What Is the Falcons' New Plan for Their Pass Rush in 2026?

FLOWERY BRANCH – One season ago, the Atlanta Falcons enjoyed their best pass-rushing season in franchise history. A pair of first-round rookies helped spur a 57-sack season, ushering in a dramatic turnaround after more than a decade of inconsistency.

Now this unit suddenly feels right back where it started after they lost the players who made their preferred evolution possible.

Three-quarters of that group's production is no longer on the active roster, is injured, or is suspended for the first half of the season. Brandon Dorlus (8.5 sacks) returns with a new role, but the first-round rookies, James Pearce Jr. and Jalon Walker, will need to be replaced.

Jeff Ulbrich’s pass rush was more than any individual contributor last season. He sent heavy pressure, finishing with the league’s second-highest blitz rate (35.6%), and it helped his unit generate a 36.8% pressure rate (eighth in the NFL). The strategy worked well for that group, with eight different players finishing with 3.5 or more sacks, but that will need to happen again this season.

But being too blitz-happy and over-committing the extra bodies can leave the rest of the defense exposed. Many of the league’s best defenses (Eagles, 49ers, Rams, Texans, and Seahawks) had blitz rates below 22%, and all were in the bottom eight of blitz-heavy teams.

In a perfect world, that is where the Falcons want to be, too, and they caught a glimpse of that as the season finished up last year. After recording a blitz rate of 40% or more in seven of their first 10 games – and 50% or more in five of those – the Falcons were able to lean on their four-man rush far more often, and to great success.

Their pressure rate hovered around 35% over the final eight weeks of the season, but their blitz rate never again surpassed that 40% threshold. A lot of that had to do with the rise of Pearce and Walker, who combined for 10.5 sacks over those eight weeks.

“We demonstrated the ability last year to generate rush when we felt we needed to create it from a schematic standpoint,” the Falcons’ defensive coordinator said. “We pressured, and we pressured well. Then I felt as though, especially with some of our younger guys as they developed as rushers, we started to back off the rushing.

“I would prefer not to pressure, but if we have to pressure, then we'll do what we have to do.”

But those guys are unavailable, at least for the first half of the year. So, either the blitz rate needs to ramp back up, or the strategy needs to change – and the latter is not all that unlikely.

Ulbrich’s attack-style front will have some much bigger bodies to deploy this year. After featuring just one regular defensive line contributor who weighed more than 300 pounds, the Falcons will have three in 2026, all acquired this offseason.

Da’Shawn Hand was brought in during free agency, and Gervon Dexter Sr. and Maason Smith were added via trade after the draft. All three will help a run defense that finished No. 24 league-wide, but they, along with LaCale London (5.0 sacks last season), are athletic enough to contribute from the interior pass rush.

But their presence opens things up for the rest of this defense.

Dorlus, who usually lined up in the interior, can now shift to the five-technique outside of the offensive tackle. The Falcons can lean on his versatility on all three downs as he looks to build on a breakout 2025. He can anchor the heavy side while not sacrificing much explosiveness, and Ulbrich can deploy a pass rusher like Za’Darius Smith or Samson Ebukam on the other side with the big bodies on the inside.

It’s an effective strategy and aligns more closely with what Ulbrich envisions for his defense.

“Last year, I thought, especially when we had the bigger guys in there – and there's a lot to be said about guys like LaCale [London] and the ways that they rushed – to lean into that,” Ulbrich said. “We called it thrash rush, bull rush, crush the pocket, whatever you want to call it, but I definitely think we're built for that.”

If the Falcons choose to send pressure, rookie linebackers Kendal Daniels and Harold Perkins Jr. will be disruptive, with plenty of pass-rushing experience from their college days, but the defense will need results from veterans looking to recreate themselves in Atlanta.

Both Smith and Ebukam believe they can return to the production they showed earlier in their careers.

Ebukam returned from a torn Achilles last season for the Colts with some disappointing results: two sacks and five tackles for loss while mainly being featured as a rotational edge. His breakout season was in 2023, when he racked up 9.5 sacks and started every game for the Colts. Smith, meanwhile, retired suddenly last season before signing with the Falcons this summer, but his 70.5 career sacks and a 2020 All-Pro second-team selection make him the most accomplished player in the Falcons’ front seven.

If Smith and Ebukam can recreate some of their previous production, Atlanta won't have to rely exclusively on its young linebackers to replace the pressure Pearce and Walker provided.

However it comes, the Falcons will face questions until they prove it on the field again this season. Ulbrich, however, is confident in his group.

“We have a group that's just so connected, and that next-man-up mentality is ingrained in that room. It's ingrained in that defense,” Ulbrich said. “There's a standard that's been set, and the guys that are going to play in the absence of both those players are guys that we're excited about as well.”

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