Are the Arizona Cardinals for Real?
Last year rookie head coach Kliff Kingsbury and the 2019 Arizona Cardinals finished the season at 5–10–1. Not a stellar record, but impressive performances against tough opponents late in the year inspired hope for year two. Add in an offseason addition of DeAndre Hopkins paired with potential sophomore jumps for Kingsbury and Kyler Murray, and there was a lot to be excited about for this offense in 2020.
So far through 6 games the 2020 Cardinals have been one of the more polarizing teams in the league. They started off 2–0 including a win over the reigning NFC champion 49ers, and it looked as though they were ready to make the jump many were hoping for. They then proceeded to lose two straight against a pair of unimpressive opponents and people hopped off the bandwagon as quickly as they got on. Now in their third act, the Cardinals have won three straight including an impressive win over the previously undefeated Seahawks on primetime television, and Kyler Murray has managed to throw his hat into the ring for the NFL’s MVP award.
Rewind back to January of 2019 when the Cardinals first announced the hiring of Kingsbury. Kingsbury had just been fired, I repeat fired, as the head coach at Texas Tech after posting a career record of 35–40 with the Red Raiders. Somehow, the Cardinals came to the conclusion that a guy who couldn’t post an above .500 record in the NCAA was going to lead their team to success in the NFL. Understandably there were a handful of critics who doubted Kingsbury had what it takes to succeed at the highest level.
Although his win loss record at Texas Tech wasn’t appealing, Kingsbury had his fair share of positive traits as an NFL head coaching candidate, and all of these traits happened to line up perfectly with the ongoing trends in the NFL. Teams in need of a new head coach wanted to hire an offensive guru who could not only lead a team, but also serve as the play caller on that side of the ball. Kingsbury called the shots for his Texas Tech teams and they put points on the board with with relative ease. Most notably his 2015 and 2016 teams placed 2nd and 5th in the nation in total offense. These offenses were quarterbacked by none other than Patrick Mahomes who wound up becoming, well… Patrick Mahomes! The success of Mahomes in the NFL was another selling point for Kingsbury as teams desperately wanted a coach capable of grooming a young quarterback into a star, and no star in the league shines brighter than the reigning Super Bowl MVP. Andy Reid gets tons of credit for the success of Mahomes in the NFL (rightfully so), but Mahomes development in college helped him get selected in the first round and become the player he is today as well. It’s tough to determine how much of the credit for this development should go to Kingsbury, but at the end of the day there’s no arguing he played a key role in Mahomes’ rise to stardom.
The Kingsbury hiring was a strange one when you look back at it, but he did manage to check all the boxes the Cardinals appeared to want in their next head coach. He’s young, capable of developing quarterbacks, and a creative play caller with an innovative offensive scheme. Although these traits didn’t lead to great success in college, the Cardinals were willing to gamble that in the right situation they would lead to success in the NFL.
So far in his NFL career, Kingsbury’s teams have gone on a roller coaster ride of highs and lows. Take a look at the images below, and notice how odd the patterns of wins and losses have been for his Cardinals teams.
Pretty strange that the wins and losses seem to come in bunches rather than being scattered periodically throughout the season. The NFL is a league where adaptability is a must have trait, and teams need to be able to adjust their game plans week in and week out to prepare for each individual opponent. The streakiness of these Cardinals teams may indicate that Kingsbury is hesitant to adjust his strategies in a timely manner. Rather than proactively making changes, it appears he waits until the losses start to pile up before conceding that something’s got to give. On the bright side, it appears his adjustments can lead to quick bouts of success as evidenced by his multiple win streaks.
An adaptation this Arizona offense seems to have already made came via the team’s usage of newly acquired DeAndre Hopkins. Throughout the first 4 weeks of the season, Hopkins had an astounding 46 targets accounting for 34.3% of the teams 134 pass attempts. It makes sense that when a team adds an elite wide receiver they’ll be excited about featuring him in their offense, but Murray and Kingsbury may have gotten a bit too excited about their new receiver. Unfortunately for the Cardinals, other teams quickly noticed how frequently they were targeting Hopkins and were able to focus solely on stopping him while paying little attention to the rest of the Cardinals pass catchers. In the Cardinals first loss against the Lions, Hopkins was targeted 12 times in a game where Kyler Murray threw 3 interceptions as he tried force feeding his new favorite target. In week 4 against the Panthers, Hopkins once again led the team in targets with 9 out of a possible 31. Murray avoided throwing a pick in this one, but he was only able to throw for a measly 133 yards as the Cardinals put up their lowest point total of the season and fell to 2–2.
Following two straight losses, Kingsbury took a deep look at the game film and realized that the playmakers surrounding Hopkins needed to be more involved in the offense. In their last three games, Hopkins has seen his target share get cut by more than half as he’s seen just 16.5% of his teams targets. Meanwhile Murray and the rest of the offense have found great success putting up 30+ points in each game as the rest of the offense has stepped up when given the opportunity. Christian Kirk specifically has shined with his increased role as he’s found the end zone four times in the last three games and has looked impressive doing so. Plus, it’s not like Hopkins has been completely removed from the offense as evidenced by his 10 catches for 103 yards and a touchdown in this week’s game against Seattle. Kingsbury came up with a particularly creative play call in this one to get his top receiver a one on one matchup. In the video below, look closely at where everyone’s attention is at the snap of the ball. They’re all staring at the sideline in an attempt to catch the defense napping as Hopkins zoomed down the sideline for a score.
Kudos to Kingsbury and his staff for understanding that although they may have wanted to rely on an overdose of Hopkins in 2020, their exciting offseason addition couldn’t be their only source of offense. The adjustments made over the last three weeks have produced positive results for this offense, but more tweaks need to be made if they want to keep the streak of W’s alive.
One of the areas where the Cardinals have really struggled this year is in their run game. On the surface it looks as though they’ve been extremely successful in this area as their 160 yards per game puts them second in the league behind only the Baltimore Ravens. However if you dig a little deeper into the data, you’ll realize that a disproportionately large chunk of these yards have come from Kyler Murray. If you take out Murray’s 62 yards and look only at the production the Cardinals are getting from their running backs, they produce an uninspiring 98 yards per game on the ground which would drop them all the way to 27th, sandwiching them right between the 1–5–1 Bengals and 1–6 Giants. Just as teams have been quick to adjust to the high usage for DeAndre Hopkins, you better believe they’ll be making the necessary tweaks to try and contain Murray’s by daring the Cardinals to hand the ball to their running backs.
So far this season Kenyan Drake has been the leading rusher for the Cardinals, and he has produced a mediocre 4.3 yards per carry. This 4.3 number has also been heavily inflated by a 164 yard performance against the Dallas Cowboys and their league worst rush defense. Take out the Cowboys game, and Drake is producing a measly 3.5 yards per carry against competent opponents this year. One of the things that has been frustrating about the Cardinals this year is their inability to get Drake and the rest of the run game going, and that needs to change if they want to evolve into serious contenders.
Last year the Cardinals traded for Drake just ahead of the deadline and the move quickly paid dividends. The Cardinals were averaging a middle of the pack 116 rush yards per game prior to the trade and saw an opportunity to ignite the run game and balance out the offense by adding a home run threat to their backfield. In the 8 games where Drake was a Cardinal, the team’s run game saw improvement as they averaged over 132 yards per game including two boom games where the team put up 226 and 253 yards against the Browns and Seahawks respectively. Without making any other major changes at the deadline, the addition of Drake helped boost the team’s per game average by 16 yards. While this number isn’t eye popping, the per game averages before the Drake trade would place the Cardinals 14th in rush yards per game, where as with Drake they would bump up all the way to 6th. More important than the rushing numbers is the increase in total points that came as a result of the improved run game. Before the trade Arizona averaged just over 21 points per game, and after the move they were just under 24. In a world where running back value seems to decline every year, a midseason move for Drake helped essentially add a field goal to the team’s point total each week.
It’s becoming more common for quarterbacks to be a focal point of the run game in the NFL. The presence of a dual threat quarterback forces opposing defenses to pause for a fraction of a second to keep an eye on the quarterback, giving offenses just enough extra time to set up their blocks and take advantage. Take a look at the 2019 Ravens where league MVP Lamar Jackson was the linchpin on an offense that broke the league record for team rushing yards in a season. In his MVP campaign, Jackson rushed for over 1200 yards and accounted for a whopping 30% of his teams rush yards. Although Jackson was the team’s leading rusher, he was doing more than just producing on the ground himself. Mark Ingram was able to generate over 1000 yards on the ground on a robust 5.0 yards per carry en route to a Pro Bowl selection of his own in large part due to the running lanes Jackson opened up for him and the rest of the Ravens backfield.
So far in 2020, Murray’s 62 yards on the ground account for an absurd 38% of the team’s rush yards, a number that simply is not sustainable if this team wants to keep winning games. In order for this offense to take another step forward, Murray’s legs need to be a threat that opens things up for his teammates, not simply his own statline. While Murray’s rushing numbers have been impressive, Drake has struggled to get things going on the ground and his backup, Chase Edmonds, has been able to average 6.1 yards per carry. Edmonds has only gotten the chance to run the ball 29 times this year, and although 29 runs is a small sample size it still begs the question why hasn’t Edmonds gotten more work in this offense? In the Cardinals most recent game against the Seahawks Kenyan Drake exited the game with an ankle injury that is expected to sideline him for multiple weeks. While Drake is out we’ll get to see what Edmonds can do with a full workload and regardless of how well he plays that 6.1 average is likely to regress as his number of rush attempts goes up. Will Edmonds increased role help unlock the running back position for this Cardinals offense, signaling the depth chart at the position is another area where Kingsbury has been too slow to adapt? Or is it more likely Edmonds numbers start to look more like Drake’s as he loses the benefit of coming into a game with fresh legs? Either way, this offense needs to unlock their running backs with or without Drake or they risk becoming too one dimensional.
Teams have already begun adjusting to slow down Hopkins on the Cardinals, and the next task for opposing defenses is containing Kyler Murray as both a runner and a passer. The NFL is a copycat league, and all it takes is one wise defensive mind to figure out how to slow down Murray and the Cardinals before the rest of the league follows suit. If this happens, it’ll be up to Kingsbury to adapt and adapt quickly, or risk losing ground in what appears to be a tough playoff race in the NFC. If opposing teams can continue to figure out Kingsbury’s game plan before he has time to adjust, even an MVP caliber quarterback and All-Pro receiver may not be enough to turn the Cardinals into contenders. They’re in arguably the toughest division in football and Kingsbury will find himself dueling with three of the best head coaches in the league twice a year as a result.
Luckily for the Cardinals they have a bye this week which is a great opportunity for Kingsbury and company to get back to the film room and come up with creative ways to get their stagnant run game going. I hope for the sake of the Cardinals he won’t be too hesitant to adjust, and hopefully when his team returns from the bye week his offense continues firing on all cylinders. The best minds in the NFL are constantly tweaking and adjusting their strategies in order to beat opponents in a variety of ways, and it’s time for Kingsbury to prove to the rest of the league that he’s capable of doing the same. Is it possible for the coach who couldn’t win more than he lost in the NCAA to take an NFL team to the playoffs? It’s certainly an uphill battle, but if his team continues to generate points in the way they have these past few weeks, he might just be ready to shock the world.
