Harold Perkins Jr. got to Atlanta with a fresh Falcons hat and a clean break from the team he grew up rooting for. The 21-year-old linebacker, taken by the Falcons with the 215th pick in the sixth round, said after the draft, "Guess what, though? I ain’t a Saints fan no more."
On Thursday, Atlanta opened a three-day rookie minicamp, putting Perkins on the field for his first official day of work with the team. The former LSU linebacker enters the league with a reputation that is equal parts burst and uncertainty, but those around him believe the Falcons may have landed a late-round bargain.
Perkins’ draft slot reflected how much his stock changed after a torn ACL in 2024 and a quieter finish to his college career. He had 7.5 sacks and 13 tackles-for-loss as a freshman at LSU, then followed with 5.5 sacks and 13 tackles-for-loss as a sophomore before injuries and a role change left him with four sacks and 9.5 tackles-for-loss across his final two seasons. Dane Brugler of The Athletic ranked him the 16th-best linebacker in the class, a reminder that the ability that once made him one of college football’s most disruptive defenders never disappeared, even if the production dipped.
The 6-foot-1, 220-pound linebacker with 31.5-inch arms still has the kind of physical profile NFL teams chase, and the Falcons are betting the tape from his early LSU seasons matters more than the uneven stretch that followed. Perkins enrolled at LSU after graduating from Cypress Park, just outside Houston, and his path has been shaped as much by expectation as by disruption.
That outlook is part of why the people around him say Atlanta may be getting the best version of Perkins since his sophomore season. Jacory Nichols, who trains both Perkins and Saints cornerback Kool-Aid McKinstry in the offseason, said this week that Perkins was already yelling "Dirty Bird" at McKinstry during workouts in Houston. Pete Longoria, who said Perkins never missed a chance to head to New Orleans for a weekend while growing up, put the Falcons’ gamble plainly: "I think at the end of the day, everybody is going to say the Falcons got a steal."
Perkins has not hidden the way he sees his own path. He said, "My plan when I came to college was to go to the league and graduate in three years," and added, "God had other plans for me, so that’s what that was." He also said, "I’m very realistic with myself," noting that while "everybody wants to be a first-round draft pick" and "everybody wants to go No. 1 overall," that is not how the league works for everyone. His own standard is higher than draft position. "My end goal wasn’t just to get to the league," he said. "My end goal was to have a gold jacket." In Atlanta, that ambition now starts with the basics: learning the playbook, proving the knee is sound and showing the Falcons that a sixth-round pick can still finish like a star.
