Finding right mix vital along both lines

Even if last year’s starting five takes another ride in 2022, they will have earned every snap and gotten better after parrying a stiff challenge.

With all that said, I’m not blind to the fact this offensive line needs a talent infusion. Further investment is required to make it really good, but all that can’t happen right now. The offensive line group as currently formed must do better in run blocking and pass protection. They have to win in short-yardage situations, especially on the interior.

Ifedi has a chance to help this unit, and could be a factor inside or outside. He was a first-round pick. He has talent. He’ll be a factor inside or out and, a bare minimum, provide better depth than the Falcons had a year ago.

We won’t get a great idea of where these guys stand until the pads come on and the lineman can start making real contact. That contact will come against a defensive line that has to get better push.

This is a line of scrimmage story, after all, and should include both sides of it.

I’ll leave the pass rush to our new teammate Ashton Edmunds – look for his story on the Falcons pass rush Tuesday morning – and will focus on an interior line that must be better while using essentially the same personnel.

Defensive coordinator Dean Pees has talked about creating an impenetrable wall that rushers and quarterbacks can’t get past while the pocket closes in all around them. That’s a big part of nose tackle Anthony Rush’s job. We all know Grady Jarrett can get after it, but Ta’Quon Graham, Marlon Davidson and the rest must be stout at the point of attack. And they must be stout together, with no weak links.

That will let other defenders make plays and make life difficult on the opposition. It sounds so simple, yet is so important.

If the Falcons can play better up front, anything is possible. The key thing is improvement, and finding the right combination of personnel required to do so. Finding that group, that rotation, will be as important as anything the…