Arizona Cardinals using read option for the defense, but it is part of their offense

When the Arizona Cardinals ran a few snaps of the read option with Carson Palmer at quarterback on Sunday, it baffled many media members. Then on Monday, they ran it again with Ryan Lindley.

Could this be part of the Cards' offensive package?

"It was more for the defense," said Arians when asked about its use. "I don't see Carson going around that corner very often, but the surprise element for our defense, knowing how to defend it. We might use it, we might not. I've always had it. I'm an old wishbone quarterback."

Palmer joked about it, saying he hadn't done anything like that since about 1996 when he was in high school.

Then he gave a more serious answer. "It's another dimension of our offense," he said. It gives our defense a chance to see it because we're going to see it a lot."

Then he adds, just for clarification, that he wasn't sure if it was his forte. "I think now that it's on film, Coach Arians has realized it isn't my forte," he explained.

"We're going to try anything and everything to be as good as we can and the end result is you're helping out the defense because you're giving them different looks and making sure guys are in the right spots and covering the right guys.

""You've got to prepare for everything, and that's one thing this coaching staff does. They don't leave a stone unturned. We cover any situation, we've run any type of play you can possibly run so that there is no surprises when you get to Sunday. You can have at least seen it in a walk through or a practice."

He did say that using Patrick Peterson on offense is about seeing what he can do. "You don't want to waste a talent like that on just one side of the ball."

I don't think anyone, after seeing the read option used, actually believed that the team would be using it as part of their offensive looks. However, it does make a lot of sense to give the offense a chance to try something else.

Should they actually run it on game days? Sheesh...I hope not.

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