Falcons owner Arthur Blank defends decision to draft Michael Penix Jr.

Arthur Blank, the owner of the Falcons, isn’t too worried about what folks still are saying about the surprise draft pick of Michael Penix weeks after the team signed Kirk Cousins.

“Thank heavens we don’t always listen to the league,” told reporters this week. “And thank heavens we don’t always listen to the media. And thank heavens we don’t always do what everybody else thinks we should be doing. We’re actually very independent thinkers.”

It is true that most of the NFL chatting class were astounded back in late April when the Falcons used the eighth pick of the first round to select Penix, the former Washington Huskies standout. Penix was a Heisman finalist who led his team to the national championship game. However, NFL analysts found fault with the pick. For one, the Falcons already committed a ton of cash to Cousins, who was the top QB available in this year’s free agent market. And two, most thought Penix wouldn’t be worth a top 10 pick. He was slotted somewhere from mid to late first round, although it would’ve surprised no one if a team traded up to get him if there had been a run on quarterbacks.

Penix was the fourth quarterback off the board and heard his name called before Michigan’s J.J. McCarthy (Vikings) and Oregon’s Bo Nix (Broncos). All the elite quarterbacks were gone after the first dozen picks.

Then Blank explained exactly why the Falcons opted for Penix. Remember that Matt Ryan was under center for years. He and the Falcons were 7-10 in 2021, his final season in Atlanta. The team then put up two more 7-10 years, leading Blank to fire head coach Arthur Smith.

Blank said the Falcons had no real succession plans on what to do post-Ryan. Now, they do. At 35, Cousins is one of the oldest quarterbacks in the NFL. He’s also coming off Achilles surgery. But Atlanta signed him to a four-year, $180 million contract, which makes Cousins the 11th highest paid quarterback in the NFL. (He’s tied with Aaron Rodgers).

“Kirk Cousins is our franchise quarterback, is our starting quarterback and he seems to be doing great from a medical standpoint,” Blank said of Cousins’ recovery from an Achilles tear. “His attitude, his leadership, culturally, personally, with our players, with the coaching staff, has been nothing short of outstanding. So, we couldn’t be happier with that situation.”

He added: “We’ve been through a situation, post-Matt Ryan, when we’re seeing that movie when we didn’t have a franchise quarterback. We didn’t want to repeat that again. I mean, I certainly didn’t. I’m super sensitive to all forms of succession planning. After 60-odd years of business, in any business, that’s critical. At the key position, the quarterback position in the NFL, that’s very important. So, just listening to our coaching staff and our personnel department, they really made the decision. Michael was going to be available at No. 8. They saw an extraordinary talent.”

So now the Falcons are a week into training camp. Cousins is the starting quarterbacks, with no one questioning the move. New coach Raheem Morris is dividing second team practice reps between Penix and Taylor Heinicke.