This is a pivotal draft for the Atlanta Falcons defense

The 2025 free agency class, the team’s obvious holes, and the age of some star players all combine to make this a critical year for the front office.

For a brief, shining moment, the Atlanta Falcons defense looked competent in 2023. The end of the year saw some frustrating, injury-ignited lapses, but there was at least modest and genuine defensive improvement for Atlanta last year with the addition of players like Jessie Bates, David Onyemata, and Bud Dupree, with new defensive coordinator Ryan Nielsen and assistant head coach Jerry Gray coaxing some gains out of that group.

In 2024, the Falcons now boast a defensive-minded head coach and a deep staff on that side of the ball, and they still have the top-shelf talent like A.J. Terrell, Grady Jarrett, and Bates to go with a number of useful starters. There is the foundation of a good defense here, one that the draft will have to augment. And make no mistake, getting defensive help in this draft class is vital not just for 2024 but in the years to come.

Why? Two reasons, really.

The defense needs help right now

The team’s most productive EDGE, Arnold Ebiketie, had six sacks last year. They don’t have a single other player on the roster who had more than three sacks in that position group.

On the interior, the team is reliant on two high-end starters who are on the wrong side of 30 years old, and both dealt with injuries last year.

At inside linebacker, they have a young, high-upside wild card in Troy Andersen who is coming off a major injury, plus a really good starter in Kaden Elliss and a pleasant surprise in Nate Landman.

In the secondary, they have two terrific starters and several players with something to prove. Richie Grant and DeMarrco Hellams are vying for a starting role at safety, while Clark Phillips, Antonio Hamilton, Dee Alford, and Kevin King are duking it out for a couple of starting spots at cornerback.

What you’ll notice throughout is that there is uncertainty at every level of the defense, and the Falcons have made only modest investments on that side of the ball to this point. Even if you assume Andersen, Ebiketie, Hellams, Grant, Phillips, and so forth all improve, the Falcons need help. They badly need pass rushing help of any kind up front to unlock anything bigger and better for this side of the ball—ESPN still had the team with the lowest pass rush win rate in the NFL last year, if you put any stock in that—and you have to do a lot of projecting with the likes of Andersen, Phillips, and Hellams/Grant to believe the team’s coverage is going to be stout.

Even a small handful of immediately useful draft picks will make a big difference here. Getting a potential impact pass rusher, whether on the interior or at EDGE, allows the Falcons to attack post-draft free agency accordingly and cobble together a useful pass rush. Nailing down the safety spot next to Bates or the starting cornerback job across from Terrell again lets you figure out where to use your limited free agency dollars while also potentially giving the defense a significant boost right now.

The Falcons defense is unquestionably a work in progress. If the draft can’t deliver short-term answers, it’s likely to remain pretty flawed heading into the season, even if the team is able to land stopgaps in a still-robust safety market and at EDGE.

The defense needs building block for the future

A.J. Terrell is set to hit free agency in 2025. So is Richie Grant, Ta’Quon Graham, Dee Alford (as a restricted free agent), and Lorenzo Carter, as well as all those one-year signings. Grady Jarrett will be 32 years old and David Onyemata will be, as well. Kaden Elliss will be turning 30. There is a not-insignificant portion of today’s defense that will either be ticketed for free agency or reaching an age where decline is likely, if not inevitable.

While the Falcons are likely to lock Terrell up, attrition will pile up elsewhere. The Falcons will have the 2025 free agency period with plenty of cash and the 2025 draft to re-stock, so I don’t mean to imply that they will be bereft if they mess up this draft class. But I do mean to suggest that with eight picks, including four in the first three rounds, this team is well-equipped to start thinking ahead a bit and snagging players who can raise the floor for this defense down the line, as well as help navigate through the inevitable loss of some of their veteran players. That’s particularly urgent up front, where the long-term answers already on the roster are basically nonexistent.

The team’s inability to find those long-term answers on this side of the ball has been the story of Fontenot’s drafting thus far. While he’s nailed free agency with signings like Bates, Elliss, and Onyemata, the draft has brought back useful-but-not-elite options like Ebiketie, still-proving-it upside picks like Andersen, and young players we still have to see grow into roles. Perhaps last year will change the tide, but out of the 12 picks Fontenot has made on defense thus far, just one is a slam dunk starter this coming season, and that player is Andersen, who is coming off a major injury. I’d love to see Phillips and Hellams emerge from the last draft class and for Zach Harrison to build on his strong closing stretch in 2023, which would go miles toward turning things around for Atlanta. It doesn’t diminish the importance of getting the 2024 class right, however.

The Falcons need defensive help both now and in the future, a common theme for their drafts for as long as I can remember. With a new coaching staff hoping to lift that side of the ball and a mandate organizationally to contend right now, they’re going to have to nail their additions on defense in this draft.