Cards’ reflection after loss shows way up
Late in fourth quarter as the Cardinals were down 27-12 to the Detroit Lions, James Conner and A.J. Green sat together on their team’s bench.
The FOX TV Network camera zoomed in for a shot of Conner and Green’s stoic facial expressions, their lips somewhat pursed. They seemingly stared toward field as the Lions home crowd roared at their ensuing victory.
The Cardinals experienced one of their highest point in the team’s history as one of this season’s best teams after a 7-0 start and could’ve earned their first playoff spot in six years after years of being NFC basement dwellers.
Since their Oct. 28 home loss to the Green Bay Packers that was 15 seconds from a walk-off touchdown, Arizona has gone 3-4, including a 3-3 at home record. The Cardinals failed once more to clinch a playoff berth after being dominated all game by the Lions, a perennial NFC basement dweller which holds the league’s worst record (2-11-1).
Conner and Green’s spaced-out look was like they stared into a mirror, stunned and disappointed at their team’s collective reflection as they realized a comeback was out of reach. Kyler Murray’s targeted pass to Green for a two-point conversion was no good after Christian Kirk caught the Cardinals’ only touchdown with 4:46 left to play.
Murray’s backup Colt McCoy entered the game not long after that series to concede to the loss, their second straight after their primetime Monday Night Football home loss to the Los Angeles Rams six days prior.
Cardinals coach Kliff Kingsbury used the same mirror metaphor about how to find a new direction in practice this week after their final 30-12 loss.
“We’ve got to work at it. We’ve got to talk about it and face it,” Kingsbury said to reporters after the game on Sunday. “All of us have got to look at ourselves in the mirror and figure out why it was like that because that hadn’t been us all year.”
The Cardinals have reached several franchise and individual player milestones this season. But being on the dark side of NFL history adds an immense low point to their story this season.
They became the third team since 1970 to enter a game having the league’s best record (including ties) to be defeated by a team having the league’s worst record (minimum of eight games played each), per NFL research.
The Cardinals are the first time ever 10-plus win team that lost by double
digits to a team with one or fewer wins.
Kliff Kingsbury has been repeatedly questioned about his trend of secondhalf seasonal failures as a college and NFL head coach. He doesn’t believe in narratives for his personal history repeating itself for this year, or the narrative about tapering off from a potential NFC top seed to losing its strength with three regular games left.
“I don’t think it’s about the narrative, it’s just about – we’ve got to get better,” Kingsbury said. “I mean, we’ve approached it week to week, every game this year. We’ve got to get back in there tomorrow and figure out how to get better.”
Several Cardinals such as Budda Baker, Zach Ertz, kicker Matt Prater and Kingsbury showed respect to the Lions last week when discussing their lowly record.
“I think they’re on the right path. The guys are 100 percent giving their best effort,” Prater said. “They’ve just had some bad breaks. I think they lost one game on a 66-yarder and they’ve had some heartbreaking losses. I think they’re close. They got some talent, good young pieces they drafted and brought in ...
“They’re a lot better than their record for sure.”
The Cardinals gave them more than a break.
To say the least, here’s what the Cardinals gave the Lions: six first downs
(out of their total 22) in their nearly 9minute opening possession; 83 yards from seven penalties; two turnovers on downs; two sacks and a weak offensive line performance that had Murray scrambling like for cover like a headless chicken; an interception returned for 50 yards to the Cardinals 6, which led to the their third early in the third quarter.
In an unforgiving business that’s doesn’t forgive head coaches with abysmal team records, Sunday’s loss might given Lions coach Dan Campbell some grace to stay past Black Monday in January.
“That was fun. So, proud of our guys,” Campbell said. “We knew what we had to do today and we did it, really in all three phases across the board. The minute it felt like something may go the wrong way, we were able to tilt it back into our favor.”
Fun is not what you’d expect in a twowin team’s vocabulary at this point in the season.
Being beaten by a team like the Lions brings a team back to earth to start from scratch, and learning what they have to do next.
Like the memorable hook from the late Michael Jackson’s 1988 hit single “Man In The Mirror,” the Cardinals have to ask themselves how to change their ways.
It starts with the rushing defense, which the Cardinals have struggled with
this season.
Cardinals defensive coordinator Vance Joseph always talks about stopping the run game on first down, which they didn’t do on Sunday.
In addition to the Lions’ 6-for-13 third-down conversion tries and a successful fourth-down attempt, they got four first downs and three each for secondand third-and-shorts from run plays. They mainly came from their backup running back Craig Reynolds, who had a game-high 26 carries for 122 yards. His longest runs were for 16 on a second down and 27 on a third down.
The Cardinals are 20th in rushing defense and have been hovering the bottom half to lower tier in that category this season.
After this rock bottom point for the Cardinals, they need to fly high like a phoenix with a vengeance as they’ll host the Indianapolis Colts (8-6), currently the league’s top rushing offense led by the league’s best rusher Jonathan Taylor, on Christmas night.
“We’ve got to be better throughout the week next week,” Murray said. “We’ve got a great Indianapolis team coming in. They’re not going to feel sorry for us on Christmas. So, we’ve got to lock in and be better.”