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No matter how many times we think it may be time to bury the Arizona Cardinals, Bruce Arians and company find a way to extend it a week.
The Arizona Cardinals moved to 5-6 on the season and are still in playoff contention.
Maybe more important, Bruce Arians has completely transformed himself as a play caller and tailored the offense around what Blaine Gabbert does well.
It has been a very conservative offense, shots down the field are basically non-existent, the intermediate throws are in big windows and the team is finding a way to not out too much on Gabbert.
It is the opposite of what Arians did with Drew Stanton, where he just left the offense the same like he still had Carson Palmer out there and in turn it has created a boring offense, that doesn't make mistakes.
This is the biggest revelation of the the Cardinals without Palmer, they are 2-2 post Palmer injury, and continue to treat water in the NFC.
The work by Arians and his offensive staff should he praised more than maybe any coaching job he has done in his time with the Cardinals.
Gabbert's numbers are pedestrian: 44/72 61.1% 298 yards 5 TD 3 INT
Yet, these are some of the best numbers of Gabbert's career. It isn't because he's great in Bruce Arians offense, no, in fact this offense doesn't resemble anything we've seen in the Arians era.
Yet, it has been extremely… effective for Blaine Gabbert.
Not taking chances, setting up passes using the running game, even if it has been… bad.
Quick throws out of the backfield, using the tight ends consistently.
There's been one deep pass in two games and it resulted in a touchdown.
You know what? That's fine…
Give me an adaptive approach by a coach and I'll show you a great coach.
The coaching job Arians has done post Palmer injury is impressive.
His defense and special teams have let him down in one game (Houston) and they just couldn't stop a great player in the other (Seattle and Wilson).
The Cardinals are amazingly still in this.
Let's get crazy and back on the bandwagon, y'all.