Atlanta Falcons: It’s Devonta Freeman’s Time To Shine

The Atlanta Falcons have tried to get Devonta Freeman as many snaps as they can. The coaches obviously knew this whole time that the fourth round prospect out of Florida State has play-making potential, but there’s only so many snaps in a game. Steven Jackson and Jacquizz Rodgers always forces the coaches to limit Devonta to as limited snaps as possible.

This Sunday, the young rookie will get a bigger role.

"“Jackson failed to practice today and his status is unclear for Sunday, announced D. Orlando Ledbetter of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Yesterday, ESPN’s Vaughn McClure stated, “Think this was obvious with Mike Smith saying Jerome Smith would be active, but Steven Jackson (quad) now not expected to play Sunday.””"

Last week against the Saints, Freeman broke out of the scene after Steven Jackson got injured, scoring on a 31-yard touchdown blast and scampering for a 36 yard reception.

The fourth-round draft pick from Florida State has been getting not more then an average of 10 snaps a game thus far, but under the new circumstances he will, for the first time in his NFL career, go into a game expecting for more most of the touches.

When the media asked star QB Matt Ryan and head coach Mike Smith about the “prospect,” they had nothing but good words to say.

"“Oh, Devonta’s a good kid,” Ryan said. “He’s a quite a guy, but he’s got a great attitude. He loves to play. And he loves to compete. And he wants to get better. Every day he’s in here, he’s working hard to get better and constantly asking me questions; what he can do. I’ve tried to be as helpful as I can be to bring him along in our offense as quickly as possible.” “Devonta has improved every week,” Smith said. “I think the biggest thing, as we said if you go back and look at transcripts from training camp, it was going to be about his ability to pick up the pass protection. And he did outstanding job [against the Saints]. He was called on because of the injury to Steven Jackson to play more snaps. He did a good job in his pass protection. He’s a very good slash runner. He’s does a good job hitting the hole. And he made a very good run on the long touchdown run. He’s got some sneaky speed. He’s not super fast, but he’s fast enough to run away from guys in the secondary.” per ESPN.com"

Next: This is Devonta's Time To Shine