Cardinals’ Bruce Arians: ‘Attention to detail on offense is very lacking’
Sep 16, 2013, 9:56 PM | Updated: 9:56 pm
While the Arizona Cardinals scratched out their first win of the season Sunday, it wasn’t always pretty. So much so, that head coach Bruce Arians told the media Monday that his team needs to do a better job of paying more attention to the details.
In their 25-21 victory over the Detroit Lions, Arizona’s offense was 1-of-11 on third downs and only scored one touchdown in four trips to the red zone.
Arians said both things need to be corrected in practice this week.
“It was third down when we were shooting ourselves in the foot and it’s very correctable,” Arians said. “It was a collective group thing on 1-for-11. Same thing down in the red zone. A couple of miscommunications, things we’re still ironing out.”
Though pass protection — their biggest problem in a Week 1 loss to the St. Louis Rams — was much improved Sunday, the offense still struggled to execute on critical passing situations. The Cardinals’ only third down conversion came in the fourth quarter, and their only touchdown came on Rashard Mendenhall’s one-yard, go-ahead score with 1:59 remaining in the contest.
Arians knows the offense can be better and emphasized a need for a higher level of focus going forward.
“Our attention to detail on offense is very lacking,” Arians said. “A lot of coaches say the little things. There are no little things. Everything’s a big thing. That attention to detail has to increase to be as good as we want to be on offense.”
Although he was critical of the offense’s overall focus, Arians did praise the play of quarterback Carson Palmer for the second straight week, focusing on the 31-year-old’s leadership following his interception.
“The young guys all gravitated around him,” Arians said. “He set the best example and sent the best signals.”
