Struggling Arizona Cardinals offense wants to learn, improve after loss to Seattle Seahawks
Nov 25, 2014, 4:39 AM | Updated: 3:40 pm
TEMPE, Ariz. — It’s amazing the kind of difference one week can make.
Or, rather, one loss.
Last Monday, the Arizona Cardinals were the toast of the NFL, coming off a victory over a very good Detroit Lions team. They were 9-1, had a three-game lead in the NFC West, and seemed ready for a postseason push.
This Monday, they lost on the road to a very good Seattle Seahawks team, are 9-2 and saw their division lead shrink to two. All of a sudden, there are questions surrounding the team and its chances of making a playoff run.
A week ago, there was a strong media contingent at the team’s Tempe training facility waiting to talk to head coach Bruce Arians and players; this week, there were just a handful of people in attendance.
It’s almost as if the sky is falling after the 19-3 loss to the Seahawks.
“You can make it that way if you want,” Arians said of that perception. “It’s easy to look at it that way sometimes. When you step back, you measure where you’re at after the game. For me, the corrections are more important because we have to play them so soon, and it will be a big division game when we play them again.”
That game will come on Dec. 21, and it’s possible the Week 16 matchup will have some pretty heavy playoff implications. But there are three games between now and then, with the first coming Sunday in Atlanta. That is Arizona’s primary focus as it moves forward, along with fixing some problems that emerged in Seattle.
Most notably among them is the offense, which has now gone seven consecutive quarters without reaching the end zone and mustered just 204 yards in Seattle. While not ideal, Arians attributes much of that to the defense played by the Detroit Lions and Seahawks.
“When you don’t convert on third down, you’re not going to score many points,” he added when asked if the touchdown drought is a concern. “Most of those situations it was either penalties, dropped balls or self-inflicted wounds.
“No, I’m not concerned with that.”
Many people are, though, and it’s not entirely unreasonable. If you were someone who doubted the Cardinals’ ability to continue to win with starting quarterback Carson Palmer on the shelf, the last seven quarters of football have given you a healthy amount of ammunition.
Since throwing a pair of touchdown passes in the opening frame against the Lions, Drew Stanton has completed 27-of-48 passes for 299 yards with three interceptions, providing some the evidence they were looking for to declare Arizona doomed without Palmer under center.
“We had our chances. We just didn’t make the most of them,” Stanton said after the Seattle loss. “That starts with me making sure we are doing everything correctly, everyone has the right assignment and then just going out there and making plays. They were there to be had; we had some shots early on and throughout the course of the game. We just didn’t make them, unfortunately.”
Arians believes Sunday’s performance, while not a good one, was impacted by some factors that had nothing to do with the quarterback himself. When asked if he’s confident in Stanton going forward, the coach answered, “Oh, totally. Totally.”
And it’s not just Arians who is confident in Stanton; the Cardinals are confident in themselves, believing the offense can get back on track.
“The biggest thing is just being able to use it as a learning tool,” left tackle Jared Veldheer said of the loss in Seattle.
That, and simply doing their jobs.
“We have to all do our jobs, and do our jobs a little better,” Veldheer added, “because it hasn’t been good enough the last seven quarters.
“It takes everybody. We all need to be accountable and all need to go to work and find a way to get better at it and improve.”
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