00:00The Falcons on the road and bringing home a win.
00:0235-14, the final score at Lambeau Field.
00:05The Falcons' first win there since 2008 when it was a rookie quarterback
00:10named Matt Ryan who led the Falcons into enemy territory
00:13and came away with that win.
00:15This breaks a four-game slide up there, and the return of Michael Penix
00:17obviously was the big story on this night.
00:20Penix was quite simply superb in his return.
00:24He was injured in Week 11 last year, missed the first couple of weeks
00:27of this season and came back with a vengeance.
00:30Let's call it that here in Week 3 as the Falcons pick up a much-needed win.
00:34Let's send it back up to Lambeau Field.
00:35Dave Archer with Falcons quarterback Michael Penix.
00:38Michael, I had a chance to see your young bride before the game.
00:41She was excited before the game.
00:43I said, how's Mike feeling?
00:44She said, I know he's excited.
00:46Tell me about how it felt like out there.
00:47Man, I was excited.
00:49I'm just blessed.
00:50Blessed to be able to come out of this game healthy, obviously with a win as well.
00:54I felt really good.
00:55I felt good coming into this week.
00:57That's the reason why I was out there.
00:58We're going to keep it rolling.
01:00It was fun to watch you cut it loose.
01:01It felt like you played free and that you trusted the guys out there.
01:05Talk me through that.
01:06Yeah, for sure.
01:07I had to settle in early in the game.
01:09Obviously, I had a pick that I want back.
01:12Once I settled in, I felt comfortable with B. John and B. Rob in the run game.
01:19Helping open up things in the back end with the pass game.
01:22It was awesome.
01:22As you watched Green Bay try to figure out what they could do to start, they kept trying
01:27to play that two-high shell and they weren't able to stop the run game, but it seemed like
01:31every time they tried to walk somebody in the box, you touched them down the field.
01:34Yeah, for sure, man.
01:34That's the power of having a run game.
01:38They got to defend.
01:39They got to figure out which one they want to defend.
01:40Obviously, with the weapons that we have all over the field, it's hard for a defense to
01:46defend that.
01:47It's great to be able to see B. John, B. Rob, the O-line, working hard and getting the
01:52run game going to open up the pass game.
01:53There was a couple of cool moments for you, for me, watching, having played the position.
01:58The bootleg play where you get out and you find the two-point conversion.
02:00There was a play where it gets called back, where Taylor gets called for holding, but
02:08you bounced outside like nothing and found B. Rob on the sideline.
02:13Tell me about just, I mean, from a confidence standpoint.
02:16I know you already had the confidence.
02:17Did it feel good to do that?
02:18Yeah, it did feel good.
02:19Like I said, I just continue to get more confidence throughout the game.
02:23As I continue to get comfortable in the game, getting calm in the pocket and stuff like
02:29that.
02:29It felt good.
02:30I felt good coming into this game.
02:32I knew I could do all those things whenever that time presented itself.
02:35When it did, when that time do come, I will get out of the pocket like you saw.
02:39This is a team that had won 12 consecutive home openers.
02:43This is not an easy place to win.
02:44There's a lot of teams.
02:45In fact, Atlanta lost their last four games in this building.
02:48How does it feel to come into Lambeau Field and get a win?
02:50Man, it's awesome, man.
02:52It was awesome to be here.
02:53This, obviously, is my first time playing here.
02:56Their fans, they were loud, but our fans came.
02:59Our fans showed up.
03:00Yeah, they did.
03:00You know, so just thankful for our fans showing up.
03:02We heard them.
03:03So just for y'all out there, we heard y'all out there.
03:05We appreciate y'all showing up.
03:07And obviously, we got that win for y'all.
03:09Appreciate it.
03:10Tell you who else showed up.
03:11Michael Penix, Jr., our guys back on the field.
03:13So thanks, man.
03:14Always.
03:15That's right.
03:16Michael Penix, Jr., Atlanta Falcons quarterback, as he was back from that ACL injury, suffered
03:21late last season.
03:22And what a return it was for him.
03:24And as he pointed out, and we talked about it a little bit earlier, I mean, it was a very
03:27vocal contingent of Falcons fans, Mike.
03:29And that was not lost on Atlanta up there, you know, in a tough place to play, in a place
03:34that you can't necessarily go in and expect to win.
03:36They were able to win in a very emphatic fashion as well.
03:40So a lot to cheer about up there for those Falcons fans.
03:42And obviously, for this team to take away from this game, Penix started out one of five,
03:47had the interception on the opening drive as well.
03:50From that point on, 17 of 20, he was super dialed in.
03:54And part of that dialed in was he had his big playmaker.
03:56And that was Drake London, who had a monster game as well.
03:59If you're Michael Penix, I don't know how much better it can be than to have a receiver
04:03like Drake London, who can go out there and make the kind of plays he made tonight.
04:06Yeah, I think it was, it's really interesting too, because I think there was a situation
04:09very early where it was a fourth down that Drake wanted them to go for.
04:14And he was visibly upset, yelling on the sideline, like kind of being demonstrative in some of
04:21the things he was saying.
04:22And I can only imagine the frustration for him over what really he's been through over
04:27the course of not only the last few weeks, his career with the quarterback position, right?
04:32It's been frustrating for him.
04:33So you start to see some of that spill out.
04:35He, you know, he's a veteran player now.
04:37He's got the contract extension.
04:38He wants to be able to make sure he makes his imprint on the game.
04:41And I thought that he just took over in terms of the way he was running his routes, the
04:45tenacity with which he ran the ball once he did get his hands on the ball.
04:49And look, I want to make mention of this too, because Michael Penix brought it up.
04:52You brought it up.
04:53This team, the way they dealt with the fan base and Michael Penix has dealt with the fan
04:58base over the last couple of days and the last couple of weeks, they were united in
05:02the message.
05:02We have to play better.
05:04Yeah.
05:04In a day and age where you hear people talking about booze and, you know, you hear players
05:09in different sports saying, I made this money because of this.
05:12And I thought that the fact that they were able to hold all that together and Michael
05:16Penix was able to hold that together and then to come out and thank the fans and the
05:19fans show up in Green Bay.
05:20I think that's worth a tip of the cap, in my opinion, for everybody involved.
05:24And I think that's awesome to hear.
05:26Yeah.
05:26I mean, that's how you handle it.
05:27And that's, you want that kind of recognition as well.
05:29I don't mean that the fans, obviously they always want to be recognized, but you want
05:32to have somebody that has that awareness that's able to bring attention where it belongs,
05:36which is the support that you need to get through a long season.
05:39And again, I shudder to think what it would have been like for the Falcons to continue to
05:42struggle to get consistent quarterback play.
05:44Or if this game was say the opposite, and we're talking about the score being the other
05:48way around, you know, it'd be a very different kind of conversation in the season would obviously
05:52continue to be challenge after challenge after challenge, which of course the NFL, that's
05:56a new challenge every single week.
05:57It's never going to be easy.
05:58And so you've got to, I think, really take everything you can from a win like this, because
06:03this was hard fought.
06:04This involved contributions up and down on both sides of the ball and special teams.
06:09This was a really complete win for the Atlanta Falcons.
06:12And we'll talk about some of the different stats in all of this, but I don't know the
06:15last time I've looked at a Falcons team that had 25 first downs, but they
06:18did on this night.
06:19Yeah.
06:19Some of the numbers I'm looking at are kind of crazy.
06:22And I mentioned to you a minute ago, it was like they had 500 yards and then they kneeled
06:25on it twice and you ended up with 498.
06:27That's right.
06:27That's like round numbers.
06:29Yeah.
06:29That's something you're going to hate.
06:30But I mean, look, I think the beauty of it is, and I don't want to go too far into
06:34this.
06:34We got plenty of time left to talk about it, but we talked a lot during training camp about
06:40toughness and about live tackling drills.
06:43And Kevin Stefanski's first interview is like, it's going to start in the weight room.
06:46And we're going to build, and I think you lose sight of that because of what you've
06:49seen the last couple of weeks.
06:50It feels finesse.
06:51It doesn't feel tough.
06:53So to come out and really, you know, put your foot down in prime time and be able to
06:58just, you mentioned some of the numbers we're seeing.
07:01It just has to feel good for everybody involved.
07:03Yeah.
07:04I mean, they imposed their will on the Green Bay Packers tonight and the Packers have
07:08got a lot of things to, uh, to figure out.
07:09And obviously we'll talk a little bit about that as we continue, as far as what the style
07:13of play was.
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