All-Access with Bruce Arians: Carson Palmer ‘about the same’, Peyton Manning the ‘piranha’

Arizona Cardinals head coach Bruce Arians meets the media the day after every game (or in the case of this week after the bye), often times explaining injury situations as well as anything else he may have seen the day before.

Here in this space, we’ll highlight some of the most notable quotes.

“Good start back. Spirited practice. Went half the practice in pads and the guys were getting after it pretty good. I know we took the pads off to finish it up. Pleased to start it back. Injury wise, everyone practiced except (right guard) Paul Fanaika. He’ll be ready to go Wednesday, so we should all hands on Wednesday and ready to go.”

How is the right shoulder of Carson Palmer?

“About the same. No real change in it. Hopefully, Carson will be throwing on Wednesday.”

Was he able to do any more over the weekend?

“Uh, no. No.”

Was that expected or was he able to make the progress that you thought he would over the weekend?

“You would have liked to have seen a little more.”

Does your gut tell you right now that Palmer will be able to play Sunday?

“I quit trusting my gut a long time ago. That son of a bitch has been lying to me forever.”

Given how much time Palmer has missed, how important is practice on Wednesday?

“It’s very important; very important. Wednesday and Thursday will be huge this week.”

As a staff, when did you start preparing for the Denver Broncos?

“This is one of the games we broke down last spring just because (they have) the same coordinators. Last week we had most of the game plan, the basic game plan done, so this should be an easy preparation week for us.”

How much of what Peyton Manning is doing still familiar to you?

“Very. I’m sure Tom (Moore) can call the plays, but they’re all called at the line of scrimmage so you don’t really know what’s coming. I might watch signals for the first time in awhile.”

Is there any danger in over-preparing for a Manning-led offense?

“Yeah, you can. You can get paralysis through analysis. Just play the game. Don’t get caught up with his gyrations and all the things that are going to go on because he’s good at them. He’s really good at it, especially at home. It’s much different playing him at home than on the road.”

What unique challenges does he present?

“He knows what he wants versus every coverage, and he’s got a system of calling plays late in the (game) clock. So, you can disguise some and you can try to disguise as much as you want. He’s going to find them out sooner or later. Just like blitzes. You’ll hit him with some new blitzes and then he’ll figure out how to protect them. That’s what his greatness is is his cerebralness in the game.”

As well as you and Moore know Manning, what advantages does that give the two of you?

“None. None.”

Why did you call him the ‘piranha’?

“You can’t give him enough information. I mean, he eats it up. If you had an hour-and-a-half meeting scheduled with him, you better have two-and-half hours worth of material ready because he was going to eat through it so fast and be able to give it right back to you. The other poor quarterbacks, they’re still writing the first two or three sentences down. And he still has every one of those notebooks in a closet somewhere.”

Were there times where you had to tell him, ‘Peyton go home’?

“Thursday nights he decided he was going to stay in there with Kelly Holcomb. I never left the office before a player. It was like 9:30, and I said, ‘here’s my cell phone number, man. Call me if you guys got any questions. I’m going home.’ ”

How big of a game is this?

“It’s big because it’s the next one. It’s a big road game against a team that went to the Super Bowl last year and is going to be a playoff team again this year. It’s a good barometer for us on the road.”

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