{"id":728518,"date":"2026-02-04T10:08:42","date_gmt":"2026-02-04T10:08:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/728518\/"},"modified":"2026-02-04T10:08:42","modified_gmt":"2026-02-04T10:08:42","slug":"matt-ryan-wont-commit-to-michael-penix-jr-as-falcons-starting-qb","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/728518\/","title":{"rendered":"Matt Ryan won’t commit to Michael Penix Jr. as Falcons’ starting QB"},"content":{"rendered":"

Matt Ryan<\/a> is not ready to say that Michael Penix Jr.<\/a> will be the starting quarterback for the Atlanta Falcons when the 2026 season kicks off. At the introductory press conference for new general manager Ian Cunningham, Ryan was asked if Penix will be the Falcons\u2019 starter when he returns from an ACL injury. <\/p>\n

\u201cNeither of us are the head coach of the football team, so we can\u2019t answer your question on that,\u201d Ryan said on Tuesday, per Marc Raimondi of ESPN<\/a>. \u201c\u2026 I think as we start to get into this process and dive deeper into the roster \u2014 how it currently stands, where it\u2019s going in the future \u2014 I think those are conversations that\u2019ll be a part of it.<\/p>\n

\u201cQuarterback\u2019s obviously very important, and we\u2019re excited about Mike and what he\u2019s doing with his rehab. I\u2019ve been up at the facility the last three weeks, and Michael\u2019s been in there attacking that, and he\u2019s in a good space right now, so we\u2019re excited about where he is at. But certainly, a lot of discussions for us about the entire roster.\u201d<\/p>\n

Looking at Michael Penix Jr.\u2019s numbers for the 2025 season<\/p>\n

The Falcons selected Michael Penix Jr. at No. 8 overall in the 2024 NFL Draft. He became the full-time starter at the start of the 2025 season and completed 60.1 percent of his passes for 1,982 yards, nine touchdowns, and three interceptions in nine games. Penix missed the second half of the season after suffering a torn ACL in November. He\u2019s expected to be out anywhere from nine to 12 months. <\/p>\n

Atlanta selected Penix after signing Kirk Cousins<\/a> to a four-year, $180 million contract. Cousins played in 10 games this past season and completed 61 percent of his passes for 1,721 yards with 10 touchdowns and five interceptions. He is expected to be released<\/a> by the team after his contract was adjusted. <\/p>\n

The Falcons are looking for consistency, as they have not made the playoffs since the 2017 season. At that time, Ryan was the starting QB, and he had a stellar career with the Falcons. Ryan played in Atlanta from 2008 to 2021 and was named to the Pro Bowl four times. He was also selected to the All-Pro First Team, won the NFL MVP award, and led the Falcons to a Super Bowl appearance during the 2016 season. The Falcons named Ryan the team\u2019s president of football in January.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Matt Ryan is not ready to say that Michael Penix Jr. will be the starting quarterback for the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":728519,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2074],"tags":[223,254,37274,2554,224,7,8673,105327,41571,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-728518","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-atlanta-falcons","8":"tag-atlanta","9":"tag-atlanta-falcons","10":"tag-atlanta-falcons-atlanta","11":"tag-atlantafalcons","12":"tag-falcons","13":"tag-football","14":"tag-ga","15":"tag-matt-ryan-03-william-penn-charter","16":"tag-michael-penix-jr-18-tampa-bay-tech","17":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116011814349544626","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/728518","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=728518"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/728518\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/728519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=728518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=728518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=728518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}