The Falcons somehow got blown out by the Panthers 30-0 in Week 3. Michael Penix had an uncharacteristic game, completing just 50% of his passes for 172 yards and 2 interceptions.
It was a performance that was just tough to understand. Penix was not as crisp and accurate as he normally is. He also didn’t see the field at all. There were open receivers he failed to target and his decision-making was off.
I can’t really explain why this was the case other than to say, sometimes that happens. Sometimes there are games where the ball just doesn’t come out right and a quarterback just isn’t trusting what he’s seeing.
His performance also didn’t resemble anything I’ve generally seen from Penix in the past, so I can’t say I was incredibly worried about him entering Week 4.
And Penix made me right, because he bounced back in a big way.
His ball placement and anticipation were back to normal against the Commanders, as you could see with this throw on Atlanta’s second drive of the game:
Penix recognized where the window would be well before it appeared. Look at the picture he saw when he had already made his decision to target Drake London and just started his throwing motion:
It was on from there.
The Falcons capped the drive with this variation of a spot concept. And I love the way offensive coordinator Zac Robinson did this.
Traditionally, this concept has the outside receiver running a 4-6 yard curl where he finds the soft spot in the zone over the area where the #2 receiver lines up. The running back takes his route to the flat, and the inside receiver runs a corner route:
But here, Robinson had Drake London run the spot from the #2 position, and the corner route would come from #1 with those receivers using a switch release. The other wrinkle was that the #1 receiver would take his stem inside, almost as if he was running a shallow crosser, before breaking back to the corner:
That was designed to hold or pin the middle-hook defender:
And that, along with Bijan Robinson’s route taking the curl-flat defender to the outside, opened the window for London:
