ESPN’s Eric Karabell gives fantasy football advice on the Cardinals

The Arizona Cardinals are projected to be playoff contenders on the field this season.

Coming off a 11-5 season that included a playoff appearance with their starting quarterback out for all but six games has Cardinals fans giddy about the prospects of their team.

But what about off the field, as in fantasy football?

Well, those projections may be a little different than on the field, which is a good thing for fans of real football.

ESPN.com’s fantasy football analyst Eric Karabell came on the Bickley & Marottta show of Arizona Sports 98.7 FM on Tuesday and discussed the fantasy prospects of individual players on the Cardinals.

If you are looking to draft some Cardinals players then you may not like what Karabell had to say.

“(Carson Palmer) can’t be top ten, him and (Sam) Bradford are very similar in that we think they will play really well in a per-game basis, but one guy is older, both are a little brittle at this point,” Karabell said. “I have Palmer as the number-18 (ranked) quarterback. I think he will play well as this is a very deep position. Palmer is that back-up guy you take for bye weeks and hope he plays well.”

OK, so a bad start if you were thinking about having Palmer lead your team to fantasy glory, but he does have some good things to say about one wide receiver in particular.

“He has some wide receivers that I do like a lot. I don’t have any of the three wide receivers in my top-30, but I do have them in my top-45, so I do think Palmer will split it up a lot,” Karabell said. “I do think (John Brown) will score more touchdowns than the other two combined. I think Brown will get deep and Palmer will find him, I don’t think we saw that enough last season due to Palmer getting hurt. I think Brown will be special.”

While there may be some truth in Karabell’s claim that Brown could put up bigger numbers than the 48 catch, 696 yards and five touchdown season he had last year with a healthy Palmer for only six of those games, it may not be entirely true.

Three of Brown’s five touchdown catches were thrown by Drew Stanton.

Something to keep in mind.

Karabell went on to claim that Larry Fitzgerald is a player to avoid due to his aging and that he will not put up numbers we are used to seeing.

Though, once again we need to dive deeper into those numbers.

Last season Fitzgerald did not go over 57 yards in any of the games started by a back-up quarterback. With his starting quarterback, Fitzgerald went over 70 yards in four of Palmer’s six games and caught both of his touchdown passes from number three.

Just a few things to keep in mind as you prepare for your fantasy draft.

 

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