Falcons rookie Robert Alford will provide a weekly diary for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution this season.
The Hammond, La., native who played at Southeastern Louisiana, made his Georgia Dome debut Sunday against the St. Louis Rams. He getting ready for the Miami Dolphins this week.
Here’s his third installment, as told to D. Orlando Ledbetter.
Linebacker Sean Weatherspoon is an all-around competitor. He brings a lot of energy to the defense. But like Coach (Mike Smith) said, when one player goes down, we have the next person stepping up, which is the rookie (Joplo Bartu). Pretty much I think Spoon will be on the sidelines. I think he’ll be able to show his leadership and just get us hyped on defense.
Overall, we’ve been very aggressive. The tackling has been good. We are a real-good defense.
(Miami wide receiver) Mike Wallace, he can run so he’s a vertical threat. (Miami receiver Brian) Hartline, he’s fast also. He has a lot of double moves and things like that, so you have to keep your eyes up on the receiver.
We have a good scheme in mind for them. We just have to go out there and execute it.
Joplo stepped up last week. A lot of the rookies have stepped up a lot. I think that’s why they’ve brought us in so that we can showcase our talent. I think that everybody is doing real good.
Everything has been normal (despite all of the injuries). It has slowed down for me. I’m just going out there and competing every day at practice and getting better each and every day.
They have the good receivers, and the quarterback (Ryan Tannehill) is real good, too. I think he ran a 4.5 at the combine. I think he is an all-around competitor.
