20 Questions: No. 18 - Jamaal Anderson

The 20 Questions series will run every few days leading up to the end of training camp and the start of the NFL season.

No. 18: Can Jamaal Anderson be more productive on the defensive line?

He better be or there's going to be a strong contingent of Atlanta fans waiting to run him out of town. Seriously, though, it was really surprising that Anderson had such a difficult time at defensive end last year. Everyone's biggest gripe about him was that he failed to record a sack during his rookie season, and that was certainly a valid complaint. Anderson led the SEC in sacks during his final season at Arkansas, so expectations were extremely high when the Falcons drafted him in 2007.

And really, when a team goes out of its way to draft you at No. 8 overall, shouldn't they expect a somewhat immediate turnaround? I felt bad for Anderson last year because it was obvious that this was eating at him. It's not like he didn't care that he wasn't putting decent numbers up opposite John Abraham. He's a good kid who obviously loves playing for the Falcons, but he needs to come in this season and produce to prove his worth.

Can he do it? Well, the circumstances certainly look good -- in fact, just as good as they were at the beginning of last year. With the Falcons signing Grady Jackson again, he'll have a huge presence on the defensive line and consistently eat up two offensive linemen. That is sure to help Anderson. With Abraham coming off a pretty successful season, teams will likely key up on him with occasional double teams. Those two factors alone should open things up quite a bit for Anderson, but he's going to have to take advantage of it.

With a rookie season under his belt, I think the nerves will be long gone and he'll be able to play a more relaxed brand of football up front. Anderson won't go another season without a sack, and he should rack them up pretty easily this year. I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that Anderson will record the first sack of his NFL career Sept. 7 against Detroit. That will be the first of many for Anderson in his career.

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