Not short on talent or confidence, Phillip Sims tries to make Cardinals roster
Aug 3, 2015, 4:38 PM
(Photo by Adam Green/Arizona Sports)
GLENDALE, Ariz. – What might be the most intriguing position battle during Arizona Cardinals training camp may ultimately not matter much for the 2015 season.
In fact, the hope would be that it doesn’t.
But when the team takes the field for one of its 19 practices before the regular season opener, quarterback Phillip Sims will be playing for a job. An undrafted free agent signee from Winston-Salem State, Sims turned a rookie minicamp tryout into a contract, and is now hoping to turn that contract into a spot on the 53-man roster.
Once considered a long shot, it appears he has a legitimate chance to unseat Logan Thomas and earn the third-string QB job.
“He’s been very consistent since the day he showed up for a tryout,” Cardinals coach Bruce Arians said of Sims. “(He) can articulate the offense in the huddle. Knows why he’s throwing the ball, where he’s throwing it. And when he makes a mistake, he can put it behind him and go on to the next play. I like that in a quarterback.”
It’s worth pointing out that Sims is not your classic small-school quarterback.
The 6-foot-4, 210-pound passer began his career at Alabama before transferring to Virginia and then, after being ruled academically ineligible, to Winston-Salem State. Before all that, though, he was one of the top quarterbacks in the high school class of 2010, someone who many predicted would go on to have an outstanding career.
But just because his time in college did not go as originally planned does not mean his dreams of playing in the NFL went away, so here he is, working to make it with the Cardinals.
“The same way I would if I was the first pick in the draft, it really doesn’t matter to me,” he said of how he’s approaching camp. “I am who I am. My path was different; that doesn’t make me different. The talent is what got me here. The talent was never a question through my whole path to get here.
“It was do I have issues doing this and do I have issues doing that; the talent was never an issue. I come to work just like anybody else. My path, yes, that was different. But I’m still the same player that got me a five-star ranking coming out of high school. That hasn’t changed.”
Last season with Winston-Salem State, Sims completed 118-of-198 passes for 1,560 yards and 15 touchdowns with four interceptions.
What Sims may lack in statistics, he more than makes up for in confidence which, really, is something he can’t afford not to have. Though it is not impossible to go from undrafted rookie free agent to NFL starting quarterback – see Dallas’ Tony Romo, for example — it is certainly difficult.
It also does not help that Sims’ vision isn’t all that great. As reported by AZCardinals.com’s Darren Urban, Sims has 20/50 vision in his right eye and 20/100 in the left. He was expected to get contacts but said he has yet to do so, and while LASIK is ultimately the plan, he said he cannot afford to take the time off necessary following the procedure.
So, the 22-year-old, who said he brought two weeks’ worth of clothes to camp will press on, battling Thomas and Chandler Harnish for the job as the team’s third quarterback. The first two spots on the depth chart belong to Carson Palmer and Drew Stanton, respectively.
Sims understands that there are essentially three players fighting for one spot. It figures to be an intense competition, one Sims firmly believes he can win.
“I felt like I should have been a starting quarterback at a lot of schools in college, I felt like I should have been a draft pick — I felt like I should have been a lot of things, but it’s not always up to me,” he said. “But I do believe that I’m one of the best quarterbacks here, and I’m going to come out here every day and fight for the opportunity to be on this football team come September.”
If he is to earn a roster spot, Sims said he’ll have to improve on his knowledge of the team’s offense. He wants to make sure the coaches know that he understands what is expected of him on each play, whether he is supposed to take a shot deep down the field or check down to a safer option.
Because, he said, talent will not be the issue.
“I feel like for you to get to this point in your career, to this level, you have talent. There’s no slouches out here,” he said. “Everybody has the talent. You get here, it’s how fast you can pick up on things. They know why they brought you here, they know the talent that you have. They want to see how fast can you pick up their offense, their schemes, and put your talent into their schemes and make plays.
“They know no rookie is going to come in and make every single play, but they want to see those splash plays that they expect. And when you make them, that’s what they’re hoping for.”
As for Sims, he’s just hoping to improve over the course of camp.
“If you improve every day, get better and get better, that’s what the coaches want and that’s my goal, to get better every day,” he said. “At the end of the day, if it’s good enough to make the team, that’s good for me. And if it’s not, I’ve improved enough to make myself a better player and hopefully get another shot somewhere.”