{"id":136749,"date":"2025-06-17T10:32:08","date_gmt":"2025-06-17T10:32:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/136749\/"},"modified":"2025-06-17T10:32:08","modified_gmt":"2025-06-17T10:32:08","slug":"rgiii-says-michael-penix-will-be-nfls-breakout-qb","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/136749\/","title":{"rendered":"RGIII says Michael Penix will be NFL&#8217;s &#8216;breakout QB&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Falcons QB Michael Penix Jr. receives praise from former NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Michael Penix Jr. will be the breakout QB of the Year in the NFL this year.<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Robert Griffin III (@RGIII) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/RGIII\/status\/1934730118120841460?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">June 16, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n<p>After several mediocre seasons, the <a href=\"https:\/\/thefalconswire.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/nfl\/falcons\/2025\/06\/16\/atlanta-falcons-michael-penix-jr-projected-for-5000-yard-season\/84227885007\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Atlanta Falcons<\/a> have a real shot to turn things around in 2025. While we&#8217;ve seen this team compete for the NFC South title in recent years, Atlanta hasn&#8217;t made the playoffs since 2017.<\/p>\n<p>Second-year quarterback <a href=\"https:\/\/thefalconswire.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/nfl\/falcons\/2025\/06\/16\/atlanta-falcons-michael-penix-jr-projected-for-5000-yard-season\/84227885007\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Michael Penix Jr<\/a>. will be at the helm of whatever success the <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/teams\/atlanta-falcons\/323\" data-autotag=\"55e278ca-caf0-429b-8b4a-caeb78bff5ff\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Falcons<\/a> have this season. The former No. 8 overall pick in the 2024 NFL draft started just three games for Atlanta last season but will enter 2025 as the team&#8217;s unquestioned starter.<\/p>\n<p>Despite Penix&#8217;s lack of experience, former NFL quarterback-turned-analyst Robert Griffin III believes the Falcons quarterback is on the verge of a &#8220;breakout&#8221; season.<\/p>\n<p>Griffin, or &#8220;RGIII&#8221; as most know him as, noted Penix&#8217;s arm talent and ability to stand in the pocket in the face of the pass rush. The former NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year believes these traits give Penix a solid foundation to build around as a quarterback.<\/p>\n<p>We&#8217;ve seen many great college quarterbacks struggle to adjust to the pass rush at the NFL level. Griffin noted Penix&#8217;s impressive average of 17.3 yards per completion when under pressure last season.<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Michael Penix Jr. will show off his ELITE arm talent, downfield throwing ability and anticipation this year.<\/p>\n<p>But his 3 starts last year showed he isn\u2019t afraid of the NFL pass rush.<\/p>\n<p>Penix Jr. led the NFL with 17.3 yards\/completion when under pressure.<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Robert Griffin III (@RGIII) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/RGIII\/status\/1934767244770234706?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">June 17, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Griffin&#8217;s comments come on the heels of praise also given by a <a href=\"https:\/\/thefalconswire.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/nfl\/falcons\/2025\/06\/16\/atlanta-falcons-michael-penix-jr-projected-for-5000-yard-season\/84227885007\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">former Falcons quarterback, Kurt Benkert,<\/a> as he predicts Penix will break 5,000 all-purpose yards. Considering he isn&#8217;t known for using his legs to get down field, a large portion of that would likely have to come through the air.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s not just Penix&#8217;s talent that has those around the NFL buying in. The young signal-caller&#8217;s supporting cast should truly give him a chance to succeed this season. <a href=\"https:\/\/thefalconswire.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/nfl\/falcons\/2025\/05\/24\/falcons-wide-receiver-breakdown-drake-london-darnell-mooney\/83839352007\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Drake London<\/a>, Bijan Robinson and Darnell Mooney will present matchup problems for any opposing defense.<\/p>\n<p>Plus, fifth-year tight end <a href=\"https:\/\/thefalconswire.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/nfl\/falcons\/2025\/05\/26\/falcons-te-breakdown-kyle-pitts-charlie-woerner-return-in-2025\/83864312007\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Kyle Pitts<\/a> is not someone to sleep on this season. Penix will be Pitts&#8217; fifth starting quarterback since joining the Falcons in 2021. So while a lot of people are quick to hammer the 24-year-old for not consistently putting up Pro Bowl numbers, having consistent quarterback play could be all he needs to succeed.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Falcons QB Michael Penix Jr. receives praise from former NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year Michael Penix Jr.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":136750,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[247,265,223,254,10498,4127,10329,6709,995,4130,224,7,10345,2403,1070,1092,6153,10732,6126,1879,16267,248,267,88,6,245,537,7853,7856,530,5358,202,101,9,266],"class_list":{"0":"post-136749","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nfl","8":"tag-american","9":"tag-american-football","10":"tag-atlanta","11":"tag-atlanta-falcons","12":"tag-bijan","13":"tag-bijan-robinson","14":"tag-darnell","15":"tag-darnell-mooney","16":"tag-drake","17":"tag-drake-london","18":"tag-falcons","19":"tag-football","20":"tag-griffin","21":"tag-iii","22":"tag-jr","23":"tag-kyle","24":"tag-kyle-pitts","25":"tag-london","26":"tag-michael","27":"tag-michael-penix-jr","28":"tag-mooney","29":"tag-national","30":"tag-national-sports","31":"tag-news","32":"tag-nfl","33":"tag-overall","34":"tag-overall-positive","35":"tag-penix","36":"tag-pitts","37":"tag-positive","38":"tag-robert","39":"tag-robert-griffin-iii","40":"tag-robinson","41":"tag-sports","42":"tag-sports-news"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114698252791285724","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136749","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=136749"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136749\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}