Johnathan Cyprien showed up early for his first day of work with his new employer when just about nobody was there, even though it really wasn’t a work day, so he’ll be good to play for the Falcons on Sunday.
It was a Tuesday, one day after the strong safety was traded by the Philadelphia Eagles to the Falcons in exchange for linebacker Duke Riley in a deal with a couple of 2020 draft choices thrown into the mix.
And there was Cyprien hunkering down with the defensive backs coach, trying to get up to speed.
There weren’t many if any other players around. Tuesdays in the fall, after all, are the players’ one true day off.
But the seventh-year NFL veteran hopes to help backfill the void left when strong safety Keanu Neal blew out his Achilles tendon Sept. 22 in Indianapolis. And that takes work.
"I spent a couple hours with coach Doug Mallory and we caught up on first, second, third down," Cyprien said Thursday. "Catching up on red zone now, so ..."
So, we’ll see.
The Falcons (1-3) will try to rescue a season Sunday at Houston (2-2), and they’ll do it without perhaps their No. 1 enforcer. Neal, a first-round draft choice in 2016, smacks people on football fields. He leaves impressions. He discourages folks from running routes over the middle.
But he’s gone before season’s end for the second year in a row.
And here comes Cyprien.
He’s not quite as big as Neal, although he’s close. He goes about 6-foot-1, 211 pounds to Neal’s 216.
If he can get up to speed, the Falcons won’t have to play checkers in the secondary like they did in Sunday’s loss to the Titans – the first game this season without Neal.
In that one, Kemal Ishmael – a special-teams player who has been a combo safety/linebacker – worked at strong safety in base situations.
Pass coverage is not among Ishmael’s strengths, so in those situations nickel back Demonate Kazee moved to free safety and bumped free safety Ricardo Allen to the strong spot, with rookie cornerback Kendall Sheffield manning the slot cover.
That’s not ideal. Allen doesn’t carry the heft you want there for one thing, and the fact that opponents are running them nearly to death makes it worse.
That’s a whole lot of checkers moving around in weird, not normal directions.
So, here’s Cyprien, the guy from North Miami Beach, Fla., who was drafted in the second round by the Jaguars in 2013 out of Florida International.
He started 70 of 74 NFL games played, including the first 70 with the Jags and then 10 times before a season-ending injury in 2017 in his one season with the Titans, when current Falcons assistant coach Mike Malarkey was head coach there.
The Falcons need him.
Veteran safety J.J. Wilcox was lost to season-ending injury on the first day of training camp, and Neal’s down again.
“When Keanu got hurt, we obviously had some interest in signing another strong safety who has had experience and size playing down in the box,” said coach Dan Quinn, even though the Falcons didn’t sign Cyprien. “That’s really where the decision came from.”
Cyprien missed all of 2018 with a torn ACL and joined the Eagles shortly before this season. He wasn’t playing much.
It looks like he’s about to play plenty.
So, he studying and jabbering.
“Actually, Coach told me to ask at least 10 questions a day, so I’m doing real good,” he said. “I’m definitely doing that and soaking up as much as I can.”
Allen is all in on Cyprien.
“He’s a real smart guy. You can tell he’s been in the league. He’s been in a couple different systems. The terminology is a little different, but he’s found a way to correlate things in his own way,” Allen said.
“I typically try to talk to the guy with the least amount of experience and just help them with the nuances because I know our system may not be overly complex, but like we’re very detailed. I just try to talk as much as I can.”
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