Inside Falcons 'QB Contingent,' the Masterminds Behind Kirk Cousins, Michael Penix

FLOWERY BRANCH, Ga. -- When Atlanta Falcons quarterbacks Desmond Ridder, Taylor Heinicke and Logan Woodside entered the team's quarterback room during the 2023 season, there wasn't much to take in.

Offensive coordinator Dave Ragone led the group, though he had the entire offense on his mind. Ragone was assisted by Patrick Kramer, who spent two years as an analyst before becoming an offensive assistant last fall. Final decisions were made by Falcons head coach Arthur Smith.

Ridder was handed the reins of Atlanta's offense as a second-year pro but had to navigate through the season with no specifically designated quarterback coach inside the room.

"It was pretty exclusive," now-Falcons quarterback coach T.J. Yates told FalconsSI. "The dynamic has changed just a little bit this year, having a true quarterback coach."

Yates, a seven-year NFL signal caller, spent the past two years as Atlanta's receiver coach. He wasn't in the quarterback room in 2023 but had an understanding of what went on behind closed doors.

The same goes for Raheem Morris, Atlanta's new head coach who was the Los Angeles Rams' defensive coordinator for the past three seasons. Morris wasn't even in the same time zone as the Falcons, but when he was hired Jan. 25, he knew the quarterback room needed an overhaul.

Externally, most saw the players on the roster - Ridder, Heinicke and Woodside - and believed change started there. Morris thought differently.

Within a month, Atlanta had a staff littered with strong quarterback minds sparked by past experience playing the position.

The ball began rolling with the hiring of offensive coordinator Zac Robinson, who started under center for three years at Oklahoma State University, was drafted by the New England Patriots in the seventh round in 2010 and spent four years on various NFL rosters.

Retaining Yates and moving him to work with the quarterbacks was a natural step after hiring Robinson. The two first met as camp counselors at the Manning Passing Academy in 2008 and stayed in touch while sharing philosophical similarities.

But the additions didn't stop there.

Morris brought in assistant quarterback coach D.J. Williams, senior offensive assistant Ken Zampeze, offensive assistant K.J. Black and pass game specialist Chandler Whitmer with a focus on evaluating, analyzing and coaching passers.

Three of the four - Williams, Black and Whitmer - played quarterback collegiately, while Zampese has 17 years as an NFL quarterback coach on his resume.

The result is a collection of minds far greater than the group that existed upon Morris's arrival and is now the driving force behind one of the NFL's most intriguing on-field quarterback groupings, spearheaded by four-time Pro Bowler Kirk Cousins and No. 8 overall draft pick Michael Penix Jr.

Or, as Morris calls it, "the quarterback contingent."

"Because during the draft process, during the free agent evaluation, all of us were in all the way," Yates said. "Everybody was doing evals, everybody was having their opinion because there are a lot of guys on our staff that have a lot of quarterback experience.

"We've got a great, great group of guys that know a lot of football so there's no stone unturned and no opinion not heard."

***

When Morris was the defensive backs coach for the now-Washington Commanders from 2012-14, he'd often venture down the hallways of team headquarters in Ashburn, Va., during OTAs before entering the quarterback room.

There, he'd see Cousins and, over time, a group of assistants that includes several current NFL head coaches who double as some of the sport's best offensive minds: Sean McVay, Mike McDaniel, Matt LaFleur and Kyle Shanahan.

Morris said he's always been quarterback nosey, but he recognizes the position - which he dubbed arguably the most important in sports - is far from his biggest area of expertise.

"I am not a quarterback guy, and I want to surround myself with quarterback people," Morris said. "The Zampese's, the Zac's, the T.J. Yates', the D.J. Williams', the K.J. Black's. All of the guys that are on our staff that have either playing (or) coaching experience at quarterback, been with different guys, know what it looks like because you knew what the process was going to possibly look like."

The process ultimately led Atlanta to Cousins, who signed a four-year, $180 million contract with $100 million guaranteed to join Morris and leave the Minnesota Vikings after six seasons.

Through all of the different experiences, be it playing, coaching or learning from others, the collection of voices within the quarterback contingent reached the conclusion that Cousins was the right avenue for the Falcons to pursue.

All the while, their varying levels of NFL backgrounds culminated in the understanding that securing the future of the position was critical, too. Morris said at the owners meeting in March that he's been on teams with poor quarterback play and doesn't want to endure similar fate ever again.

So, he did everything in his power to prevent it - from hiring a quarterback-centric assistant coaching staff to bolstering the immediate level of play in the room with a "big-time free agent" in Cousins and cementing his future answer in Penix.

The quarterback contingent naturally played a key role in the player acquisitions. During free agency and the draft, Morris and general manager Terry Fontenot used all of the access and resources they have within the team's headquarters to shape their plan.

This process also extended outside the building. Morris tapped into his own well of connections and spoke with McVay about drafting quarterbacks and moving on from young passers - such as Jared Goff - to veterans like Matthew Stafford.

Morris also mentioned former Falcons starting signal caller Matt Ryan as a person he deeply respects and is another to consult with about quarterback play, from the mechanics of what it looks like to how it feels.

Again, Morris is nosey - and his spring of inquiry led him to Cousins and, eventually, Penix.

"Knowing exactly what you want as far as the processor, the person that you want to get, the guy in the room, the person that can lead your team, the person that can go behind that thing and win - you want to go get that guy," Morris said.

"You always know you're potentially looking for your long-term plan, like a Michael Penix, and you get all of those different opinions."

***

The age gap among the Falcons' offensive players has been talked about extensively inside the team's facility. One day in early June, Heinicke used the example of Sept. 11, 2001, to ask how old others were when the attacks happened.

It was an exercise that extended beyond the quarterback room, as running backs Bijan Robinson and Tyler Allgeier were also included, but served as a good illustration of the discrepancy in age between the 35-year-old Cousins, 31-year-old Heinicke and Atlanta's young weapons.

"Bijan wasn't born yet, and so that was a little bit of a wow, and I said, 'how old were you, Taylor?' He said, 'Fourth grade,'" Cousins said. "Tyler Allgeier looked down, he said, 'Fourth grade?' Because Tyler was like one, and I said, 'Tyler, I was in seventh grade, man.'"

The numbers don't get better for Cousins or Heinicke when they look at the quarterbacks around them - a pair of 24-year-old rookies in Penix and undrafted free agent John Paddock, each of whom were a year and a half-old on the day of the attacks.

Yet for as extensive as the generational gap is between the signal callers, it's even greater for the quarterback contingent, though most are relatively close. Robinson and Yates are both 37 years old, Black is 35 and Whitmer and Williams are both in their early 30s. Zampese, conversely, is 56.

For Morris, who turns 48 in September, the room is separated into two groups.

"You’ve got Zampese, who’s my dad, and then you’ve got D.J., who’s my son," Morris said. "I stole him from Doug Williams. I called him and said, ‘Hey man, I stole him as my son,’ and he said, ‘You can’t take my boy.’ But I stole him as my son.

"We’ve got different walks of life in that room or around that room, which makes it a lot of fun."

Robinson and Yates are well-known figures. The others aren't.

Williams is the only-other coach in the room full-time, with Robinson coming and going when needed. As Morris referenced, Williams is the son of Super Bowl-winning quarterback Doug Williams and played quarterback from 2011-14 at Grambling State University, drawing starts in each season before receiving tryout opportunities at the NFL level in 2015.

The younger Williams was an offensive assistant on the New Orleans Saints' coaching staff from 2019-23. He's now the assistant to Yates, a role in which Robinson believes he's done a great job at performing.

Zampese isn't a literal in-the-room figure, but his voice finds its way in, regardless. He and Robinson communicate frequently, and in a room where age and experience varies, Zampese's track record stands out.

A receiver and return specialist at the University of San Diego from 1985-88, his coaching career began as a graduate assistant at USC in 1990. He's been in the industry for 34 years, and sans-one year (2019) when he returned to the college ranks and also worked in the Alliance of American Football, he's been in the NFL since 1998.

Zampese was the Cincinnati Bengals' quarterback coach from 2003-15 and became the team's offensive coordinator in 2016-17. He returned to coaching quarterbacks with the Cleveland Browns in 2018 and again with the Washington Commanders from 2020-22.

The Falcons have four offensive assistants. Only one - Zampese - has "senior" in his title, which, age aside, is a nod to the knowledge and pedigree he brings to the quarterback position.

"That (role) is a big picture, and he has a great perspective just with the amount of years he's coached and coached the position," Robinson said.

Black is one of Atlanta's non-senior offensive assistants. He was a standout college football quarterback, starting his career at Western Kentucky University before transferring to Prairie View A&M, where he compiled 4,187 passing yards and 35 touchdowns over two seasons.

In 2009, Black led Prairie View A&M to its first Southwestern Athletic Conference championship since 1964 while winning the conference's Offensive Player of the Year award.

The first seven years of his coaching career came with Prairie View A&M, starting as a graduate assistant before becoming the passing game coordinator and quarterback coach in 2015, his fifth year in the industry.

Black continued working with signal callers at Florida A&M from 2019-21 before being named a coaching fellow with the Los Angeles Rams in 2022, a role he turned into an offensive assistant gig in 2023.

When Morris and Robinson went from Los Angeles to Atlanta, they took Black with them - and McVay said he thinks Black will make a big-time contribution in his new home.

Whitmer is also moving from Los Angeles to Atlanta, but after three years as an offensive quality control coach for the Chargers.

In college, Whitmer started 24 games under center for the University of Connecticut from 2012-14 and received a rookie minicamp tryout with the Philadelphia Eagles. He spent 2018-20 as an offensive assistant at three different colleges, going from Yale to Ohio State before finishing at Clemson.

Black and Whitmer aren't often in the Falcons' quarterback room, but like Zampese, they don't need to be. And Morris already thinks highly of what they have done and how they will contribute to the room moving forward.

"Don’t tell those guys, but they’re the smartest guys in football," Morris said. "They are. They have to be."

The quarterback contingent members who distribute information directly to Cousins and the rest of Atlanta's signal callers are Robinson, Yates and Williams.

But while they're not working hands-on with the quarterbacks, the trio of Zampese, Black and Whitmer remain busy. Through what Robinson dubbed "great collaboration," their ideas and thoughts are distributed to the three coaches most frequently in the room.

Morris calls it overloading, but the Falcons want to produce and provide as much information as possible at the quarterback spot. By putting more on the coaches, the idea behind the structure is to only introduce the more important pieces to the players.

This, Morris said, is how the quarterback contingent becomes an interconnected web of several moving parts all formed into one cohesive unit.

"We can overload each other on the backend [and] simplify it," Morris said. "So when we get into that room, it’s the healthy discussions, it’s the healthy conflict, it’s the healthy ideas versus innovation, versus we’re getting too far away from our fundamental core beliefs.

"I think you need all of those things in order to formulate great rooms."

***

When the Falcons signed Cousins this spring, there was little external surprise. When they drafted Penix, there was plenty.

Through it all, the quarterback contingent was at the forefront of Atlanta's direction and offered as much insight as Morris and Fontenot wanted. But the group kept a tight seal - so much that Cousins was left stunned when Atlanta selected Penix in the opening frame.

Signing Cousins was a move made with winning in 2024 at the top of the mind. Drafting Penix does little to help that mission, but rather helps raise the floor of Atlanta's direction post-Cousins.

It's a situation that, in theory, could create awkwardness. Instead, the Falcons' quarterback room is littered with knowledge and an open floor suited for asking and answering questions.

"Everybody's been great working with each other," Yates said. "Whether it's Taylor to Mike, Kirk to Mike, vice versa, Kirk and Taylor sharing their experiences in a room. I always make sure that I have all those guys speak their mind and have a voice in the room.

"Because just like Mike can learn from me, Mike can learn from Kirk, or I can learn from Kirk - we can all learn from Kirk and all the experiences he's had."

Yates said nobody knows the game in full, and having deeper conversations enables everyone - be it players or coaches - to learn from each other. Naturally, in-room bonds follow, and everyone gets better.

Those conversations are wide-ranging; Yates noted the group covers everything, from practice film to the playbook, but the depths of the conversation varies.

Cousins and Heinicke have a combined 20 years of experience on NFL rosters. Penix and Paddock have four months. It's a good dynamic, Yates said, because the two rookies are soaking up every piece of information they can when all four passers are in the room together.

During OTAs and minicamp, teams get additional meeting times with rookies with hopes of closing the gap of information consumption created by the veterans' one-month head start in April.

As such, the group of Yates, Williams and at times Robinson have sessions each day when they meet with all of the quarterbacks together, and separate sessions for the rookies. Yates said the meetings are a little bit different.

"You can have the 500-level conversations when Kirk's in there; he's had so much experience in this type of offense and structure where you can bypass a lot of the first steps of some conversation," Yates said.

"But when you have your time with just the rookies, you go in there and you go back and you spell everything out and simplify everything as much as possible to those guys. But they've been great."

In a word, the room is conversational. Everybody's asking questions and learning from each other, Yates said.

For Penix, describing the room's atmosphere brings a few different words.

"It's fun, man," Penix said. "It's a great relationship with all of us. We all have the same goal and we all just go in each and every day and we have the attitude that we want to have the best day yet."

The Falcons officially have five coaches - Yates, Williams, Zampese, Black and Whitmer - designated to the quarterback spot. It's a stark contrast to how the staff looked in 2023, but the actual room isn't crowded.

There's an equal distribution of verbal power, creating a situation that drew smiles from Yates and Robinson due to how well it's worked.

When the Falcons take the field this fall, all eyes will be on Cousins. When they do the same several years down the road, it'll be Penix's turn. Few will be looking for - or thinking about - the assistant coaches on the sideline.

But for Morris, the implementation and initial returns of the quarterback contingency marks an early-tenure success, and with the first padded pass of his era still having yet to be thrown, Morris believes the arrow is pointing up for his quarterbacks - both playing and coaching.

"I think that room's continuing with a growth mindset, and I don't think that'll ever change within that room, within that process with those guys," Morris said. "I think it's been going great."