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#4 Arizona Cardinals
When you look at a team that just had the number one overall draft pick after a 3-13 record, usually you are just looking for some type of improvement from the following year. I believe this situation is a little different, because you have a general manager that has been part of the organization for 20 years now and took the top spot in 2013.
That guy just decided to hire a head coach, who was fired from a bottom-half Big XII school, and used the first pick in the draft on a 5’10” quarterback after selecting another QB in the top ten just a year earlier, which he ended up trading away for a late second. Those moves better pay off or Steve Keim might lose his job as well.
While I still believe in Josh Rosen’s potential to become a franchise quarterback and the strategy at the top of the board can be questioned, I thought the Cardinals had an excellent all-around draft, especially at the wide receiver position, and they added needed veteran leadership on defense with guys like Terrell Suggs and D.J. Swearinger.
Even though the defense ranked 26th in the league in points allowed last year and they will miss their best player in Patrick Peterson at corner during his six-game suspension, I think they could be pretty good on that side of the ball if some of their young guys take the next step.
The real question mark is what Kliff Kingsbury can do with his new dynamic signal-caller and the rest of the offense. After a bunch of teams already used some of their concepts, Arizona will be first NFL team to fully commit to the Air Raid system. That means their skill players need to learn how routes need to transition and how they have to adapt on the fly.
Larry Fitzgerald really is the only proven playmaker outside of David Johnson in the backfield and not even he has any experience playing in that type of offense. While Kingsbury’s system won’t require elite talent, quick adjustments and reading of defenses will be needed. And if the Cardinals do come out hot, defensive coordinator might still catch up to some of their passing concepts and give you different looks as the season progresses. I’m really interested to see if what they want to do will be sustainable.
