{"id":11122,"date":"2025-04-30T00:47:11","date_gmt":"2025-04-30T00:47:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/11122\/"},"modified":"2025-04-30T00:47:11","modified_gmt":"2025-04-30T00:47:11","slug":"falcons-had-planned-to-draft-james-pearce-jr-at-no-15","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/11122\/","title":{"rendered":"Falcons Had Planned To Draft James Pearce Jr. At No. 15"},"content":{"rendered":"

While the Jets carried the curse of John Abraham<\/a> at edge rusher for over a decade, the Falcons also struggled mightily to replace the since-retired pass rusher. Despite first-round picks, notable free agency additions and a 2024 trade, Atlanta has come up empty in its search for consistent EDGE presences.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Abraham, whom Atlanta acquired in a three-team trade in 2006, signed with the Cardinals in 2013. The Falcons have sputtered in their attempts to locate edges since. Free agency additions (Osi Umenyiora<\/a>, Dwight Freeney<\/a>, Bruce Irvin<\/a>, Dante Fowler<\/a>, Bud Dupree<\/a>) and a Matt Judon<\/a> trade either provided stopgaps or ended up misfiring, while first-rounders Vic Beasley<\/a> (2015) and Takk McKinley<\/a> (2017) did not become long-term answers. Falcons have produced one double-digit sack season (Beasley\u2019s outlier 2016) since Abraham\u2019s 2013 exit.<\/p>\n

[RELATED: Jalon Walker May Need Surgery]<\/a><\/p>\n

This alarming trend heavily influenced Atlanta\u2019s 2025 draft. The team had attempted to trade up for<\/a> Laiatu Latu<\/a> after its surprising Michael Penix Jr.<\/a> pick last year, but no deal emerged. The Falcons did find a taker this year, sending their 2026 first-rounder to the Rams in a package that secured them<\/a> James Pearce Jr.<\/a> at No. 26. This came after Atlanta chose Jalon Walker<\/a> at No. 15. The duo represents the biggest swing the Falcons have taken to stop this pass-rushing drought since Abraham\u2019s Cardinals defection.<\/p>\n

Although the Falcons have drawn criticism for trading their 2026 first to move into the late first round, they did so because they placed a high value on Pearce. The Tennessee edge presence would have been Atlanta\u2019s No. 15 pick had Walker not been available, according to SI.com\u2019s Albert Breer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Falcons did not expect Walker to be there at 15, leading to the Georgia hybrid linebacker being the choice. Walker had been linked to a few teams in the top 10 \u2014 from the Saints to the Panthesr to the Jets to even the Patriots at No. 4. Falcons GM Terry Fontenot said the team would have been \u201cmore than comfortable\u201d taking Pearce at 15, per ESPN.com\u2019s Marc Raimondi<\/a>. Fontenot noted Pearce being off the board would have caused the Falcons to stand down, but they will be without their 2026 first-rounder because of a high grade on Pearce.<\/p>\n

Even as Grady Jarrett<\/a> returned from his ACL tear to team with Judon, the Falcons ranked 31st in pressure rate last season. Pearce, who registered 17.5 sacks over his final two Tennessee seasons and clocked a 4.47-second 40-yard dash, will join Walker and free agency addition<\/a> Leonard Floyd<\/a> in a beefed-up Falcons pass rush. Pearce had come up as a Falcons target at 15 during draft week<\/a>. The team hosted him on a \u201c30\u201d visit<\/a> as well.<\/p>\n

It will be interesting to see how the Falcons use Walker, Pearce and Floyd. Walker\u2019s work as an off-ball linebacker at Georgia creates some possibilities for the team to use all three together, but Floyd is a 49ers cap casualty on a one-year, $10MM deal. Walker and Pearce are in place to be Atlanta\u2019s hopeful long-term answers to one of the NFL\u2019s longest-running problems.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While the Jets carried the curse of John Abraham at edge rusher for over a decade, the Falcons…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11123,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2074],"tags":[80,223,254,2554,224,7,1486,1497,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-11122","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-atlanta-falcons","8":"tag-2025-nfl-draft","9":"tag-atlanta","10":"tag-atlanta-falcons","11":"tag-atlantafalcons","12":"tag-falcons","13":"tag-football","14":"tag-jalon-walker","15":"tag-james-pearce","16":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114424161562442201","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11122\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11123"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}