Arizona Cardinals will crumble once injuries hit according to MMQB

With the NFL season less than three weeks away from starting, many NFL and media publications are giving their thoughts on the NFL and each individual team.

Monday Morning Quarterback is doing just that, as they preview each team in the NFL and their Andy Benoit got to his thoughts on the Arizona Cardinals.

He has a plethora of good things, but his summation is quite eye-catching, let’s hit the high notes of the article.

He (Wilks) puts unique pressure on his defensive backs, as many of his blitzes involve single-high zone coverage, not man-to-man. By converting a pass defender into a pass rusher, you become one body short in coverage, enlarging the voids in your zones.

Wilks is notorious, as much as you can be in one year as a defensive coordinator, as being aggressive and asking his defensive backs and more importantly his linebackers to be great in coverage. That begs the question, do the Cardinals have the players to do that? There is no Luke Kuechly or Thomas Davis and you wonder if they even have a Shaq Thompson.

No defender has created more negative plays for offenses over the last two years than Chandler Jones.

In other news, Chandler Jones is great.

If third-year pro Robert Nkemdiche doesn’t hone some of his extensive raw talent in 2018, he never will.

This is big.

Keep an eye on Olsen Pierre.

Of course, Nkemdiche’s injury, however serious, could give us more Pierre, who has been phenomenal.

Expect Rosen to take over before season’s end.

This is a common theme among nearly every pundit and media outlet. I haven’t seen a single writer who believes that Bradford is along for the entire season.

Larry Fitzgerald is the only known entity of this young receiving corps.

Duh.

Yes, it’s a retooled offensive line, but not necessarily a better one.

I am not sure that it could be worse, in fact, if it is I’d be incredibly disappointed by a number of things, first on the list is that of Steve Keim’s continued failure to identify talent along the offensive line. Second would be the inability of another coaching staff to coach up any talent.

It’s hard to be as bad as last year, so this point seems like quite the stretch.

BOTTOM LINE: Once injuries start hitting, this team will crumble. Expect a trying transition year in Arizona.

This point is the main one, the summation of the ten prior points, some are still available for you to read on your own, and after two games, albeit preseason games, it seems apt.

The talent on this roster is extremely top heavy, as in the first 20-25 players on the roster are good to great to Hall of Fame level.

Yet, the final 30 or so players that will make this roster are an amalgamation of inexperienced, injury prone and just flat out not good.

So, if injuries to the offensive line, linebackers and worst case, the top two non-QB skill players, it could get ugly quick.

However, some of the points on Benoit’s way to his conclusion are a bit... off.