Arizona Cardinals show signs of improvement after loss to Buffalo Bills
The Cardinals return to Arizona with momentum despite late mistakes against the Bills.
ORCHARD PARK, NY — The Arizona Cardinals had fun while they could in their season-opening loss to the Buffalo Bills on Sunday at Highmark Stadium. (34-28)
“Good back-and-forth game,” Cardinals coach Jonathan Gannon said after the game. “I thought we started the game fast, went down and scored, controlled the clock and did some good things.”
The offense was efficient and methodical. The defense applied pressure and forced turnovers. And both sides played clean, penalty-free football.
The Cardinals played great and if the game had ended with about three minutes left in the second quarter, they would have won 17-3.
Unfortunately, Josh Allen was just beginning his career at that time.
“I didn’t like the end of the half,” Gannon said.
analysis: 5 things we learned from the Cardinals’ loss to the Bills
Allen led a touchdown drive at the end of the first half by taking advantage of a questionable call of roughing the passer against Zaven Collins on a play that in any other era of football would have resulted in a clean sack.
“And then,” Gannon said, “they came out of halftime and were back up 17-17.”
Allen led another touchdown drive early in the third quarter and the damage was done.
The Cardinals were never able to regain their hitting power.
Ultimately, there are a lot of positives here. The Cardinals, a 4-13 team last season, needed a touchdown to beat a perennial playoff contender on the road. Arizona’s defense pressured Allen, even if it couldn’t bring him down. And the Cardinals scored a touchdown on special teams in the fourth quarter to stay in the game in a game that threatened to get out of reach.
For some this may be an encouraging loss, but not for me.
Marvin Harrison Jr. spent most of the game doing cardio exercises. Harrison only caught three passes. And he dropped one of them.
There was no excuse for this relegation, not for a player of his caliber.
The player selected number 4 in the draft should not finish the first game of his career with a catch of over 4 yards.
I know Harrison can’t throw the ball to himself and he deserves a few weeks to get used to the size and speed of the NFL game. But this performance is going to get someone fired, be it the offensive coordinator, the coach, or eventually the general manager.
He needs to improve and I think no one cares more about getting it corrected than he does. He needs a lot more opportunities to show what he can do.
Michael Wilson also dropped the ball with less than two minutes left and let it bounce off his chest, a catch that could have changed the outcome of the game.
And Kyler Murray is not to blame here either.
He took a sack on third-and-6 with about 9 minutes left in the third quarter after Allen had completed back-to-back touchdown drives. The Cardinals had to respond, but Murray’s response was questionable at best.
Maybe Greg Rousseau, Buffalo’s standout defensive end, just made a play? Maybe Paris Johnson Jr., Arizona’s promising left tackle, just got beat? But I wonder if Murray couldn’t or should have gone into the pocket to extend the play.
It looked like he did it, but I don’t play quarterback in the NFL and never will, so it’s hard to say for sure. I’ve watched a lot of football games from the field and the press box, including nearly every snap of Murray’s career, and I think he should have avoided that sack.
On Arizona’s next possession, Rousseau beat Kelvin Beachum, who was filling in for the injured Jonah Williams, and scored a strip sack on Murray.
Again, it’s hard to say how much of this was Murray’s fault, but on this play he held onto the ball with one hand too long, giving Rousseau a chance to smack it away. Watching this play, I wondered if Murray should have felt that pressure, or at least anticipated it, to know he should have thrown the ball away when he had the chance.
Nevertheless, I see the main blame on the game calls.
Offensive coordinator Drew Petzing didn’t seem creative or aggressive enough to win.
Murray threw for only 162 yards on 31 attempts.
For comparison: Allen threw 232 yards on 23 attempts.
Why not go further forward to Harrison and Wilson? Or Harrison? And Harrison again?
And the final drive was particularly frustrating. The Cardinals failed to capitalize on their timeouts, ran the ball on third-and-10 as if setting up a field goal, and finished the day with a long pass to Greg Dortch, who was Arizona’s most effective receiver all game but is the least physically impressive player on the field.
I’ve never been an offensive coordinator, but I would have tried to put Harrison, Wilson, or Trey McBride in position to make that play, especially since Harrison wasn’t targeted on the last series.
Gannon did not share my concerns about the play calls.
“You have to give credit to their defense,” Gannon said. “But I think our offense did enough to win the game today.”
And he can cope with the loss much better than I can.
“I’m excited to get back to work. We’re just a few plays away,” Gannon said. “We’ve got to start making those plays to win games.”
I hope he is right.
There are really a lot of reasons for optimism, I just don’t want the new-look Cardinals to lay the same old eggs.
Reach Moore at [email protected] or 602-444-2236. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter, @SayingMoore.
