00:00There are no words to describe what we witnessed yesterday.
00:04And then I realized, no, there's plenty of words, just none of them that are good.
00:07My word, if you each want to have a word, my word is calamity.
00:13What's happening with the Falcons through the first two games and what we saw yesterday,
00:17first play fumble, first play the Falcons had fumble, last play the Falcons had fumble,
00:23in between interceptions and all kinds of other bad stuff, your words.
00:28Yeah, I'm going to steal Stakes Shapiro's word from his post-game reaction video,
00:32which was on 92.9's Instagram channel, debacle.
00:35That's exactly what it was yesterday.
00:36It was a debacle.
00:37I do want to say thank you to Mike Johnson for allowing us to have 15 more minutes of your
00:42time.
00:42Yeah, thank you.
00:43You have been just absolutely grinding over the last, call it, 36 hours.
00:48However, here is where I'm at with the Falcons.
00:51However you want to characterize the quarterback situation,
00:54it has clearly, clearly started to matriculate throughout the entire roster.
01:00You saw it yesterday on the field, and it's just really unfortunate.
01:04Well, and I think that the pushback that I've been giving for the sentiment that there's,
01:08it can't get any worse, what do you have to lose, it's always the locker room.
01:12That ability to really fester and get down into the depths of a roster,
01:17a roster that, mind you, probably is going to be 35 different people next year.
01:24I'm just, I'm just, that much turnover.
01:26That much turnover.
01:27Sure.
01:27There's that, I think there's that many people.
01:29Two thirds of the roster, basically.
01:31Yeah, there's that many people whose deals are expiring next year,
01:33and you have the most salary cap room.
01:35I would use, and you guys, we've all done post-game shows.
01:39The, the most difficult, it's my favorite thing to do is get on post-game or Graham McCauley,
01:43but the most difficult part of it is getting on after days like yesterday,
01:47where you have to come up with a word and come up with an answer and come up with what
01:50you saw.
01:51And Wes Durham's like, hey, thanks for joining us on the broadcast.
01:53Now it's to Mike and Graham, and I'm sitting there going, dude, I ain't got nothing.
01:57I would say the word I'm going to use.
01:59After Wes had suffered for four hours, he just tries it to you.
02:01He's just like, hey, take it for me.
02:03You didn't have anything because there was so much that you couldn't discern.
02:07What am I going to start with first?
02:08The word I'm going to use, I think y'all both have great words.
02:11I'm going to use just darkness.
02:13Like, that's how I feel.
02:14I feel like Falcons fans are in darkness.
02:16There's no, there is no light at the end of the time.
02:18Well, Falcons fans are used to the darkness, though.
02:20Not to this level.
02:22Not to this level.
02:22I think, look, no matter what you want to say about how bad the Falcons have been,
02:26you've been 8-9 and barely missed the playoffs the last couple years.
02:29This is bad.
02:30Like, what you saw yesterday was as bad as it's been.
02:33I have a question, and I think we should utilize this first 15,
02:37not only to touch on what happened yesterday, but to talk about the bigger picture.
02:41Because you just mentioned it.
02:42Falcons have been, what, 8-9 over the last three years, close to a playoff berth.
02:46If that's good, bad, or indifferent, you're in the NFC South.
02:49Okay, when you think about who's to blame for the start of this season,
02:55I would look at it and say, I don't blame Ian Cunningham.
03:00I don't blame Matt Ryan.
03:02Kevin Stefanski might get a little bit of blame.
03:05But I was listening to a Georgia broadcast over the weekend,
03:08and Jeff Dancer was talking about a college football program,
03:11and he said, you know, you don't gain 30 pounds in one month.
03:14You gain 30 pounds over a couple years.
03:16You gain 5 pounds one year.
03:18And then the next year you might gain 10 pounds.
03:21And then three years down the road you're like, holy cow, my pants don't fit anymore.
03:24What happened?
03:25That is exactly what's happened with the Atlanta Falcons.
03:28Their 36s don't fit.
03:30They're up in the 40 range, 42 range.
03:33Now you're looking back saying, how did this happen?
03:35I think it is a load of poor decisions over the last four years
03:41that have gotten to the Falcons where they are today.
03:44And now they're looking back saying, how did this happen?
03:48I don't know, Mike, how people can sit there and scream at Matt Ryan,
03:52scream at Kevin Stefanski, scream at Ian Cunningham.
03:54They inherited this mess.
03:57I think the offensive line is a prime example.
03:59The offensive line, you were good between the 20s,
04:03and you ran wide zone scheme, and you ran until you were blue in the face.
04:05You were built for that.
04:06You built smaller athletic offensive linemen that were built for that scheme.
04:10And then when you went to Zach Robinson's offense, it didn't really fit.
04:12There wasn't any marriage between the run game and the passing game.
04:15So then you lose your identity in that way.
04:17And now you're having an entirely new offense that nobody really fit.
04:21We don't know how the puzzle pieces all fit together with what this roster is.
04:25And we've had this conversation all offseason.
04:27I know you guys had as well.
04:29But we didn't think that it had to get worse before it got better with this franchise.
04:34Sure, that's a great way to put it.
04:35We've been saying that for so long now.
04:37We're on the precipice.
04:38It turns out, and especially when you look at Ian Cunningham's background, the Bears,
04:42some of the other teams, sometimes it absolutely has to get freaking worse before it gets better.
04:48And that's where we're at right now.
04:50We have to find a way to be, not only with the salary cut room, we have to find a
04:54way to add some draft picks.
04:55That's the conversation we're going to be having in the coming weeks.
04:57It's tough.
04:58This organization right now feels like, tastes like, smells like an expansion franchise.
05:06From what we've seen in the last two weeks.
05:09I'm fine with that.
05:10But you said, you're not blaming the names that you named, and you're really kind of talking about Drew over
05:17the course of four years.
05:19Well, who's the common thread through the four years?
05:23I mean, that's Arthur Blank.
05:24I'm not going to sit here and blame Arthur Blank.
05:25What I'm going to do, though, I put some faith in Matt Ryan because he's a winner, a leader.
05:32I figured, okay, he's not on the field being the quarterback, but Matt Ryan knows what he's doing.
05:37He was around this franchise for a very long time and was successful.
05:41And what happens?
05:43He makes these selections of his new general manager, new head coach.
05:48Okay, that's great.
05:49It's only two games.
05:50I'm not going to sit here and fire anybody.
05:53That's not the case.
05:56But one of his biggest decisions, I don't know how many people are talking about it,
05:59but it's something that stuck out for me during the late games yesterday.
06:03Kirk Cousins has six touchdown passes for the Raiders,
06:09and look at the mess that we have continuing to go on here.
06:13Cliff Kubiak was obviously on the Falcons' radar, I believe, Mike.
06:17He was in the building for a head coaching interview, and he had familiarity with Kirk Cousins.
06:23Obviously, the Falcons were going to have to continue to pay Kirk Cousins if they wanted to keep him.
06:26But look at what Cliff Kubiak is doing with Kirk Cousins in Las Vegas with the Raiders.
06:32They're 2-0.
06:33I don't even want to bring up that name.
06:34Forget about who they play.
06:35It's not even worth talking about it.
06:36We need to focus on our quarterback position here in Atlanta.
06:40And, yes, a lot of the conversation is around Michael Penix.
06:44What's up with Tua Tungabailoa, man?
06:46I mean, what is going on?
06:48Let me stop you there because I don't get enough time with you guys.
06:50But here's what I'll say, and this is one of the reasons I was not as hard on Cooper Rush
06:54last week
06:55because of what the offensive structure is.
06:57You guys bring up Kirk Cousins.
06:59He looks great in Vegas right now.
07:01The guy who was calling and designing the plays under Kirk Cousins doesn't look so good in Tampa right now.
07:05And it's one of the reasons I sometimes have a hard time going in on certain guys at that position
07:10because when you look at everything else they're being asked to do,
07:13and you go back to last week, there wasn't that many open receivers.
07:16It wasn't like we were designing these crazy nice plays.
07:19And that's what I mean by darkness when I look at this team is
07:22we don't even know that the guy calling the plays is the guy,
07:26much less who's going to be the quarterback.
07:28If Michael Penix comes in Thursday night and struggles and looks just like Cooper Rush did,
07:3451% of me says yes.
07:36The problem is the other 49%, I don't even know what name that is.
07:40You've had an ACL, right?
07:41Have you had an ACL surgery?
07:43No ACL.
07:43Okay, you've had surgeries, though.
07:45Yes, many.
07:46Tell me this.
07:48What does 72 hours do for Michael Penix on a short week?
07:53Today, we'll walk through.
07:54Tomorrow, light practice.
07:56Wednesday, probably a walk-through travel day.
07:58You're telling me that he's ready to go on Thursday and he wasn't ready yesterday?
08:03I asked the question this morning.
08:05I'd love to hear what you guys think.
08:07What does the text thread look like with Drake London, Kyle Pitts, and Michael Penix?
08:11Because you know there is one.
08:12Did you not say how they looked?
08:14They were absolutely...
08:15What does that look like?
08:16Is it not Drake going, all right, dude.
08:19What are we doing, man?
08:20What are we doing here?
08:21Because I'm yelling with fans.
08:23Me and Bajon are having probably players-only meetings at some point.
08:26Like, I don't know how...
08:29I always go player first, jury the same way.
08:31It's like, dude, you've got to make the decisions for you.
08:33It's a business.
08:33But I don't know how those conversations go with other individuals in the locker room
08:37saying, hey, I'm not ready.
08:38Hey, Drake, Bajon, and Kyle Pitts all just signed new deals, right?
08:43I can't imagine the types of incentives they have on performance inside their deals.
08:49They're getting their money messed with right now.
08:51You start week one and week two, and you're not getting anything at all.
08:56You know these guys, Mike.
08:58You know that in the locker room, they're worried about their own money.
09:01They want to perform at a high level.
09:02That's how they get paid on top of their salary, and they don't have a quarterback who can get
09:08them the football.
09:10If I'm Drake Lennon, and this is not necessarily a Penix thing.
09:14Well, we saw it last night.
09:14We saw it after the game, during the game.
09:16The frustration was him engaging with a fan in the stands.
09:19I can't, and I think that Falcons fans are looking and going, oh, he's under contract.
09:23He's fine.
09:23He's not.
09:24Dude, you're right.
09:25He's a competitor.
09:26A competitive person, and we've seen it.
09:28We see it time and time again throughout the NFL, where all of a sudden, a guy's in year
09:32two, year three of a contract, and it's like, I want out.
09:34Yeah.
09:34I want out.
09:35Matter of fact, DK Metcalf.
09:37I mean, you can go down the list of players that have done this over the course of the years
09:41on bad football teams.
09:42Oh, AJ Brown.
09:43How about just a couple of years ago when the Jets traded Sauce Gardner and Quentin Williams?
09:48It's, it's, that's, unfortunately, that's what we are, that's what we are moving towards
09:53right now.
09:53Well, that, I mean, that's beyond darkness, then.
09:56I agree.
09:57I think that's beyond darkness.
09:58I just think we're at a, we're at a precipice right now.
10:01We're at this pinch point where Thursday night, we need to know something about the future
10:06of this team.
10:06Well, it seems to me that Michael Penix would be the future of this team.
10:12You would think, you would hope, right?
10:13Hope and pray.
10:14But for you, a guy who's in the trenches, a guy who's part of your job is to protect
10:20that dude back there, and you know that he's not all in.
10:24How do you continue to do that?
10:26How do you play for a guy like that once he's out there, if he's ever out there, Mike?
10:30Well, the bottom line is, is that if you have Michael Penix come back Thursday and Michael
10:34Penix goes nine and six down the stretch or whatever else that record may be.
10:37Do you think that there is a world that that's a possibility?
10:40That Michael Penix can lead the Falcons to a nine and six record?
10:43I would say the odds are no, but if he comes out and looks great, the offense is operating
10:48at a much higher level, then I think that you look, you get at the end of the season
10:52and you forget about the first two weeks.
10:53You're like, ah, that's weird.
10:55Sure, sure.
10:55That's absolutely a possibility.
10:58That's the best case scenario.
10:59I mean, the mother of our best case scenarios.
11:00Right?
11:00That is the mother of our best case scenarios.
11:02Just real quick, in a couple of words, is Tua done?
11:06Is Tua just done?
11:10That's all I needed to know.
11:11Yes.
11:12Crazy, man.
11:13What a situation for the Falcons again.
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