Atlanta Falcons: Frank Darby will benefit from Julio Jones trade

The Atlanta Falcons are closing in on trading away one of the franchise’s all-time great players, wide receiver Julio Jones. Jones was part of the vaunted 2011 NFL Draft class which featured a number of future Hall of Fame players but his run in Atlanta is sadly coming to an end.

The Falcons’ motivation for trading Julio Jones seems to be pretty obviously financially charged, but rookie general manager Terry Fontenot also realizes he has an opportunity to recoup a pretty good draft asset for Jones that will disappear rather soon.

Still, trading Jones at this point makes very little sense for the Falcons, who doubled down on Matt Ryan and took Kyle Pitts high in the 2021 NFL Draft. The Falcons could have moved down off the fourth overall pick and traded it to the highest bidder, but they stayed put instead.

Why trade Julio Jones with Matt Ryan in the later stages of his career when you could have something special on offense?

It’s clearly not a move motivated by the Atlanta Falcons’ depth chart at wide receiver.

Russell Gage was targeted 109 times last season and caught 72 passes for 786 yards and four touchdowns, but where do the Atlanta Falcons see him going from there?

Calvin Ridley will be just fine eating up the majority of targets for this passing attack, and Kyle Pitts will undoubtedly get some work out wide and as a big slot, but there are not many options for Atlanta inspiring great confidence.

The team did take a shot on former Arizona State receiver Frank Darby in the 2021 NFL Draft, getting a fascinating talent at one of the draft’s deepest positions.

Darby appeared in just three games this past season, catching six passes for 46 yards and a touchdown. The year prior is where he put himself on the NFL radar with 31 receptions for 616 yards (19.9 yards per reception) and a team-leading eight touchdowns.

The “team-leading” aspect of that is important because of the fact that Darby was sharing targets with San Francisco 49ers 2020 first-round pick Brandon Aiyuk.

You don’t often see guys leading their team in touchdown catches with just 31 receptions for an entire season (13 games) but Darby showed off his big-play ability and nose for the end zone.

As a sixth-round pick, expectations should probably be tempered, but it cannot be overstated that receivers in this year’s draft and even the 2020 NFL Draft are getting picked a round later than they otherwise could or should because of the depth at the position.

Darby stands to benefit greatly from the departure of Julio Jones with the Atlant Falcons because an opportunity for extra playing time will be there for the taking on a relatively weak depth chart at the position.