Falcons vs. Panthers, Week 2: Kevin Stefanski declines to name starting QB Monday

There’s a specific question on the mind of pretty much every Falcons fan: Who’s the starting quarterback for Week 2? Kevin Stefanski spoke to the media Monday afternoon (I was in a meeting and couldn’t join the Zoom call, but I caught part of it on NFL Network), and confirmed he will not have an answer to that question today.

“Today’s a big day for our football team,” Stefanski said about the opportunity to review what went wrong in Sunday’s loss to the Steelers, and to correct those things.

“It was a lot of little things,” that went wrong for Atlanta on Sunday, and those little things add up to big things like the Week 1 loss.

The turnover margin was the first element of Sunday’s game Stefanski mentioned. Rush threw two picks, including TJ Watt’s pick-six. Bijan Robinson also fumbled twice — though he recovered one, and Jahan Dotson recovered the other. The turnover differential wasn’t huge — just -1 — but Stefanski noted that teams that end up on the wrong side of that turnover margin do not tend to win those games. This will be a point of emphasis for the Falcons this week and beyond.

The most important news that came out of Stefanski’s Monday presser is injury-related; chiefly that the team is not ready to name a starter for Week 2 vs. the NFC South rival Panthers. I expect that announcement will come Wednesday, because they need to decide who’s taking those first-team reps in practice.

In addition to the injuries up and down the quarterback depth chart, Stefanski shared two other major injury updates.

Right guard Chris Lindstrom is in the concussion protocol.

Da’Shawn Hand suffered a torn quad and is expected to miss the remainder of the season.

While I do expect a starting QB to be named Wednesday, Stefanski made no such promises. “I need to get through today,” before committing to a starter, Stefanski said.

I will be in Flowery Branch on Wednesday reporting on the quarterback situation and all other Falcons-Panthers related information right here in The Falcoholic’s Feed.

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