Julio Jones Set for Huge Season in Atlanta Falcons' Revamped Offense

Julio Jones is widely regarded as one of the best wide receivers in the NFL.

Through four years of his career, Jones has caught 278 passes for 4,330 yards and 26 touchdowns. His receiving yards are the eighth most in history for a receiver over his first four seasons in the league. On its own that is an incredible achievement, but Jones has done it while missing 15 regular season games.

Last year, after returning from major injury, Jones played in all but one regular season game and had his most productive season.

On 104 receptions he compiled 1,593 yards and six touchdowns. Jones had previously peaked at 79 receptions and 1,198 yards for a single season. What was most amazing about Jones' season was that he achieved those numbers while still not playing to his full potential.

Charting through his targets revealed a large number of failures at the catch point.

On 17 occasions Jones failed to bring in a catchable pass by either not tracking the ball through the air properly, losing it through contact, not keeping his feet in bounds or enduring a blatant drop. Seventeen occasions is a huge number, though it's offset some by how many targets Jones received.

What stood out most about Jones' play last season, and throughout his career, was his ability to get open deep down the field with such consistency.

In each of his seasons in the league Jones has had a reception of at least 79 yards. Last season he 43 receptions of at least 16 yards, with 30 of those receptions going for at least 20 yards. Jones' 43 receptions of 16+ yards accounted for 1,009 of his 1,593 yards and three of his six touchdowns.

Jones achieved those numbers in Dirk Koetter's offensive system that heavily featured vertical routes to free him downfield. While Koetter's offense suited Jones' skill set, Kyle Shanahan's may be even better for him.

Koetter's offense made use of play action and bootlegs to disrupt opposing coverages. While it was a feature of Koetter's offense, it's a primary principle of Shanahan's. With very limited pieces last season, Shanahan was able to consistently get receivers open downfield by using specific route combinations after play action.

Those route combinations should perfectly highlight Jones' ability to get downfield in a hurry.

Credit: NFL.com

After play action, Julio will be running plenty of crossing routes or pure vertical routes down the seam or sideline. Shanahan attempts to target specific defenders by combining these two routes after a hard play fake that takes the quarterback out of the pocket.

This play results in a long completion to Andrew Hawkins that comes easily even for a quarterback and receiver tandem as limited as Hawkins and Brian Hoyer.

Credit: NFL.com

Shanahan is primarily targeting the left cornerback on this play, Johnathan Joseph. Joseph lined up in off coverage and is already committing to mirroring Josh Gordon as he runs down the seam. Meanwhile, the safety to the inside of Joseph has bought completely into the play fake in the backfield.

The safety is aggressively flying forward to the point that he overruns the crossing Hawkins.

Typically Hawkins has to sprint in front of a safety coming from deep on this route, but the safety has reacted so poorly to the fake that Hawkins now actually has to run in behind him early in his route. This makes Hoyer's job even easier when he turns to survey the field.

Credit: NFL.com

Hoyer's read is simplified because both of his receivers are in line with other as he looks downfield. Hawkins is running into wide-open space as Joseph has his back turned to the receiver. With the underneath safety out of the play, Hoyer can pitch the ball in front of Hawkins who then carries it further downfield.

Jones can obviously run a crossing route and is very dangerous once he has the ball in space.

With Roddy White on the field, Jones will likely be the receiver running vertically more often than he is the crosser. However, that is likely why Leonard Hankerson has been talked up ahead of the season. Hankerson has the athleticism to match Jones when it comes to simply running vertically downfield.

He can clear out space for Jones as effectively as Jones can clear out space for him. White's physical talent has clearly declined and he's expected to deal with knee issues moving forward.

The quality of safety play in the NFL today is possibly lower than it has ever been. While it may not be the case from a sheer talent perspective, it is when you consider what players are being asked to do at the position.

Few safeties have the wide-ranging skill set required to be effective in as many areas as they are used. Shanahan attempts to stress safeties as much as possible with his misdirection and route combinations, but those traits of his offense can also more regularly lead to breakdowns between teammates in the secondary.

Often when the Browns looked to the vertical route last season it was because the secondary had mixed up an assignment trying to adjust the different elements of the offense that were developing.

Credit: NFL.com

Against the Baltimore Ravens on this play, the deep three in the secondary don't react to the play fake. Hoyer settles in the pocket after cutting his bootleg turn short by design. This gives him time to survey the field for an open receiver.

There isn't initially an obvious option, but the hard play action pulled the front seven away from the quarterback so he has time to hold the ball.

Credit: NFL.com

Both the free safety and cornerback are drawn to the crossing route underneath, freeing up Taylor Gabriel, the outside receiver, to run wide open down the seam. Once again, all of Hoyer's receivers and the defenders he has to read off of are in the same eye line. A simple read.

This was a miscommunication between the safety and the cornerback. One of the two, likely the cornerback, should have run with Gabriel downfield.

While you're relying on the defense to make a mistake with players such as Gabriel and Hoyer running your offense, Gabriel averaged over 17 yards per reception last year despite being an unimpressive individual talent.

Shanahan has never had a quarterback as talented as Ryan to work with, even Robert Griffin III during his rookie season, while none of his receivers has ever come close to Jones.

That's something he discussed earlier in the offseason, via Vaughn McClure of ESPN.com:

"

"Just physically ... I mean, I loved Julio coming out of college [and] I've always known how talented he is,'' Shanahan said. "Just to be around a guy who is as explosive as he is but who can still break down and cut and attack the football and see the ball ... and his toughness. The guy doesn't take a play off. He's physically tough and mentally tough. He's very fun to coach. And he makes you a better coach.''

"

Having Jones and Ryan is going to make it much easier for Shanahan to execute the staple plays of his philosophy, but it will also allow him to deviate from them more when necessary.

Credit: NFL.com

Jones isn't a great route runner, but he has developed over the years into a good one. With his level of athleticism, he doesn't need to be a great route runner to be extremely productive. Importantly, his best routes are vertical routes.

For his longest reception of the year, he ran a very impressive double move against the Green Bay Packers.

Credit: NFL.com

The defensive back across from him, Tramon Williams, lined up in off coverage at the snap. Jones wasn't sloppy with his route in spite of that. His stem led him directly downfield, parallel with the sideline. Once he had passed five yards, he made one hard cut with his right foot to push inside.

Once he turned inside, he kept moving for two steps, turning his shoulders to sell the in-route.

His in-breaking movement drew Williams forward into a position where Jones could make an aggressive move past his outside shoulder. Jones left the defensive back in his wake as he accelerated down the sideline into a position where Ryan could find him.

Credit: NFL.com

Ryan's pass arrives at the perfect time and is accurate enough to allow Jones to catch it in space without coming to a complete stop. The ball beat the safety across the field, so Jones had the opportunity to set him a cutback past his inside shoulder.

Jones was 30 yards downfield at this point but was able to extend the play past the safety for another 40. He finished the play with a 79-yard gain, but he probably should have scored a touchdown.

He made a critical error at the end of the play by not running towards the pylon, instead aggressively attempting to run through the recovering safety. It was a minor issue on what was otherwise a hugely impressive play from the receiver.

Unlike anyone that Shanahan had last season, Jones can beat defensive backs in a myriad of ways. That's especially true when left in one-on-one situations.

While Jones had issues consistently pulling the ball in and showed poor awareness of the sideline with his feet too often last season, his ball skills to adjust to the ball and win it over defensive backs were still evident.

Credit: NFL.com

So long as he gets enough targets in these situations, he should continue to be very productive, even if he continues to fail at the rate he did last season. Shanahan should also make use of Jones' ability after the catch on screen plays.

Jones had 565 yards of YAC last season, while averaging 8.9 yards on screens/passes caught behind or at the line of scrimmage.

With Shanahan understanding how to assault secondaries deep and Jones' sheer talent to come free, the receiver is set for a huge year in 2015. At 26 years of age, he is entering his physical prime while White's diminishing role should allow him to see even more targets than the huge number he received last season.

Even though the Falcons defense appears to be headed in the right direction, it's unlikely that the team will be in position to run a lot next season.

There may not be a better offensive coordinator in the NFL for Julio Jones than Kyle Shanahan. Everything is setting up for it to be a record-breaking year in Atlanta this season.

All unsourced statistics were acquired through the writer's own tape analysis.