Cardinals vs. Rams defensive playing time: Johnson, Bell, Dansby are the ironmen

The Arizona Cardinals ran more offensive plays than the St. Louis Rams did on Sunday. They had 71 to the Rams' 67, which means that 67 was the magic number for the defensive players.

When it comes to playing time, there were three ironmen. Safeties Rashad Johnson and Yeremiah Bell each played every play, as did veteran linebacker Karlos Dansby. Cornerback Patrick Peterson got to rest one play.

After Peterson's 66 plays, Jerraud Powers saw the most time with 64 plays, followed by 60 plays each from linebacker Jasper Brinkley and defensive end Calais Campbell.

From there, the rest of the defensive line and the outside linebackers saw a lot of players rotating in and out.

On the defensive line, Darnell Dockett was in for 54 snaps and Dan Williams was in for 32. The depth guys -- Ronald Taller and Frostee Rucker -- each got 19 plays.

Matt Shaughnessy, who plays both DE and OLB, got 25 plays in.

The outside linebackers saw their time split like this -- Sam Acho was on the field for 37 plays, Lorenzo Alexander was for 36 and John Abraham only got 20 plays in. Head coach Bruce Arians said that he would like to have gotten Abraham in there for about 30 plays.

Rookie Tyrann Mathieu was on the field as the nickel corner for 39 plays, and Antoine Cason saw time on the field for five plays.

The notable absences? Kevin Minter saw no time, nor did Justin Bethel or Tony Jefferson. Alex Okafor was inactive.

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