Atlanta started 0-2 with Cooper Rush at quarterback, averaging 8.0 points per game, the fewest in the NFL, with 262 yards per game and seven turnovers. Since Michael Penix Jr. took over, the Falcons average 40 points and 459 yards per game with one turnover, and they have won two straight by 20 or more, including on the road.
That is not an improvement. That is a different sport.
The complication is that Tua Tagovailoa, who signed with Atlanta in free agency this year and won the starting job in camp, is now the backup.
How the job changed hands
Tagovailoa was ruled out of Week 1 against Pittsburgh with an oblique injury. Rush started the first two games. Penix, returning from an ACL tear suffered last November, his second, had been brought along slowly through camp and told head coach Kevin Stefanski in September, “I just told him I’m not where I want to be right now.”
He took over in Week 3 on Thursday night against Green Bay. He has not given it back.
In Monday night’s 45-24 win at New Orleans, Penix completed 15 passes for 233 yards and a touchdown and was pressured on just three of 20 dropbacks. Bijan Robinson ran 19 times for 145 yards and two scores, including a 59-yard touchdown on Atlanta’s third snap. Brian Robinson Jr. added 14 carries for 62 yards and three short touchdowns.
His teammates are not being subtle about it
Safety Jessie Bates put it plainly: “Obviously, when you got Penix back there dealing, it’s a whole different team.”
Brian Robinson Jr. went further on the person rather than the production. “He’s been phenomenal, man,” he said. “I appreciate his attitude, how he come in and just take the field and he’s focused and he’s ready.”
Stefanski and offensive coordinator Tommy Rees deserve a share of the credit. Atlanta has gone to more under-center looks and more play-action since the change, which is a scheme built for a quarterback who can throw from a platform rather than one who has to create.
What Atlanta does with Tagovailoa
This is the awkward part. Tagovailoa won a camp competition, got hurt, and watched a quarterback coming off a second ACL tear turn the league’s worst offense into one scoring 40 a game. Contract specifics for his Atlanta deal have not been confirmed publicly.
There is no quarterback controversy here. There is a quarterback who was supposed to be the answer and is now holding a clipboard. Those situations have a shelf life, and the trade deadline is November 10.
The real question is sustainability
Atlanta is 2-2. Two blowout wins against Green Bay and New Orleans do not make a contender, and the Saints are 1-3 with a locker room that just got publicly called out by Cameron Jordan.
Penix has played two good games coming off a major knee injury. The schedule will get harder. But the gap between 8 points and 40 is too wide to be noise, and Atlanta looks like a team that found its quarterback by accident in Week 3.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.