The Atlanta Falcons are seemingly in the midst of a major QB dilemma. Some people want to see them roll with Michael Penix Jr., some want to see them pursue Malik Willis, and others have names on their mind that are coming straight out of left field-- and nobody knows what to expect anymore after Kevin Stefanski failed to commit to Penix as the starting QB.
This led us here at Blogging Dirty to conduct a poll on Twitter about who Falcons fans want to see as Atlanta's Week 1 starting quarterback. Since Willis doesn't seem overly likely, the options were Penix, Joe Flacco, Mac Jones, and Tyson Bagent, likely the most viable of the options this team could want.
Of these options do you want the #Falcons starting QB in 2026 to be?
— Blogging Dirty (@BloggingDirty) February 24, 2026
Despite the smaller sample size, the results were honestly pretty telling, and Stefanski should take notes. Between 62 voters, Penix received a staggering 64.5% of the votes, while Jones finished in second with 17.7% of the votes and Bagent barely edged out Flacco to finish third with 9.7% of votes.
Falcons fans want Michael Penix Jr. to be the 2026 starting quarterback
Perhaps the alternative choices weren't as desirable as they were if Willis, Tua Tagovailoa, and Kyler Murray were the other options, but it can't be an outlier that the 25-year-old is garnering this much fan support. In my eyes, I would still choose starting a healthy Penix in Week 1 over anyone else here.
The national media has been swearing up and down that the Dirty Birds are primed to move on from Penix and will be key players in the quarterback market this offseason, but, I don't see it. Stefanski clearly believes in him, we just need to see how he will look in practice once he returns to the field.
A big benefit of this revamped Falcons' coaching staff is that there is a lot more that's being done to give the Heisman Trophy runner-up the development and support he wasn't getting from the previous staff. And the system itself is a better fit for Penix's skillset than Zac Robinson's scheme ever was.
Part of why Stefanski was hired by Atlanta to begin with was to help the Washington product turn a corner in his development. After all, this is a player who was drafted eighth overall and was one of the best signal-callers in the nation in college, but running the pistol was evidently holding him back.
The injury history is understandably alarming, but beyond that, he has looked like a viable franchise QB at times. The potential is there, and it isn't worth throwing that away to throw a bag at Willis or pursue a QB Ian Cunningham is familiar with in Bagent when there's plenty of meat left on the bone.
If Penix didn't have the support of the fanbase, they would be calling for other QBs. But they aren't. Stefanski has backed him. Matt Ryan has backed him. So for as murky as things might seem in the short-term, it's clear that he's a key piece of the long-term vision the new regime has for this team.