Atlanta Falcons: Mohamed Sanu headed for a breakout season?
By Derek Snyder
The Atlanta Falcons truly have a talented receiving corps heading into 2017, but one guy specifically has been catching Dan Quinn’s eye in camp.
Mohamed Sanu came over to the Atlanta Falcons from the Cincinnati Bengals a little over a year ago by signing a deal with the team in free-agency. Initially, there weren’t too many Falcons fans that were on board with the signing of Sanu, especially since he signed a five-year deal worth $32.5 million, according to Vaughn McClure from ESPN.
Sanu had been a key contributor to the Bengals offense since 2012, but he never proved to be a receiver Atlanta should waste a ton of money signing. That being said, I think Sanu proved all of us wrong throughout the 2016 season for the Falcons.
The veteran Sanu had 653 receiving yards for four receiving touchdowns and a career-high 59 receptions. While those aren’t huge numbers by any stretch, he made big play after big play for an offense that will go down as one of the best in NFL history.
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However, it’s not Sanu’s 2016 production that should have Falcons fans excited, it’s the news that’s been reported about his physical condition coming into the team’s 2017 training camp. Take a look at this quote from Dan Quinn in Will McFadden’s article from the Falcons official website:
"The talent on the Falcons offense is well-known, but Sanu may surprise those who haven’t followed the team closely this offseason. Speaking with the media on Thursday, coach Dan Quinn said Sanu has worked extremely hard to improve ahead of the 2017 season.“When he came back for the offseason, he was intent on throwing a hell of an offseason,” Quinn said. “And that part of his game he really came in more fit, stronger, really like at the top of it heading into the offseason, which is not always easy to do – sometimes guys are dealing with injury or something as they’re coming back – but for him, he really went for it.”"
Heck, the fifth-year player out of Rutgers University is already 6-2 and 215 pounds. One of my favorite attributes of Sanu is that he isn’t afraid of contact whatsoever. Not to mention, there were numerous times last year that Sanu bailed Matt Ryan out over the middle of the field.
Sanu is the perfect No. 2 receiver to Julio Jones that the Falcons could have gone out and signed. No, he’s not the fastest guy on the field and no, he doesn’t have the greatest hands in the game, but this dude goes hard every single play – there’s nothing more you can ask from a player as a fan.
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If Sanu worked as hard as Dan Quinn mentioned and indeed improved his physical conditioning, he could have one heck of a 2017 season in Atlanta.