The Atlanta Falcons haven’t drafted a star edge rusher since 1999.
It’s hard to believe it’s been that long since the Falcons found a pass-rusher in the draft it could rely on for multiple seasons in a big way, but it’s the truth. Defensive end Patrick Kerney stands as Atlanta’s last truly impactful drafted edge rusher that provided meaningful success over multiple seasons.
Outside of Kerney, the team’s next-best edge rusher drafted is defensive end Kroy Biermann, a rotational player who never eclipsed more than five sacks in a season. Sure, 2015 first rounder Vic Beasley led the league in sacks in 2016, but that campaign was an anomaly compared to his other four seasons in Atlanta.
Since 2000, John Abraham and Adrian Clayborn were the only notable veteran edge additions that ever panned out as hoped. Flashy edge free-agent signings like Ray Edwards, Dante Fowler Jr., Tyson Jackson, Osi Umenyiora and Brooks Reed failed to ever live up to their lofty contracts the 2010s. Successful stopgap players like Dwight Freeney, Calais Campbell and Bud Dupree only stuck around for single seasons.
The Falcons haven’t fielded a double-digit edge rusher since that 2016 Beasley season. Clayborn’s 9.5-sack 2017 was the last time any Atlanta player got close to that mark. The franchise’s single-season sack history doesn’t even seem real for how few players have sustained real impact over the years. The franchise has the fewest amount of sacks in the NFL over the past 20 seasons as a result.
If you’re wondering why the Falcons decided to trade its 2026 first rounder to snag an additional first rounder this year to draft Tennessee outside linebacker James Pearce Jr., this is a big reason as to why.
The team double-dipping at the edge position in the 2025 NFL Draft dropped a lot of jaws outside of the Falcons sphere, if only because you basically never see a team add two players at the same position in the first round of a draft and expend massive draft capital to do so. For most, the move reeks of desperation.
However, for Atlanta, “desperation” hasn’t ever felt so… convincing.
A year after shocking the world by picking Michael Penix Jr. eighth overall in the 2024 NFL Draft after signing Kirk Cousins, the team decided to take Georgia outside linebacker Jalon Walker and Pearce last week, mortgaging a future first-rounder to make the latter possible.
After signing outside linebacker Leonard Floyd in the offseason as a free agent and returning 2024 rookie outside linebacker Bralen Trice from an offseason ACL tear, the Falcons will have completed a dramatic makeover of its outside linebacker room. Ascending outside linebacker Arnold Ebiketie has been the only Falcons draft pick of the Terry Fontenot era to consistently show improvement on the defensive line, but he’s not going to be alone this fall in getting after the quarterback.
The gamble Fontenot and coach Raheem Morris made in 2024 with Penix paid off in a huge way once the wheels came off Cousins last fall. Penix flashed astonishing throwing ability and displayed consistent poise through his impressive three starts to close the season after Cousins was benched, making that widely decried draft pick look much, much more savvy in the rearview. Sure, the Cousins signing didn’t age well, but taking Penix did for where the team now finds itself.
Rather than scramble to find a Cousins replacement in 2025 through an underwhelming quarterback class, the Falcons now get to build on Penix’s promise and see if he can unlock the full potential of having running back Bijan Robinson and Tyler Allgeier, wide receivers Drake London and Darnell Mooney and tight end Kyle Pitts on your roster. Combined with a veteran offensive line, Atlanta’s offense had what it needed to take the next step.
The defense did not. The Cousins signing did limit the team’s cap space in 2025, and Atlanta had to settle for more fiscally reasonable defensive free agents like Floyd, defensive end Morgan Fox, linebacker Divine Deablo and safety Jordan Fuller. All of those guys can be solid contributors, but none of them have star power.
The Walker-Pearce combo gives the team’s defensive front seven the best chance it’s had at establishing a real pass rush in ages. Not since the 2017 season have the Falcons had this kind of lineup, when the team boasted Beasley, Clayborn, Reed, 2017 first rounder Takk McKinley and Derrick Shelby as its primary rushing group. Of course, that group was highlighted by Clayborn’s 9.5 sacks, so even it didn’t live up to its potential. Beasley, Reed and Shelby all started to taper out during that campaign, and McKinley’s brief ascent ended with him being cut in 2020. This 2025 group has so much youth and promise compared to years past.
Fontenot and Morris have showed striking draft conviction since joining forces in 2024, and they clearly have no worries about fielding the jeers of those who feel that their unconventional, aggressive approach is foolish.
It’s not hard to see the way this goes wrong for Atlanta. What if Walker plays well and Pearce does not? What if both players struggle, the offense doesn’t take the leap and the Falcons have a losing season with no 2026 first-round pick? Fontenot and Morris will be judged harshly after that, perhaps most severely with their jobs. That’s a lot of things that need to go wrong, but this is the NFL. Snowballing can tank your best intentions.
However … what if it all works? What if the unconventional aggression that dictates the Fontenot and Morris era actually pays off for Atlanta in a big way? What if Walker and Pearce both show oodles of pass-rushing potential in their first season right when the Penix offense starts to take flight? What if Atlanta starts winning games in bundles, wins the division and boasts an impressive young core all on rookie contracts?
Fontenot and Morris see that vision and have acted on it. Time will tell if they’re right, but is their approach really that risky as opposed to straddling the line? Sure, the team didn’t consider positional value during the Arthur Smith years, but that team cratered because of lackluster play-calling, a lack of a long-term quarterback and, quite frankly, taking a couple of swings to fix massive issues. It was devastatingly conservative to the point of ruin.
The Morris years have put such a premium on finding solutions to Atlanta’s biggest needs that the team hasn’t been afraid to double down on possible solutions to make sure they’re, y’know, found if at all possible.
The Falcons have missed the playoffs for the last seven seasons, and Fontenot and Morris entered this offseason desperately needing to spark the team in a major way with limited resources. They took yet another massive swing in the first-round in the 2025 NFL Draft that got lots of scrutiny, but the duo’s Penix foresight looks much better now that Cousins is on the outs in Atlanta.
If they hit on their Walker and Pearce picks, they’ll both be in Atlanta for the next couple of seasons at least. If they don’t, they may find themselves without a job. Even if they didn’t make the Pearce move, this was a crucial offseason for general manager and coach to make things work sooner than later in Atlanta. Do you blame them for swinging for the fences and seeing if they can hit in a massive way as opposed to continued slow-walking that could yield the same result?
Teams like the Philadelphia Eagles and Baltimore Ravens can afford to pace things out because of their sustained success. However, the Eagles earned lots of strange looks by taking Jalen Hurts in the second round when Carson Wentz was already on the roster, and the Ravens did the same when taking Lamar Jackson while Joe Flacco still wore a Baltimore jersey. Neither move earned much praise at the time, but both decisions paved the path for real team-building and eventual contention. If the Falcons hit on Penix, that will be their path, too. It’s easier to build out your team’s foundation when you have a quarterback.
That path will largely hinge right now on Walker and Pearce showing immediate promise. However, if this really was the make-it-or-break-it offseason for Fontenot and Morris, why not push all the chips in?
There are no guarantees this will work for the Falcons as they hope, and plenty of people think it’s destined to fail in the same way people expect Wile E. Coyote to crash out while chasing the Road Runner. However, the Falcons aren’t Wile E. Coyote, if only because nobody in the NFL is in essence. Any team can find success if they play their cards right, and sometimes, it’s the passionate gambler who walks way the richest.
This plan working could set Atlanta up in a substantial way for the next decade and prove a lot of people wrong. With the real potential Penix, Walker and Pearce all have, this massive bet really can pay off in ways that pull Atlanta out of the football cellar once and for all.
Sometimes, getting a little desperate… sick and tired of making the same mistakes the old-fashioned way and seemingly without any other options to dig yourself out than making a couple of big risks, driven by internal belief and ironclad conviction… is all it takes to find yourself winning again. It’s not at all safe, but the reward is immense.
