Zachariah Branch had two bad moments on Sunday, and both turned into Chicago points. The Atlanta Falcons rookie muffed a punt at his own 10-yard line late in the first half, and the Bears scored a touchdown two plays later to go up 21-7. Late in the third quarter he lost the ball at the end of a 26-yard kickoff return, and Chicago kicked a field goal to make it 31-7. The Falcons scored the next 16 points but lost 31-23.
A day later, Branch said the hardest part was knowing how much work had gone into the week. “You don’t want to have those type of moments in the game, especially when the game is such a, you know, a small margin for error,” he said Monday. “But I feel like I responded well, you know, even after the certain experiences, I bounced back, had a couple catches, you know, to try to control what I can after that.”
A prayer on the sideline
Branch said Drake London, Jahan Dotson and Bijan Robinson all came to find him on the bench. Robinson went further and prayed with him. “I’m very faith led,” Branch said, “and to have people around me and surround people around me like that, you know, as teammates is a blessing just to have someone who can pray for me on the sideline.” He said it was the first time a teammate had done that for him during a game. “He didn’t have to pray for me and just do those extra things and take the extra mile to be a good teammate for me,” he said. “It’s just sort of leadership and a maturity on his level.”
The message from the older players, he said, was simple: do not let one play ruin the rest of the afternoon. “We know the standard that you hold yourself. We know what you’re capable of, but don’t dwell on it too much to where it affects you the rest of the game,” Branch said, describing what they told him. “Because we still have a lot of football to play.”
“Just misjudged it”
Branch did not make excuses for either play. On the punt, he said he read the ball wrong. “Just misjudged it. You know, should have just got underneath it a little bit more and, you know, fielded it cleanly,” he said. “Pretty comfortable back there catching. But, you know, just had to make a split decision.” On the kickoff, he said the problem was ball security in traffic. “You got to hit it with full speed and have good ball security at the end of the day,” he said. “So I got to do a better job with, you know, taking care of the ball in that instance.”
The coaches kept going to him. Branch, a third-round pick (No. 79) out of Georgia, caught passes of 5 and 4 yards on fourth-quarter drives and caught Michael Penix Jr.’s two-point pass after Kyle Pitts’ first touchdown. He finished with two catches for 9 yards, plus four kickoff returns for 86 yards. Asked whether the staff had told him they want to give him a bigger role, he said they had. “Whatever they want me to do, I’m willing to do it for the team to be able to win,” he said, including motions that act as decoys: “Some of those motions are things that some people may not really realize.”
Branch also talked about linebacker Kendal Daniels, a fellow rookie who was taken off the field on a cart with a neck injury in the third quarter and was released from the hospital the same day. “That’s the worst part about this game, in my opinion, is the injuries,” Branch said. “We’ve been doing a lot of things together. So we have a pretty good bond.” He said he was praying for Daniels on the field.
Dotson: “It happened. It’s over”
Dotson was one of the players who went to Branch, and he explained why. After the muffed punt, he said, he tried to imagine making that mistake himself. “I know I practice catching punts every single day, right? I know I have full trust in my hands to make every catch back there,” he said. “And, you know, I went up to him just as a brother.” His advice: “Forget it. It happened. It’s over.”
Dotson said he learned that from A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith in Philadelphia. “Mistakes are going to happen. You’re not going to catch every single ball,” he said. “You’re going to have another opportunity to make a play. And what are you going to do then? Are you going to still be thinking about the muff punt? Or are you going to … take one to the house?”
Dotson had his own big day. He caught a 13-yard touchdown pass from Penix for Atlanta’s first points, then had catches of 33 and 41 yards in the fourth quarter. The 41-yarder set up Pitts’ second touchdown. He finished with three catches for 87 yards. Through six games he has 11 catches for 236 yards, 21.5 yards per catch, and two touchdowns. He had one touchdown in his two seasons with the Eagles combined. Asked whether he had always had the back-shoulder catch in his game, he said yes. “I get discredited for my size a little bit,” he said. “People don’t think I have that in my skill set.”
He said the touchdowns are nice, but he cares more about something else. “Obviously, you know, I’m a big yards guy. Touchdowns are cool. I like yards,” he said. “I think that’s kind of a little receiver thing.” When his numbers were low early in the season, he said, Falcons president of football Matt Ryan told him he was getting open and “the ball will find you as long as you just keep doing what you’re doing.” Dotson said he had already stopped worrying about it: “I’m super process driven.”
The Falcons (2-4) host the unbeaten San Francisco 49ers on Sunday. Branch said he had not studied them yet because Monday was for fixing the Bears game. “I’m pretty sure they’re undefeated,” he said. “We’re going to be facing a good football team each and every week.”
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