Photo by Atlanta Falcons, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia CommonsDrake London Has Fewer Red-Zone Targets Than Atlanta's Left Tackle
ESPN asked on Thursday evening whether Drake London is the top receiver in the league. Atlanta has thrown 11 passes from inside an opponent's 20 this season and he was not the target on any of them.
Atlanta has thrown a red-zone pass to its left tackle this season and not one to Drake London.
Not a shot at London. He is fourth in receiving yards among the 161 players ESPN counts as qualified, and of the top 15 on that list nobody does more per ball thrown at him: 488 yards on 37 targets. He is also the only man in the top 26 by yards with no receiving touchdown. The next zero sits 214 yards behind him.
So where does that zero come from?
Atlanta has attempted 11 passes from inside an opponent's 20 all year. Jahan Dotson, Bijan Robinson and Kyle Pitts Sr. got two apiece. Austin Hooper, Brian Robinson Jr., Charlie Woerner and Olamide Zaccheaus got one each. And Jake Matthews, the left tackle, number 70, reported in as eligible on second-and-5 from the Baltimore 5 and got the eleventh.
London got none. The closest a throw to him has even been snapped is 27 yards from the end zone.
The red zone is fine. Atlanta scores on every trip it takes there and converts touchdowns at the seventh-best rate in the league. In September Miles Grady wrote about an offense that had not taken a single snap inside an opponent's 20. That part got solved. London was not in the solution.
Nobody is eating his touchdowns. Four touchdown passes, four different men, one each. Kyle Pitts Sr., whose usage I went after a week ago, owns one of them now.
I'm 71% sure Atlanta does not throw London a ball inside Chicago's 20 on Sunday. That is a number on Atlanta's play sheet, not on his hands.
ESPN asked a question Thursday evening. Atlanta has five games of evidence that it has no intention of letting anyone answer it.
The Tilt
Atlanta has never once asked Drake London to answer the question ESPN just asked.
— Dex Ponce
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