Atlanta will be without Mooney for foreseeable training camp future. Eyes now turn to who the Falcons could pinpoint as his "clone."
Tori McElhaney
FLOWERY BRANCH, Ga. As time passes, the prognosis on wide receiver Darnell Mooney remains a bit TBD.
Mooney took a hard fall on the first day of Falcons' training camp practices last week. He suffered a shoulder injury on the play, with the Falcons confirming a couple days later that he would miss "a few weeks" as he gets back to 100%.
Asked for further information on Mooney when the pads came on Tuesday, particularly if he would be ready to go by Week 1, head coach Raheem Morris kept the receiver's potential return date open ended.
"We're going with a few weeks right now, and then we'll play it out after we get to that point," Morris said. "When we get to that point, we'll figure out where we're at."
Hopefully, Morris continued, everything looks good and the Falcons are ready to welcome Mooney back as the regular season commences. However, he did not say for certain if that will ultimately be the case. So, it begged the follow up question: If Mooney needs more time to recover, who do the Falcons tap to replace him?
Morris and offensive coordinator Zac Robinson have often used the term "clones" when describing how they build offensive depth. Whereas the offensive line and Dwayne Ledford have often said its about putting the best five linemen on the field, when it comes to wide receiver, the roles (and what those roles ultimately need) are a bit more defined. It's not a one-for-one swap Drake London, for example, is a special enough talent that you can't fully mimic it but you can get close in body type and play style.
There are opportunities for certain players to step into Mooney's vacant foot path. But who?
To answer that, you have to look at Mooney's role, itself. He's the X in Robinson's system. When he missed the season finale in 2024 (also because of a shoulder injury, though whether that is the same injury re-aggravated now is up for debate), it was Ray-Ray McCloud who was asked to fill that role, primarily. Meanwhile, the Falcons still continued to findsuccess with Londonworking out of the slot half the time, and then splitting out to the Z.
With Mooney out for the foreseeable camp future, that continues to be the case for Atlanta, which has McCloud taking on Mooney's role, and oftentimes KhaDarel Hodge filling in wherever London isn't when they're in a triple receiver look. Tight end Kyle Pitts was not working in team drills during Thursday's practice because he is on a modified practice schedule, so that trio of London, McCloud and Hodge got a lot of work together, with sporadic appearances from tight ends Charlie Woerner and Teagan Quitoriano moving to the flat as the check-down option.
Still, there are others who now have a bigger opening to show their stuff than before.
When pressed for names, Morris specifically called out Casey Washington right at the top.
"We got a chance to see a young guy like Casey Washington be able to accumulate more reps the other day," Morris said. "(We're) able to watch him go out there and grow and perform and be the best version of himself and what he's able to do because he's able to get more reps and be able to go prove himself in those settings."
Morris also called out Chris Blair, who often acts as London's clone for the second team. That may be the case, but they're cross-training Blair, too. Then, there'sthe signing of DJ Chark. Despite the fact the Falcons had Chark's workout scheduled well before Mooney's injury, the natural inclination, based on Chark's skill set, is that he can act as Mooney's clone. That's not unfounded, considering Chark's experience as a speedy deep threat.
"There's opportunity for those guys to be able to go show out at the spot that Mooney plays when you're talking about the guy that's the deep threat, you're talking about a guy that can run intermediate routes," Morris said. "You're talking about the guy that can move inside, move around, do different things and provides that speed element that Mooney definitely provides to us."
Again, though, its not fully possible to clone Mooney one-for-one. However, it is possible to find people who can provide something similar to what he does. That's the goal of the next few weeks of work.
"It's hard to replace your starting X, your Mooney, but we've got people in place that are clone-like to be able to go in there and do some of those things for us that we're going to need to get done," Morris concluded. "It's fun to watch those guys do it as well."
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