Roy Lopez: Cardinals defense needs to ‘play the full 60 minutes’ to have success

By most metrics, the Arizona Cardinals’ defense is one of the worst in the NFL. But if you look deeper, the unit has had moments of success. It just hasn’t sustained success.

That’s exactly what defensive lineman Roy Lopez said needs to change if the Cardinals defense wants to improve.

“It’s just being ourselves for 60 minutes. Down in, down out, whether you get punched or you don’t, right? And when you get punched, it’s lining back up, right? It’s the next play,” Lopez told Arizona Sports’ Wolf & Luke on Friday. “It’s stop the run. It’s force them to pass and make a play, right? Whether that’s pass rush or in coverage. You play the full 60 minutes. Whether you get the ball at the minus-20 (or) you get the ball at the 50. Doesn’t matter. Wherever the ball’s placed, lining up.”

The Cardinals defense has given up the seventh-most yards per game this season and the most points per game in the NFL.

However, there have been times this year when Arizona’s defense has put a few great sequences together.

In the Cardinals’ season-opening win over the Los Angeles Chargers, after allowing an opening drive touchdown, the defense forced a fumble and turnover on downs on the Chargers’ other two drives before halftime. The unit then closed the game by forcing a punt, blocked punt, interception and two turnovers on downs in five straight possessions.

Against the Seahawks, the Cardinals allowed an 82-yard touchdown to Jaxon Smith-Njigba on the opening drive and then forced two punts, two turnovers on downs and a fumble on Seattle’s final five possessions of the first half.

Arizona held the New York Giants to six points until the last four minutes of the first half, and then limited the Detroit Lions to negative-six total yards in the first quarter last week.

“There’s times where we’ve done it, and it’s just you got to do it for 60, right? You got to do it the whole game,” Lopez said. “You got to do it for four quarters. You can’t get tired. Can’t blink. You can’t flinch. You got to be able to hang your hat on, after 60 minutes, yeah, you’re going to be tired. You’re going to be beat up.

“But you’ll be able to look yourself in the mirror and be happy (with) whatever the result is. That’s what we got to do. We got to do 60 minutes.”

After Arizona held Detroit without a first down in the first quarter, the Lions scored on seven straight possessions, including six touchdowns. The Giants scored two touchdowns in the final four minutes of the first half to flip the game on its head. The 49ers opened the game with back-to-back touchdown drives and as soon as the Cardinals worked their way back, the 49ers scored back-to-back touchdowns again, this time in the fourth quarter to basically ice the game.

The Seahawks had four possessions in the second half and scored every time, including three touchdowns. That’s what Arizona needs to fix. But Lopez feels confident the Cardinals unit can do so, because he knows the effort is there.

“We pride ourselves on being a group that flies around. And anybody that sees us when we’re flying around, having fun and things are connecting, it’s fun to watch,” Lopez said. “We’re a fun unit to watch, and when we’re not ourselves, and we’re not doing that, not putting that on tape and on TV, we’re a different unit.”

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