They're just maybe some, some small things.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I agree.

And yeah, you, I don't think you can put all the blame on, on any, you know, one player, but in general, I kind of say that it's, it's, it's, the coaching needs to be better for Pennix to like give him the better ideas, the better picture in his mind of where he needs to be going with the football or where he needs to be looking and, and giving him the kinds of routes in order to be able to take advantage of these looks.

If there's one thing that I feel like Stefanski is really mentioned in every single press conference he's done since the bears game ended the post game, the Monday, and then even today is, is saying like these pressure looks that we're getting from these teams, like these extreme pressure looks when they're bringing like seven guys in the line of scrimmage, like that should be our advantage.

We should be able to see that and essentially be like licking our lips and saying like we can actually take the advantage in this situation and not kind of be like in a defensive posture of like, OK, we need to have like every every single guy blog and just like doing our best to make sure that we execute on every level.

have those bad plays but then the whole team is like dapping you up and like no man we really believe in you he goes out at the end of the game makes some great plays one of them unfortunately gets called back due to penalty but like still made some great plays i think this is like this might be like the turning point you know where you look at those bad plays it's like oh yeah remember that game and then he like took off i feel like this happens with rookies sometimes so that's my prediction is that after this week you know branches is part of this offense

Strand, maybe? But what's your read on this situation? Because I feel like we're no closer to figuring this thing out than we were a month ago.

Yeah, it's an interesting one.

I think today everybody thought that it was going to be Cooper Rush.

That was kind of like the understanding with the wishy-washiness from Kevin Stefanski's press conference in the morning was that Cooper was going to be the starter.

Yeah.

And then, you know, I asked Cooper Rush if he got all the starting snaps, which Kevin Stefanski was also asked what that distribution would be beforehand.

He openly declined to answer that question.

But, yeah, Joe, I mean, do you think there's anything to that line of thinking where it's like if Penix doesn't start this week, are you really putting him out there for Green Bay on a short week? You know, I mean, it's a tough situation there.

And I guess maybe that's the next place to go here is do you think Penix not participating in preseason is like a disqualifier for winning the week one job? Or is this just sort of another thing that that is maybe fans overrating versus what the team actually cares about?

It doesn't sound like it's disqualifying because I basically asked Kevin Stavansky that today.

Like if Michael Penix isn't playing in preseason, does he have a chance to be the week one starter or is Tua kind of by default the week one starter? And he was like, you know, staying where we are day to day, we're not going to kind of get ahead of ourselves there.

So that to me, the answer there is that it's not disqualifying for Michael Penix.

What's growing very obvious to me now is curious to me when Ian Rappaport mentioned it on Monday on the NFL Network show.

But what's becoming blatantly obvious is every national pundit or comment, you know, commentator that has insight into the Falcons is saying that this is basically Michael.

pennix's job to win going into these basically next two weeks you know the media is not going to be up there next week and i believe it's just like that across the nfl like the the week before the week one is kind of a dead week for media will be up there one time for a press conference with the in cunningham but they will be practicing all week and i do wonder if maybe you know this quarterback competition i wonder if maybe it gets actually like very competitive in that regards for this like short time term period um because someone needs to win this job you know like someone needs to earn this job that's what all these reporters are saying and it takes me back kevin to that speech that matt ryan gave when he was kind of surprisingly introduced and inducted into the ring of honor for the falcons and he was giving that that that speech in the team meeting room and he was talking about what it means to be a falcon and like earning it and if you earn it then like the falcon the the fans are gonna come reward you and I think it kind of ties back to that like and especially with Matt Ryan at the head of this thing now like somebody's got to actually earn it like nobody like you can't just give this thing away like by default which is kind of the situation we've been in for a while and I think that since they've realized that there was an opportunity for Mike to get back and actually put his hat in the ring for this I think they've wanted to kind of leave that option open and um as long as you know Tua wasn't blowing their doors off

The fact that he's coming out and saying something like that is really meaningful, I think, for the state of this quarterback competition.

yeah definitely now uh later we're going to get into the how the quarterbacks look today but you know outside of the quarterback position was there any player or any uh position group that stood out today in today's padded practice

Yeah.

I mean, I think, you know, Zachariah branch continues to stand out.

I don't know if people have seen yet on the Falcon social media, but he had a really great one-handed catch in some one-on-ones.

Now, normally I don't really take a whole lot away from, from one-on-ones, especially for the receiver, because it's just, it almost feels unfair.

They have so much room to work with, but in this case, he was just kind of running a go route basically.

And so it was just a straight up win for him and in some pretty tight coverage there.

What was your assessment of Penix's performance on Monday and, you know, or some of the discussions of maybe him having lackluster days the last couple of days in practice, you know, maybe overblown or is it accurate in your

Penix really isn't able to get out there, it's kind of just Tua's job at that point to lose.

Yeah, and, and you also I think have to take in account, you know, all the things that they've done in the off-season program prior to this, where Tua was leading, you know, the ones for the most part.

Not that Penix didn't get any reps, but that it was mainly Tua.

Um, and, you know, there was always the reason why he wanted to sign for the Falcons.

I, I always come back to that, you know.

Like, Tua could've signed pretty much anywhere at a, a million and a half dollars.

Um, and the reason he probably signed is 'cause he thought he, you know, had a, had a, you know, great chance to, to be the starting quarterback here because of really the contextual situation of Penix's injury.

Um, but yeah, I mean, really, Joe, like, uh, what, what are you, what are you hoping to see? I know there's another practice tomorrow before things get opened up to the fans, but what, what are you hoping to see, uh, over the next couple days while things get ramped up?

And I'm curious, Joe, when you think about what this offensive line is going to be in 2026, and then potentially in the years after that, where do your thoughts go?

Yeah.

And one of the reasons I wanted to talk about offensive lines, cause I want to get your opinion on this as well.

And one of the reasons why it was top of mind for me is because of, uh, the conversation or question I was asking, uh, Bill Callahan, um, a couple of weeks ago when media was out there and, um, you know, it's something I asked him a question that I'd heard a little bit from Arthur Smith and I think Terry Fontenot too, um, you know, in previous years, kind of talking about offensive line developments and, um, how quickly you can create a pro offensive lineman from college where they're running so much weird quick game stuff and they're not necessarily used to protecting a quarterback under center on a seven-step drop or whatever.

And what was interesting to me about it was Bill Callahan kind of explained that the goal is kind of related to the salary cap.

And as an offensive line coach, you're kind of trying to help the team in the salary cap department more than anything, you're just trying to come up with, you know, usable offensive linemen at an NFL level that are basically cheap.

Like, I don't know if an offensive line coach is necessarily creating the next Tristan works.

know kevin stefanski's success and and failures in cleveland often were tied to that brown's offensive line when they were at their best that's when they were a playoff team and you saw diminishing returns these last couple years when they had constant injuries constantly reshuffling that offensive line over the last two years so i'm just curious what do you think is the goal for this team maintaining continuity or just kind of let's kind of rebuild this in our own animation

So I'm just curious, where do you kind of fall in that conversation?

Yeah, it's kind of a double-edged sword because I think one of the reasons why you are able to offer these contracts to Drake and Bijan and keep them around is because you're not tied down to a really big contract that tends to be at the quarterback position.

In fact, I was just looking around at the – I don't know if you've ever looked at this on Over the Cap, but the cap textures kind of segment of the – um, website kind of breaks down each of each team's roster kind of by contract class.

So there's like the elite class and that's like the, the $40 million contracts.

And not every team has one.

I would say probably maybe, uh, Maybe 40% of the NFL probably doesn't even have one single elite contract in that sense, just elite being the size of the contract.

And those elite contracts tend to be quarterbacks, edge rushers, those really premium positions.

In practice, I'm curious, are there things that you're sort of noticing so far that, you know, you think could have an impact later this summer when we get to training camp and the competition really heats up?

What do you think about this extension? Is this right about where you expected this to come in? What do you think about the deal?

Pretty much.

I actually kind of – I don't know if I was just – kind of dooming over this, but like, I was kind of imagining something different potentially happening with, with Drake London, which was him just stringing the thing along, you know, playing the fifth year option, playing on a franchise tag and just kind of making things uncomfortable for the Falcons potentially until they got a quarterback in place that he felt comfortable with, or they came out and, you know, paid an exorbitant amount for him.

To me, this is obviously, it's a rich deal.

Of course, like he's going, he's like, going to put nearly as many dollars in his pocket as any wide receiver in history but you know in the context of the modern NFL I think that it's a it's a very reasonable deal for the Falcons where he's getting paid as like one of the top receivers but not the top and um the number will continue to look better as it always does with all these guys remember when AJ Terrell signed his new deal and was like wow he's like being paid like I forget what he was at the time where it put him among cornerbacks when he signed his deal.

But then, you know, other cornerbacks get signed.

As the years go on, the salary cap goes up, and all of a sudden that contract, you know, doesn't look nearly as – like anchoring to you as it once may have.

but yeah please please continue Joe