The Falcons Defense Is Losing Pieces Faster Than Ulbrich Can Replace Them

DeMarcco Hellams lined up at free safety with the first-team defense on Thursday, taking every snap alongside Xavier Watts while Jessie Bates III stood on the sideline without pads for the second consecutive day. Across the field, CJ Henderson was absent entirely -- held out of his second straight practice with no official explanation. Combined with Jalon Walker's season-ending ACL tear from Day 6, that is three defensive starters unavailable simultaneously, seven days before the Falcons open the preseason against Denver.

Camp injuries happen. But there is a difference between losing bodies and losing the bodies your scheme was built around, and the Falcons are crossing that line faster than anyone in Flowery Branch would like to admit.

I wrote last week that the 57-sack defense was Atlanta's competitive advantage -- the foundation of the argument that this roster was the best-constructed non-QB team in the NFC South. That argument deserves an update. The foundation is cracking.

The edge losses are already documented. Walker is gone for the year. Pearce faces a likely suspension from his February arrest. Both 2025 first-round edge investments are simultaneously unavailable, and the rotation behind them -- Ebukam returning from an Achilles tear, Ojulari and Thomas on prove-it deals, Trice with zero NFL snaps, a sixth-round rookie in Perkins getting first-team reps at Walker's hybrid spot -- is a collection of hopeful outcomes, not established production. That was already an identity problem.

What changed this week is that the secondary started bleeding too.

Bates's absence is the most significant development in camp since Walker went down, and it is significant precisely because nobody will say what it is. He had his helmet off during Day 6's 11-on-11 work. He was absent entirely on Day 7. No injury designation from the team. And the subtext -- which Bates himself has provided -- is that the Falcons have not initiated extension talks with a 29-year-old, second-team All-Pro safety entering the final year of a four-year, $64 million contract with a void year in 2027.

I will not speculate about whether this is injury or negotiating posture. What I can tell you is what his absence means schematically: Bates is the defensive quarterback, the player who sets the coverage shell and communicates adjustments pre-snap. When he is on the field, Ulbrich can run his full menu of two-high and single-high rotations. When Hellams is there instead, that menu gets shorter.

Henderson's absence compounds the problem from a different angle. A former ninth-overall pick signed this offseason as depth insurance behind A.J. Terrell and Mike Hughes, his two consecutive missed practices push the cornerback depth to Clark Phillips III, Mike Ford Jr., and Natrone Brooks. That is thin. That is one Terrell tweak away from a problem that keeps defensive coordinators awake at night.

The question worth asking is structural: at what point does the quantity of simultaneous absences change the qualitative identity of the defense? Walker gone for the season. Pearce facing suspension. Bates out for an unknown duration with an unknown cause. Henderson missing two straight days. Ulbrich's scheme -- the one that transformed Atlanta from second-to-last in sacks to second in the NFL in a single season -- was designed around specific personnel. Remove enough of those personnel and the scheme does not just get worse. It becomes a different scheme.

Avieon Terrell, the second-round rookie with an interception on Day 7, is a bright spot. Watts anchors the safety group after a Defensive Rookie of the Year-caliber 2025 season. Dorlus has flashed inside (strip sack on Day 4), and Andersen anchors the linebacker corps, though Elliss's departure to New Orleans leaves a gap the draft class is still learning to fill. But those pieces were supposed to complement a fully staffed secondary and a pass rush led by two first-round edges. Not carry the unit.

Seven days to Denver. The preseason opener is a dress rehearsal, not a referendum, but it is also the first chance for Ulbrich to see his defense under game conditions -- and right now full strength does not exist. The Falcons have spent the offseason investing in the offense: the quarterback competition, Robinson's extension, every headline out of Flowery Branch. The assumption was that the defense would be the constant while the offense figured itself out.

That assumption is being tested. And the defense, for the first time since Ulbrich's arrival, is the unit that needs defending.