D.J. Humphries impressed by pace on first day of Cardinals camp

Already, something is different in the air at Cardinals camp this year.

That is, at least according to offensive tackle D.J. Humphries, who is entering his fifth season with the team.

“I saw something today that I haven’t seen,” he began explaining to 98.7 FM Arizona’s Sports Station’s Bickley & Marotta.

Humphries laid out the scope of the Cardinals practice field. It was time for walkthroughs, where things usually slow down and time is taken to really go over certain aspects of plays. With Kliff Kingbury’s new offense, things are being accelerated. And that means that walkthroughs aren’t the same type of slog.

“But, I looked around, and usually when you do walkthroughs, you do a special teams walkthrough, then you do an offensive walkthrough,” Humphries said. “While the special teams walkthrough is going on, usually you chop it up with your offensive line coach, you talk about what you’re going to be doing today.

“Today I saw, we’re doing the special teams in the middle, Kyler [Murray] has some guys over here going over some stuff, defensive guys [are] going over some stuff, receivers are on their knee getting tennis balls thrown over their shoulder, working on hand-eye coordinator,” he said.

The scene was one littered with players putting in work.

“I was just kind of like, ‘There’s a lot of stuff going on right now. We’re using all of our time. There’s no standing around.’ What I’m used to here, walkthroughs are a little bit lax, in the sense of, not when we’re on the grass, but in between,” Humphries said.

“I was like ‘I see what’s going on here,'” he said.

That same mojo is one that rookie quarterback Kyler Murray has embraced as well. Humphries experienced it first-hand.

“I saw him get serious for the first time today,” Humphries said. “With me, actually! We were doing our little side walkthrough, and he wanted something to go faster. And he was like ‘Bro you got to get set! C’mon! Get set!’ and I was like ‘Oh my bad, bro.’

“It kind of caught me by surprise at first, but at the same time I was like ‘Ah, yeah you’re right.'”

That type of leadership was something that Humphries was thankful to see.

“I like that from him,” he said. “Not that, ‘Well I’m going to call it when these guys get set. We’ll wait.’ I kind of like him and that ownership, being like, ‘Come on, we got to go.'”