FLOWERY BRANCH, Ga. — Atlanta Falcons rookie quarterback Michael Penix Jr. was excited Tuesday night when head coach Raheem Morris told him he’d be starting his first NFL game this week. Morris knows that because Penix told him. Otherwise, it would have been hard to tell.
“‘Excited’ for Mike is the cool Mike that y’all know,” Morris said Wednesday. “He’ll give you a smile, but he doesn’t ride the emotional roller coaster. He’s a pretty even-keeled kid. That’s what we love about him.”
It’s also a significant reason the Falcons think Penix can succeed being thrust into the starting lineup after the team’s shocking decision to bench Kirk Cousins only nine months after signing the veteran quarterback to the largest total money free-agency deal in NFL history (four years with a maximum value of $180 million).
“His heart beats very slow, which is a good thing,” Falcons offensive coordinator Zac Robinson said of Penix. “I don’t think anybody is going to have to say anything for Mike to be calm. He is about as cool as they come.”
Penix was at Costco with his girlfriend when he got the call to inform him he was starting. He had just ordered a hot dog but was too excited to eat it after the call.
“I ain’t going to lie, I’m going to be nervous running out of that tunnel, but when I get on the field, it’s a whole different mentality,” Penix said. “It’s a flipped switch, and I’m ready to go. I’m going to be ready.”
Atlanta’s No. 8 pick in this year’s draft, Penix will make his starting debut at 1 p.m. Sunday at Mercedes-Benz Stadium against the New York Giants (2-11). He has previously appeared twice in the fourth quarter of blowout losses, completing three passes for 38 yards.
“I’m excited,” the 24-year-old said. “I’ve got a lot of feelings. I don’t know what they are, but I’m going to be ready to play. I’m blessed to be in this position. I’m just going to make sure I take full advantage of it.”
Michael Penix Jr. highlights 🏹9️⃣@themikepenix 🔥 pic.twitter.com/7RDjqsb6JS
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Morris acknowledged he’s surprised to find himself changing quarterbacks with three games left in a season that started with so much promise.
“We were playing extremely well so I’d be telling you a story if I said I wasn’t surprised how the last couple weeks have gone and how we haven’t been able to turn it around and play a little bit better at the position in order to keep things going how we had and to stick with the general plan,” Morris said.
As recently as last week, Morris said he didn’t want to promote Penix too quickly for fear of damaging his confidence and long-term development.
“Every single week, I know you guys could hear it, I had a lot of confidence that we would play better,” the coach said Wednesday. “I had a lot of confidence that Kirk would get back to his form, and we just didn’t for whatever reason. We had been searching, digging as much as we can dig to try to make things work.”
Wednesday’s mood was in stark contrast to Cousins’ introductory news conference in March when the Falcons believed they had just added the veteran quarterback to unlock their offensive potential and carry them on a playoff run.
“I brought Kirk in here with full expectation that we could win a championship with Kirk,” Morris said. “For whatever reason, whatever has happened the last couple weeks, it just hasn’t felt that way.”
Morris informed Cousins of the change Tuesday night, calling him at home and asking him to come to the team facility. The conversation was “simple and straightforward, didn’t last long,” Cousins said.
“It’s pro football,” the quarterback said. “There’s a standard that I have for myself, that the team has for me. Unfortunately, I wasn’t playing up to that standard consistently enough. It is what it is. You roll with it.”
Since Week 10, when the Falcons were 6-3 and led the NFC South by two games, Cousins has thrown nine interceptions and one touchdown pass and is 33rd in the league in expected points added per dropback (minus-.14). The 36-year-old has an NFL-high 16 interceptions this season.
“Anytime you take a step down, a demotion, it’s not going to be met with great appreciation, but Kirk was a professional,” Morris said. “He’s a pro, he’s a man, he’s a great human, he’s a great father, he’s a great football player, he’s done a lot of great things for us this year. He handled it with class. I can’t say enough good things about who the man is, but it comes with some disappointment when you lose your job.”
Cousins returned this season from a torn Achilles tendon suffered in Week 8 last year, but he and Morris denied that injury or health was a factor in his recent poor play.
“It’s probably more decision-making than anything and that wouldn’t have anything to do with any physical limitations,” Cousins said.
Cousins also said his confidence wasn’t shaken.
“If anything, maybe you need less confidence to not try to force the ball into tighter windows, just got to make great decisions and if you don’t, you pay for it,” he said.
In the Tuesday night staff meeting in which the team decided to make a change, “we all felt strongly one way about it,” Robinson said.
Cousins will serve as the No. 2 quarterback this week, Morris said. The coach did not close the door on Cousins returning to a starting role in the future, although Penix did say that he was told he’d be the starter “the rest of this season.”
“I don’t think anything is ever permanent in the National Football League, but right now Michael Penix is our quarterback,” Morris said. “We are going to give him the utmost support he needs.”
Falcons owner Arthur Blank was “involved” in the decision to make a change, Morris said.
“Obviously our owner is always going to be involved with what we do, in more of a supportive role than anything,” the coach said.
Atlanta would take a $65 million dead-money salary-cap hit if it released Cousins this offseason.
“It obviously has some financial implications for us in how you go about your process, but we are always going to make football decisions based on winning the football game,” Morris said.
The head coach said he hasn’t given much thought to what the Falcons’ future with Cousins will be beyond this season.
“We are just trying to get a win against the Giants,” Morris said. “You have to have those long-term answers, but that’s not right now.”
Cousins, likewise, sidestepped questions about the future implications of this move, but he did offer a note of defiance aimed at the idea that this will be the end of his story.
“I didn’t forget how to play quarterback,” he said. “Certainly the turnovers are not what you want, but I didn’t forget how to play. … The story is still being written. You just kind of keep going one day at a time, someday look back and have a little bit better ability to tell the story.”
Cousins called Penix after his Tuesday night meeting with Morris to offer his support. The pair has had a close working relationship since Penix was drafted in April. They live on the same street in a neighborhood outside Atlanta and often carpool to Falcons home games and to the airport for road trips. Penix said he found himself Wednesday trying to control the huddle the way he heard Cousins did it.
“I look up to Kirk,” Penix said. “To be honest, Kirk couldn’t do any wrong in my eyes.”
Atlanta’s offense, which ranks 21st in the league in scoring (20.93 ppg), won’t change with Penix, Morris said.
“We’re going to do what we do,” Morris said. “Mike is a little more mobile just because of the youth. He can execute everything we want to do. He’s got a live arm, got great accuracy. It’ll look very similar to what it’s been.”
Penix will have plenty of supporters in town to see it. He already was planning to host his family for Christmas so he expects a group of about 35 at the game Sunday. When he called his dad Tuesday night to tell him the news, his dad rushed him off the phone, he said.
“He said, ‘I’ve got to tell your uncles,’” Penix said. “I was like, ‘Dang, all right.’ He was like, ‘I’ll talk to you later.’”
Penix’s last start came on Jan. 8 when he started in the national championship game, which the Huskies lost 34-13 to Michigan. He threw 1,685 passes and was twice named a Heisman finalist in a college career that lasted five years. That experience is another reason the Falcons believe he’ll be ready for his next start.
“He’s got a lot of poise, and he’s come here and shown nothing but growth and development,” Morris said. “Now, we’ll go see what it looks like.”
(Top photo: Brett Davis / Imagn Images)
