Falcons bring back DL Kentavius Street

Atlanta makes a move on defense, re-stocking their depth on the defensive line with a familiar face.

The Atlanta Falcons hadn’t done much with their defense to this point in free agency, but that was going to change sooner than later. After all, even if the NFL Draft is defense-heavy, the Falcons will still need starters and depth alike to ensure that side of the ball can hold its own in 2024.

They got started on Monday by bringing back a familiar face. That’d be Kentavius Street, who joined the team in an October 31 trade from the Philadelphia Eagles, and who will provide the team with quality depth along their defensive line.

Street only wound up playing in five games for Atlanta last year owing to injury, but in that five game stretch, Pro Football Focus credited him with eight run stops, four hurries, and a sack. He looked like a rock solid piece of the defensive line rotation until that injury unfortunately wiped out the rest of the year—the Falcons defensive line was mighty thin by the end of 2023—and that’s exactly what the soon-to-be-28-year-old should be again in 2024 for Atlanta. The fact that he’s returning for Raheem Morris’s defense despite being a Ryan Nielsen guy—he overlapped with the ex-Falcons defensive coordinator in New Orleans—tells you the Falcons like what he brought to the table in that short stint.

The Falcons now have Grady Jarrett, David Onyemata, Ta’Quon Graham, Zach Harrison, LaCale London, Tommy Toigai, and Willington Previlon under contract in addition to Street, giving them a pair of aging but mighty effective starters up front with a lot of younger pieces they’re hoping can be valuable players. Street is one of the more proven options in that group and should have a significant 2024 role if he’s healthy, and we’ll hope the Falcons add more talent to this group to ensure they’re in good shape if Jarrett or Onyemata are injured or just need someone to pick up the slack a bit.