Ricardo Allen began listing the weapons on the Atlanta Falcons‘ offense and shook his head.
Wide receivers Julio Jones
Andre Reed Jersey , Mohamed Sanu and Calvin Ridley. Running backs Devonta Freeman and Tevin Coleman. Quarterback Matt Ryan.
The safety said facing those playmakers is like a bad dream he must revisit every practice. But Allen also smiled because that’s good news for Atlanta’s
2018 outlook.
”Oh, man, you’ve got Julio, you’ve got Sanu, you’ve got Ridley on the field at the same time and you’ve got those running backs,” Allen said Saturday. ”Who
do you match up against? Who do you put your best players on? It’s like a
matchup nightmare.”
The front office has taken action to make those playmakers happy – and safe.
Ryan has a new five-year, $150 million contract extension. Jones was given an adjustment to his five-year, $71.5 million contract and a promise the deal will
be renegotiated after the season. Left tackle Jake Matthews agreed to five-year,
$75 million extension on Friday, and the team’s top offseason acquisition was
right guard Brandon Fusco, adding more stability to the offensive line.
Ridley, a wide receiver from Alabama, was the team’s first-round draft pick .
Ryan is 33. Jones is 29. Coleman can be a free agent after the season. The Falcons are attempting to seize this opportunity to take full advantage of this
offense – most of the unit led the league in scoring two years ago.
”To go up against it every day, I personally don’t think any other offense that has this many weapons from sideline to sideline to give us that much
pressure,” Allen said. ”Then you’ve got Matty Ice out there putting the ball
anywhere he can. It’s a hard matchup and every day is a challenge and that’s a
good thing.”
The Falcons led the league with 33.8 points a game in their 2016 Super Bowl season with former coordinator Kyle Shanahan
Giovani Bernard Jersey , now San Francisco’s coach, in charge of the offense. In Steve Sarkasian’s 2017 debut as offensive coordinator, Atlanta fell
back to 15th in scoring, at 22.1 points per game.
Center Alex Mack says the Falcons are starting faster in their second year with Sarkasian.
”I just see it as a way to start fast and build,” Mack said Saturday. ”As an offense in training camp, you can start at a more advanced point than you
started the year before, so you can get into the details and work on the little
things and be really on the same page.”
The Falcons opened training camp with Freeman and Jones at full health.
Jones played every game but dealt with a long list of injuries last season. Freeman missed two games with his second concussion of the year, including one
last preseason, and also was slowed by a knee injury at the end of the
season.
”It is awesome to see Free back, feeling like himself,” coach Dan Quinn said. ”His aggressive nature always comes out and he’s off to a great start.”
Quinn said the familiarity that comes with the offense’s second season with Sarkasian is crucial.
”I think anytime you’re around guys for more than a year, he has such a clear vision of what guys can do,” Quinn said. ”As small as that may sound to you,
it’s a big deal.”
NOTES: DE Takkarist McKinley left practice with an apparent right shoulder injury. He has had surgeries on both shoulders the last two years. Quinn said
Saturday’s injury is not believed to be serious. … The Falcons have sold all
60,000 tickets
J.J. Jansen Jersey , at $5 each, for their practice at Mercedes-Benz Stadium on Sunday. It will be the team’s first practice in pads.
—
Patrick Mahomes II could have spent his offseason just about anywhere, back home in Texas perhaps, or maybe even some exotic locale befitting a 20-something
starting quarterback in the NFL.
Instead, Mahomes spent it in Kansas City.
Deeply immersed in Kansas City.
He showed up wearing his Chiefs jersey to read "Oh the Places You Will Go" to a group of children at the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library and Museum. He
hung out with fans at a Jason Aldean concert at the downtown Sprint Center.
He wore a cutoff jersey from the T-Bones, a local independent minor league baseball team, and a pair of jorts while attending the NASCAR race at Kansas
Speedway. And he threw out the first pitch when the Royals played the New York
Yankees at Kauffman Stadium.
Throw in the dozens of times fans have bumped into Mahomes at restaurants or on the street, usually documented on social media accounts, and it would be safe
to call him a man about town.
"I mean, the fans come out every single week and show passion and love for us and our team and what we're doing here," Mahomes said, "so for me, I want to be
back in the community, giving back. And just be a part of it, to show the same
love and passion to them."
That earnestness is refreshing in the modern NFL
Mike Ditka Jersey , where large chasms have come to separate players from fans. Rarely do the biggest stars stick around town in the offseason, and
even more rarely do players willingly embrace being part of the community.
Just this week, Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver Antonio Brown bemoaned the constant attention he receives, and the fact that he can't even work out without
people showing up and bothering him.
Mahomes would prefer people show up to work out with him.
The way he's embraced living in Kansas City is not unlike the way Eric Hosmer and the rest of the Royals embraced the city during their back-to-back World
Series runs. They would frequently pop up at local bars and buy a round for the
entire place, even celebrating among the fans during playoff triumphs.
Maybe it's something unique about Kansas City.
More likely, it's something unique about those individuals.
The way Mahomes has engrossed himself in the city hasn't been lost on the fanbase, either. He's only started one game, a Week 17 win over Denver with
nothing on the line, and has yet to really prove himself as a legitimate NFL
starting quarterback. But he's become one of the most popular players on the
team, and his No. 15 jersey is one of the hottest sellers at local sporting
goods stores.
Nor has it been lost on his teammates, who rave about the way the 22-year-old Mahomes has taken on the leadership role that Alex Smith once held, even though
he's one of the youngest guys in the locker room.
"He's always been confident. From the time I've known him, he's been confident," said safety Eric Berry, one of the Chiefs' elder statesmen. "He's
been sure of himself and he's came out and made plays
Andy Dalton Jersey , so nothing's really changed. Just now he's with the ones (starters)."
Well, that's a big change. The Chiefs have playoff aspirations this season, and whether they extend their streak of back-to-back AFC West titles will
largely fall on Mahomes' shoulders.
"He's just going in there with confidence, talking with everybody, making the calls and staying on top of things," running back Kareem Hunt said. "He really
wants to win and be a good quarterback."
That's the next crucial step for Mahomes: Showing he can win games.
It's one thing for Mahomes to be a man among the people, popping up all over town and snapping photos and signing autographs until every fan is content.
It's quite another to keep them happy by performing well on the field, where even the most popular players get lambasted after bad games.
Smith went 50-26 as the starter in Kansas City and many fans couldn't wait for him to leave.
Chiefs coach Andy Reid doesn't seem concerned about the pressure getting to the Chiefs' first-round pick from last year's draft. He points out that Mahomes
had an entire year to learn the ropes, and that he has not only absorbed the
Chiefs' vast playbook but broken down every nuance of it.
"He's phenomenal," Reid said. "He's got great leadership. He loves playing. He's absorbing everything and now he's just got to do it. He's got to just go
practice and work through it and massage each play and see how it works against
these different coverages and he's so willing. That's the part you
appreciate."
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