If you thought the Arizona Cardinals’ 2-4 start that includes two embarrassing blowouts is surprising, you had your head buried in the moist sand alongside Kool-Aid beach.
Lots of people tried to warn us.
Not that a few aggregated stories from specific authors should morph your perspective, but ESPN’s Michael Clay did a position-by-position breakdown of every NFL team this preseason. Added up, he ranked Arizona with the 31st-best roster in the NFL.
His ESPN colleagues, including a seasoned NFL reporter (Dan Graziano), former player (Louis Riddick) and analytics guru (Aaron Schatz), graded out Arizona in the bottom-six of non-quarterback roster talent. They didn’t rank the quarterback, coaches and front office in the top-20 of the league either.
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You can see similar evaluations from Pro Football Focus and others.
This was a four-win team for the most part running it back, with the most notable upgrade being its healthy starting quarterback. We can argue about Kyler Murray all we like. But this goes a lot deeper.
The Cardinals either sold us — or really believe — they equipped Murray to succeed. That is categorically false.
With the exception of second-year pro Michael Wilson, the receivers are in roles they haven’t held before.
Arizona is riding its identity on James Conner, who is undervalued as a leader but overvalued as a No. 1 back. Relatedly, its passing attack can’t find an ounce of rhythm without Conner getting going, and that seems less and less possible with depth problems along the right side of the offensive line.
The same goes for the defensive trenches, where the two reasonable defensive line additions from free agency — Justin Jones and Bilal Nichols — are already out injured, as are the two most likely pass rush contributors drafted by general manager Monti Ossenfort’s group. Darius Robinson’s return could provide an inkling of hope that better days are ahead, but BJ Ojulari’s two years of little production at edge loom over the drafting decisions made by this Cardinals regime.
I get it, things take time. Bad luck strikes.
Head coach Jonathan Gannon and Ossenfort have to prove they can keep the attention of an undertalented team. In how they’ve operated, they also have to either nail ready-to-go talent deep into the draft or, more realistically, prove they can develop that more raw talent. They have failed at the former, so it’s on to hoping Harrison, Robinson, Wilson, cornerback Max Melton and more can keep taking steps forward.
Or Arizona can flip into spending mode by trading draft picks and players to add more proven NFL producers to deploy their schemes.
Spending money to point this current trajectory further upward also means they must get extensions done with one or a few of Budda Baker, Conner and Kyzir White. All remain valuable to the locker room, and all remain productive at their positions despite their age.
All three are free agents after this season.
Those players are three of the team’s four captains. Including the quarterback in this discussion and we’re still unsure about the future of this current core six games through the 2024 season. Like, whether they will be on the team next year type of unsure.
The Nov. 5 trade deadline will tip us off about how the Cardinals’ front office feels about that group. Bolstering the roster around the core four captains would bring fans back into the fold by showing them incremental improvements are still happening.
The disappointing thing is if Arizona gives a Joaquin Phoenix from Gladiator thumbs down to this leadership group, the only next step is blowing this up even further.
And then we’d all ask: Why did the Cardinals spend time doing what they did for the past two seasons?
At this moment, that seems unlikely. Arizona just hasn’t shot that possibility down yet.
The ask from Cardinals fans seems to be something like this: They just want the Cardinals to show a little admission, any bit of acknowledgment, that this roster even when healthy still isn’t good enough to field a winning team. Or to be proven wrong in a lighter backend of the schedule.