because Pennix played perfect in this game. He wasn’t perfect in this game. He made plenty of mistakes, including that costly um you know uh intentional grounding, but essentially late in the game, you kind of needed him to kind of put his team on his back and show that clutch gene that we’ve seen Michael Pennock show before. And unfortunately, we haven’t seen enough of uh this season to get the Falcons the wins. And you know that that that gene was out there genaning, if I’m going to make up a word, right? Um, you know, he he had some big time throws on that potential game-winning game tying drive. Uh, again, John Park Romo, yes, you’re going to catch all these L’s. Um, you know, you had the the one-handed grab to Bejian, which was a great catch by Bejian. Uh, a lot of great catches in this game. The 40-yard bomb to Drake London on the double move where he moss Christian Gonzalez. You saw him get outside the pocket, extend the play, throw back across his body, hit Kyle Pitts right in the chest, and then of course Kyle Pittz dropped it. And I was like, Kyle, man, you know, you you were doing so great this year. Like, why why did the old Kyle Pitch show up uh for the first time this year on that particular play? But fortunately for the Falcons, that was a third down. They went for it on the fourth down and Drake London made a an excellent catch, a onehanded catch on the fade to in theory tie the game up and then John Parko came out there. But you saw some earlier great plays from Michael Penn as well. 15 yard scramble where he showed more juice on that run than he had shown at any point in his career where he was like it’s second and 14. I’m getting these 15 yards. And we haven’t really seen Michael Penn do that. He’s always been a little tentative when he it comes time to tucking it and running. Um and you saw that on a earlier scramble where he was potentially going to be in a position to dive for the end zone and he’s slid a little short of the goal. Uh very Matt Ryanesque on that particular slide, but you saw plenty of play extension from Michael Penn. you saw plenty of creativity which is one of those things that when we talk about the quarterback and and really fixating on the things that he is doing isolating him from the offense right so much of it the discourse surrounding this Falcons offense is about you know the play calling and how is the play calling helping or hurting various players but when we can sort of isolate okay where are the things that Pennix is taking control over when he gets outside the pocket is he making the right throws the right plays all those various things and he was able to do that a number of times times in this game. And so we give Michael Penn credit for that. And that’s what, you know, leads to a potential two-p performance, even if you can sit there and nitpick and say, “Yeah, he made some mistakes. Yeah, there’s a couple passes uh in and balls that he would want back and whatnot.” But speaking of, you know, the things surrounding Michael Penn when we’re talking about him in isolation, let’s talk about Zack Robinson’s play calling, which is a weekly topic of discussion. Um, you know, I didn’t have a problem with Zack Robinson’s play calling in this game. Certainly by no means perfect. We saw a kind of a soft benching of Charlie Warner in this game where the Falcons had been primarily a 12 personnel um offense along with their 11 personnel about 5644 uh type of split or 5640 I think with like 5% other uh this season you know about 40% uh two tight end sets at 12 personnel. Uh today we didn’t really see any 12 personnel at all from what I gathered. I think Charlie won only played five snaps in this game and instead the Falcons really leaned into 21 personnel which is two running backs on the field where they use a lot of Bejian sort of motioning him out getting him out wide uh with Tyler Aier in the back field. Uh, and we’ve, you know, we’ve seen basically, you know, a lot of those plays over the last, you know, two months with this Falcons offense where they would put Charlie Warner in the back field and essentially treat him like a an oversized fullback uh, in pass protection and instead they had Tyler Alier doing that, which I know is something that a lot of people, myself included, um, have been wanting to see. I just haven’t been as vocal as others being like, they have to do this or else, uh, type of thing. So, um, it felt like the Falcons were throwing some new wrinkles out there as we’ve discussed many times on this pod when it comes to Zack Robinson after we spent all offseason being like, we need to see Zack Robinson evolve, uh, this offense. Uh, we saw a little bit of evolution. It’s by no means, you know, all the pieces are fitting together. We’ll see what the film shows uh, upon rewatch later this week when we do the extended in all 22 review. But for me, it’s a lot of it is like you’re never going to love Zack Robinson’s offense. So like I’m not expecting him to go out there and call a perfect game. I’m not expecting him to go out there and look like, you know, Shawn McVey or Kyle Shanahan or, you know, Kevin Oconor or whoever else you want to put uh in that pan, even Josh McDaniels, uh the Patriots offensive coordinator. But like to me, this was a step in the right direction because this offense hopefully we will see this offense being a little bit closer to what we want to see uh in the back half of this season and you know a big part of this season. You know, it’s not how you start, it’s how you finish. when we’re talking about evaluating some of these young players like a Michael Penn, you want to see him, you know, grow, right, with this offense and and seeing this offense improve, you know, and and him improve upon some of the struggles that he’s had, be more of that creator, that decision maker, that operator, all those types of things. And I felt like the play calling, at least today, again, we’ll see if it holds up under more scrutiny when we get to the Alt 22 later this week, but I felt like it was a step in the right direction. it’s not all the way there and again if they can continue to make steps in the right direction maybe we’ll get to a point uh in you know by the end of this month maybe where we are looking at this offense to okay it took you know three months or rather three months longer than we would like it to be but Zack eventually was able to figure it out and this offense is starting to fire on all cylinders and that will allow you know Pennix to you know do whatever he needs to do uh in the back half of the season so we’ll see if the Falcons if this is getting the ball rolling or is this just, you know, one step forward, two steps backward type of performance for this Falcons offense. Uh, but there’s still more positive to talk about with the Falcons offense. We’ll talk about Drake London’s big day as well when we turn our attention to the defense. We’ll talk about Jaylen Walker as well as some of the other things that the Falcons need to clean up on that side of the ball as we wrap up today’s locked on Falcons. Today’s episode is brought to you by FanDuel. With the NBA season being back, there’s no better place to get in on the action than FanDuel, the official sports betting partner of the NBA. And so, if you miss, you know, the next tip off for the Atlanta Hawks or whoever your favorite NBA team, or you just want to ride the hot hand FanDuel is going to have all those live bets on everything you need from who’s going to score next to any of those fourth quarter comebacks. Plus, you can combine those live bets into a same game parlay. bet a little, win a lot, you get a shot for a bigger payout and it keeps every game exciting, especially when your team is making a late game push. 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You know, I refuse to blame Kirk Cousins for anything in 2024, but we’ve turned the page in 2025 where we’re just gonna we’re gonna chalk up that Dolphins game. We’re gonna push it and we’re just going to blame it all on Kirk Cousins. Even if that’s a not fair to do to Kirk, it is what it is. This is the world we live in now. We live in a a Kirk Kirk is everything. He he’s he cost the Falcons everything, right? And uh Drake is is going to cost the Falcons quite a bit based off what he’s doing uh when he’s been healthy this year. Basically that 49ers game aside, we’ve seen Drake play outstanding football in three of the last four games that he’s played. Uh and that included today with nine catches, 14 targets, 118 yards, three Tutties. Ladies and gentlemen, my man is getting a hat-tick, right? you know, if you’re you’re hankering for hockey, you know, Drake London has got you covered. So, it was a back and forth game with Drake London going up against Christian Gonzalez. And if this was a boxing match, you probably would have had Drake behind on the scorecard in the early rounds, right? Because there were a number of times where they were they were trying to get Drake on some slants and whatnot. Um, and Christian Gonzalez was able to kind of disrupt and contest those throws. That that turnover on downs uh right after the two-minute warning in the first half was a slant. You go to your number one guy against their number one guy and their number one guy kind of won in that situation. But even though Drake was behind on the scorecard, you know, he came in the end with the literal knockout play uh on that 40-yard bomb on a double move where he just basically mossed uh Christian Gonzalez had Jarvis Davis comparing it to, you know, what Julio Jones did to Luke Keequley oh so many years ago. And you know, I didn’t say anything on the Falcon Squad show, but I agree with Jarvis. It was it definitely reminded me of that type of play. And that play, you know, Drake landed on Christian Gonzalez. Christian Gonzalez exited the game from that point on and Drake took full advantage of that later uh with his third touchdown. Uh I believe was it on Carlton Davis or was it on Marcus Jones? I can’t remember. He two of them were on Marcus Jones definitely. I can’t remember the third one. Who was that on? But Drake made an excellent catch uh on that. So he was really kind of the star of the offense um today and the star of the defense today was Jaylen Walker. We welcome you back Mr. Walker. you you we haven’t seen you since that Bills game and you know we uh we really missed you my guy you know he came out there and he balled out right two sacks two tackles for loss three pressures uh forced fumble a PBU you know he did give up a touchdown to Pop Douglas early in this game you know that was a good scheme by Josh McDaniels if only uh another play caller could you know look at that and be like hey I’m going to steal that but you know that’s what happens when you put a guy in the back field and then you get him matched up against a linebacker and that’s been something that you know that’s just Josh McDaniels you know seeing like oh I know what the Falcons do right if we have the running back release to the left that means the edge rusher on that side of the field in this case Jaylen Walker is going to drop into coverage if we have the running back release to the right that means the other guy is going to drop in coverage and that would have been Leonard Floyd and the Falcons took advantage of that by put or the Patriots took advantage of that by hey we’re going to put our fastest guy up against a linebacker and take advantage of this on the wheel route and and that led to Jaylen Walker getting beat. But basically outside of that, Jaylen Walker, he you know, and he took that personally and he came back and made a number of crucial plays, including that sack strip. Uh that was that huge momentum swing right before halftime. He came free on a stunt, was able to just knock the ball loose on Drake May. James Pierce scooped it up, nearly scored, uh but went to set up uh that touchdown uh to cut the lead to seven points going into halftime. And so other thing that stood out on defense, Stefan Diggs had a quiet game. Now, he did score on a play um but finished this game with just three catches, 38 yards. Uh he did have a touchdown where he made a couple of guys miss uh after the catch, but you know, we’ll see what the film says. But likely Diggs’s quiet day today to me was it’s a testament to AJ Terrell uh keeping him locked down. AJ Terrell really had an outstanding game in this game, you know, or at least was invisible in this game for the most part because they weren’t throwing at him uh in this game. And that’s a testament, I think, to him. But we’ll see if if that’s true once we dig into the film. Um, and I I only bring it up just because I know when we talked about this with locked on Patriots on the crossover Thursday earlier, uh, last week, um, it was kind of like, okay, if we can take digs out of the game with AJ Terrell, you know, and he was kind of the opinion, well, it’s like, oh, well, the Patriots have other guys that can beat you. And the worry for me was, okay, if you take Diggs out of the game, does that open up an opportunity for someone like Kahan Boute, who’s been a very effective deep threat, uh, going up against Mike Q’s, right? But Boute exited his game pretty early and so Mike Hughes was kind of, you know, Mike a normal Mike Hughes game. Not not what we’ve seen for Mike Hughes the last couple weeks, which had been bad Mike Hughes, but just normal, okay, functional replacement level Mike Hughes. But instead, instead of Boute being the guy that beat you, it was Pop Douglas that really gave the Falcons problems in this game. He finished with four catches, 100 yards, a touchdown. He had a 58 yard bomb against uh Dford. I think a couple of those catches were against the offer. Not all of them, but uh really gave D offer the business. So, uh as they say, you know, Billy come back. Uh you can blame it all on me. Uh and so we need Billy Bowman to come back. You know, the last couple of weeks have been like, yeah, you know, I don’t think there’s a lot of difference between D. Alford and Billy Bowman, at least as far as being the nickel quarterback uh today. But, you know, as we talk about wanting to see these young players step up, it’s like, okay, Dia, you had you a nice run. It’s time for Billy to come back. And so hopefully we’ll get to see that. Um we’ll have many more and plenty more to talk about in this game as the week unfolds. Uh but those are kind of my main takeaways. The last little tidbit, you know, talking about players coming back from injury. The main t the other takeaway uh coming out of this game is going to be the offensive line injuries, right? Matthew Bersron, the Falcons left guard, exited the game early. He was replaced by Kyle Hinton. Chris Lindstöm, the Falcons right guard, exited late. he was replaced by Jovon Quinn. Uh, and if those injuries linger into this upcoming Colts game, that’s going to have major ramifications for this offense, particularly the run game. We talked about it when Caleb McGary, the Falcons right tackle, went down. It basically like, you know, him and Chris Lindstrom, like if if the run game was a V8 engine, McGary was four valves of that eight, you know, valve engine and Lynch was the other four valves as well. And so, you know, you already lost McGary for the season. You can’t afford to lose Lindstöm at all at this point because you even saw it in this game where the Falcons were just like, you know what, I don’t think we’re going to run the football uh against one of the best run defenses in the NFL, particularly with the injuries that the Falcons were dealing with. And you know, while other people may complain about that, I’m not going to necessarily um spend too much worry being like, we weren’t balanced against one of the best run defenses in the league with a bunch of backup offensive linemen in, you know, like that is not a that’s not a gripe that you’re going to hear from me this week. Uh but we’ll we’ll see on that front. So, you know, Jarvis Davis uh suggested on the Falcon Squad show that they kick Elijah Wilkinson inside to right guard and potentially have Storm Norton play right tackle. we talked about this um you know feels like this is the week where Storm Norton’s going to come back and so if Lindstöm does miss this upcoming game I think he exited with a foot injury. So we’ll hopefully get a positive update tomorrow on the podcast. But if he does miss that’s probably the the the best mechanism because you know we we do not want to see Javon Gwyn uh play any more snaps. But uh we’ll see on that front. And if you’re sitting here wondering, yes, the German accent will be utilized all week long, right? Don’t steal my joy, guys. I I know some of you guys hate the German accent, but like, look, I I have to talk about the Atlanta Falcons every single day. So, I need something that gives me joy. It’s not this team. And me doing a terrible German accent on the podcast is the thing that get is going to give me joy. So, don’t steal my joy. So, if you don’t like the German accent, then you know, okay? Right. No big deal. But I’m gonna keep doing it. So that’s it. A defiant way uh to wrap up the episode. Um you know, I’m just I’m I’m glad we’re back to just normal Falcons losses. I mean, there’s nothing normal about the way the Falcons lose a game. They miss an extra point, but like at the same time, it’s like, oh, this is just a normal Falcons loss. Like, oh, okay. This we’re back. We’re back, baby. So, like rather than just like the the utter disappointment of last week against Miami, where it’s just like y’all not going to even show up to the stadium in a home game. This is a home game. You know what I’m saying? So, uh, you know, I I I may be all smiles, not because I’m like overjoyed or anything like that, but I’m just like, okay, I don’t I don’t have to crash out this week. I can just talk about a normal Falcons loss like, you know, like any other loss that we’ve had over over the last, you know, 20 years that I’ve been doing this. So, um that’s it guys. Appreciate you. Hopefully, uh you know, better days are ahead for this team in Germany, uh included. And, uh make sure you continue to make us your first listen by checking us out on YouTube or wherever you listen to podcast. And of course, if you want to get the scoop on all the other things that happen all weekend long across the NFL in week nine, locked on NFL is going to have you covered two shows. That shot of espresso with Tyler Roland, the madman. And of course, headed to the barber shop for some real sports talk with Tony Wiggins. It’s all part of Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day.

Atlanta Falcons fall 24-23 to the New England Patriots after kicker John Parker Romo misses a crucial extra point that would have tied the game. Host Aaron Freeman breaks down Romo’s costly performance, Michael Penix Jr.’s improved road performance, and Drake London’s offensive explosion. Jalon Walker also dominated defensively with a game-changing strip-sack before halftime. The analysis covers offensive coordinator Zac Robinson’s evolving play-calling, critical offensive line injuries, and potential kicker replacements, including German prospect Lenny Krieg.

#atlantafalcons #nfl #newenglandpatriots #nflweek9 #week9 #drakelondon #michaelpenixjr #bijanrobinson #drakemaye #johnparkerromo #lennykrieg #jalonwalker

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