The Atlanta Falcons have struggled consistently sacking the quarterback for a while now, and they have definitely struggled bringing mobile quarterbacks down over the last few years as well. If you look back at the Falcons’ overtime loss to the Washington Commanders last season Atlanta lost that game because Jayden Daniels ran for a season-high 127 yards, including 42 in OT.
However, after drafting Georgia linebacker Jalon Walker and Tennessee edge rusher James Pearce Jr. last night in the first round of the 2025 NFL Draft former Falcons quarterback and now analyst for the Atlanta Falcons Radio Network Dave Archer doesn’t think that will be much of a problem anymore because Atlanta now has two "hunters" to stop mobile quarterbacks.
“There’s no question, the ability for quarterbacks to move in the National Football League we saw two guys drafted last night at quarterback, Jaxon Dart, who the Giants jumped back into they went in and got he’s an athlete type player, that’s a guy that [Jalon] Walker has had to track down for the last couple of years at Ole Miss and certainly Cam Ward’s ability to create and extend plays that’s what this thing has become to a large extent I mean think about Patrick Mahomes extending plays, Jayden Daniels, all these guys extending plays, Jalen Hurts who won a Super Bowl extending plays, do you have guys that can go get them? Well you just drafted two guys that that’s what they do.” Dave said
Arch finished his thought by saying “Both of these guys were guys that I termed hunters. These are both hunters, and they can walk people down.”
Falcons have lost a few games over the past few years because they couldn’t get a final stop, and a lot of the time they couldn’t get that final stop because the quarterback they were facing was able to extend the play in some way shape or form, but now that Atlanta has added Jalon Walker and James Pearce Jr. to a pass rush group of Leonard Floyd, Arnold Ebiketie, and Bralen Trice hopefully that won’t be an issue anymore.