The Arizona Cardinals got tangled up in an old fashion Texas Showdown. Although their were some positives to the Cardinals unfortunate loss. For the most part they were defeated by a very poor Texan team that won’t get any where near the NFL Playoffs. The most concerning thing for the Arizona Cardinals in the second half of the season is the lack of heart and emotion. Ever since the lost to the Los Angeles Rams in London, the Cardinals go into every game looking defeated before the game even starts. Ultimately, they fell victim to this again and couldn’t pull off the road win in Houston.
Offensively, The Arizona Cardinals are just beat down. Although It’s nice to see the development of Blaine Gabbert is going well as he went 22 for 34 on his passes along with 257 yards and 3 touchdowns. Although, Gabbert threw 2 late 4th quarter interceptions I wouldn’t be fazed. At the time of this the Cardinals were desperately trying to come back and Gabbert was just forcing some deep passes. The one other bright spot offensively was practice squad promote Ricky Seals-Jones. Jones had himself quite the homecoming as he caught three passes for 54 yards and two touchdowns. I like the idea of giving players on your chance a look to see if they can play, the Cards could’ve quite possible found themselves a “diamond in the rough”. Besides these two, the Cardinal offense just looks broken, I would blame this on the injuries. If you stop and think about it, the Cardinals have lost All-Pro Running Back David Johnson, starting Guard Mike Iupati starting Left Tackle D.J. Humphries, Quarterbacks Carson Palmer and Drew Stanton, plus Wide Receiver John Brown is struggling to stay healthy. Overall, wait til 2017 and the Cardinal offense will get much better.
Defensively, the only thing that was watchable was Rookie Safety Budda Baker. Baker looks like a man possessed, I’ve never seen someone play with so much passion then 2013 when teammate Tyrann Mathieu was healthy. Baker continues to flash on Special Teams and prove himself on Defense as he shuts down any receiver he was covering. Although Budda had some mental errors in Sundays loss to the Texans, I wouldn’t be worried Cardinal fans, these are just minor growing pains when dealing with a rookie. However, the rest of the defense outside of Linebacker Chandler Jones and Patrick Peterson are terrible. Every Player on the Defensive side of the ball look ether uninspired or old. The Cardinals better be ready to address this come the off-season. If they keep on bringing in these old uninspired players then they’ll continue to be bad. What the Cardinals management needs to remember when signing “older” players is that there is a big difference between a veteran player and an old player.
The Cardinals will host the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sunday at University of Phoenix Stadium in the return of Calais Campbell. When watching the game this Weekend I encourage you to watch and see if the Cardinals are going to roll over at home or show some pride and provide us with an upset overa very good Jacksonville team.
