UNLOCKED: The BOLD Atlanta Falcons Gamble to UNLEASH Kyle Pitts as Their No. 2 Target

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Welcome back, everyone, to another episode of the Locked On Falcons Podcast, your daily Atlanta Falcons podcast. I'm your humble host, Aaron Freeman. Been covering the Falcons for two decades, spent one of those decades here

as the illustrious host of Locked On Falcons. And on today's Locked On Falcons, we are continuing our positional previews of training camp, talking today about the tight end position. We'll talk about if it's worthwhile for the Falcons to carry a fourth tight end on the roster and break down the guys fighting for that spot.

We'll debate whether Charlie Warner or Austin Hooper is the most unsung tight end on this roster and will become their most valuable piece. But first, we got to talk about Kyle Pitts and the burning question that has hounded the Atlanta Falcons for the last several years. can this Falcons offense become a potent one with Kyle Pitts as their number two? And the key reason why we are less concerned about the Falcons' lack of a quote-unquote

proven number two wide receiver option is because the expectation that, well, Kyle Pitts can be the number two receiver, even if he's not a wide receiver, with Drake London being the number one guy. And thus far, achieving that dream, reaching that goal has basically eluded the Falcons over these last several years, at least in terms of producing a potent offense that Pitts has

finished either number one or number two in targets in four out of last five years. And I know like in 2022, technically he was number three in targets, but because he got injured that year, he was basically number two in targets. But the one year that Pitts wasn't number one or number two in targets. He was number four in targets that year. That was 2024. And that was the most

potent passing attack that the Falcons have had during the Kyle Pitts era. They finished 13th in passing EPA, 16th in passing DVOA. And to be clear, when we're talking about EPA, we're talking specifically about EPA on throws rather. So we're not really factoring in sacks and scrambles, other numbers that are included often in EPA. And when you look at their average finish over the

four other years of Kyle Pitts outside of 2024, their average EPA ranking during those four years was 22nd. Their average DVOA ranking was 21st. So definitely a below average offense most years with Kyle Pitts as that number two option. And I think a big reason for that was, you know, because throwing the ball to the tight end is not as valuable as throwing the ball to the wide

receivers. And 2024 was the one season where the Falcons had two really performing, high-performing wide receivers. You go back to prior to Kyle Pitts' arrival in Atlanta when the Falcons had a potent offense. What did they have? Two very high-performing wide receivers in Julio Jones and Calvin Ridley. You go back to 2016, three high-performing receivers in Julio, Sanu, and

Taylor Gabriel. So clearly I think there's a pattern there. But when you look at the one year out of those four years since Kyle Pitts' arrival, where they did have a pretty decent passing attack. It was 2022 where they were average that year. They were 16th in EPA, 15th in DVOA passing the football in 2022. And I think that year is notable why it's the exception. We'll circle

back to that a little bit later, but I don't think this trend of producing middling to bad offenses by featuring the tight end is unique to the Atlanta Falcons. I think you can look around the league, as we say, you know, featuring wide receivers usually leads to better outcomes than featuring a wide receiver in a tight end. You look at the Ravens offenses under Greg Roman that

featured Mark Andrews as that top guy, right? Those passing attacks were very middling. You look at the current Arizona Cardinals offense with Trey McBride, very middling under Drew Petting, by the way, you know, remember that Petting is a Stefanski protege and arguably his offense is the closest version to the offense that the Falcons are going to be running this year,

right? You know, you look at Stefanski's so-called tight and friendly offense in Cleveland, very middling at best for many, many years. All right. You can go to Falcons quarterback coaches, Alex Van Pelt's offense when he called plays for the Patriots in 2024, when Hunter Henry was their top target. That was one of the worst offenses in the NFL that year. You can look at Tanner

Ingram, the Falcons passing game coordinators offense with the Jets last year. Their number one target getter was tight in Mason Taylor. Granted, Garrett Wilson was hurt and all that stuff. And A.D. Mitchell only was acquired midway through the season. So, okay, we're fudging in numbers a little bit to make the point, but still nonetheless, another terrible offense.

The list goes on and on. Now, it's not to suggest that the only reason these offenses were bad was because they were featuring the tight end. But the point is you don't often see top 10 offenses in the NFL that heavily feature a tight end. There are obvious exceptions. The big ones that you would probably have been screaming at your phone for the last minute has been the Travis

Kelsey era Chiefs, the Gronk era Patriots, the George Kittle era 49ers. But to me, the thing that stands out about those three offenses in particular is who they have a quarterback and or who's calling the plays for those terms. You have two of the great quarterbacks of all time in Patrick Mahomes and Tom Brady. You have one of the great play callers of all time and Kyle

Shanahan. And then, you know, you look at other current offenses that have, you know, like Ben Johnson's offense. You look at what people expect from that offense with Colston Loveland,