The Atlanta signed four draft picks on Thursday, the team announced.
The signing of sixth-round linebacker Harold Perkins was previously reported. The Falcons also signed third-round wide receiver Zachariah Branch, fourth-round linebacker Kendal Daniels and seventh-round offensive lineman Ethan Onianwa.
Atlanta selected Branch with the 79th overall pick. He played the 2025 season at Georgia following two seasons (2023-24) at Southern California. In three college seasons, Branch appeared in 38 games and caught 159 passes for 1,634 yards and nine touchdowns.
The Falcons selected Daniels 134th overall. He played 52 games with 41 starts in five seasons with Oklahoma State (2022-24) and Oklahoma (2025). Daniels recorded 293 tackles, 33.5 tackles for loss, 16 passes defensed, 7.5 sacks, five interceptions and two forced fumbles.
Onianwa was the 231st overall pick. He spent four seasons (2021-24) at Rice before transferring to Ohio State for the 2025 season. Onianwa made 25 consecutive starts at right tackle in 2022 and 2023 before moving to left tackle before the 2024 season, starting all nine games he played that year.
Falcons rookie linebacker Harold Perkins Jr. has signed his rookie deal, Zach Klein of WSB-Ch. 2 Atlanta reports.
The Falcons made Perkins a sixth-round pick out of LSU, and many have him listed as a sleeper.
He earned Freshman All-America honors in 2022 with 72 tackles, 7.5 sacks, four forced fumbles and an interception. He repeated that in 2023 with 75 tackles, 5.5 sacks, three forced fumbles and an interception.
Perkins likely would have bypassed his fourth season had he not torn an ACL in his right knee in 2024.
Last season, he had 56 tackles, eight tackles for loss, four sacks and three interceptions.
Cornerback Darren Hall is headed back to Atlanta.
The Falcons announced that they have signed Hall to their 90-man roster on Thursday. Hall began his NFL career as a 2021 fourth-round pick by the team.
Hall played 31 games and made 10 starts over his first two seasons, but was waived ahead of the 2023 season. He spent most of that season on the Colts’ practice squad and moved on to play in 17 games for the Cardinals over the last two seasons.
Hall has 94 tackles, a sack, a forced fumble and a fumble recovery across all of those stops.
The Falcons waived safety Tysheem Johnson in a corresponding move.
The Saints will host two veteran quarterbacks at their rookie minicamp.
Kyle Trask and Easton Stick are among the players trying out this weekend, Nick Underhill of NewOrleans.Football reports. They will join rookie free agents Kaleb Blaha from Wisconsin-River Falls and Braylon Braxton from Southern Mississippi in a competition for the fourth spot on the depth chart.
Tyler Shough, Spencer Rattler and Zach Wilson are the top quarterbacks heading into organized team activities.
Trask, 28, entered the NFL as a second-round pick of the Bucs in 2022. He spent last season with the Falcons.
Trask has played seven regular-season games but has never started, going 4-for-11 for 28 yards.
Stick, 30, played for Saints head coach Kellen Moore with the Chargers in 2023. He was a fifth-round pick of the Chargers in 2019 and has appeared in six games with four starts, completing 64 percent of his passes for 1,133 yards with three touchdowns and one interception.
Falcons president of football Matt Ryan isn’t quite sure what to expect from the team’s quarterbacks once the team gets to training camp this summer, but he seems to have a bit more certainty when it comes to one of the team’s offseason additions.
Wide receiver Jahan Dotson signed with the Falcons as a free agent after catching 37 passes over two seasons with the Eagles. That production continued a run of underwhelming results for Dotson since he was drafted in the first round by Washington in 2022 and the move to Atlanta wasn’t heralded as a significant move for a team that already has the likes of Drake London, Kyle Pitts and Bijan Robinson on their offense.
During a Monday appearance on 680 The Fan, Ryan shone a light on Dotson as a player that he thinks has more to his game than he’s been able to show in his first four seasons.
“Of course, you’ve got to have these premier players,” Ryan said. “But if you’re going to be successful long-term and you’re going to be consistent year in and year out, depth is paramount. So when you add a guy like Jahan Dotson, who I’m excited about, I think there’s untapped potential with him. And some of it is just the situations he was in early on and some of the places that he was. So, excited about what he can do.”
The Falcons also signed Olamide Zaccheaus and drafted Zachariah Branch in the third round, so Dotson will have to stand out on the practice field to make Ryan’s comments look prescient come the fall.
