Arizona Cardinals fans were somewhat torn with the result of Super Bowl LV on Sunday. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers dominated the Kansas City Chiefs and became the football champions of the world with a 31-9 win, playing in their home stadium for the big game.
The Bucs are led by Bruce Arians, who was the head coach for the Cardinals from 2013-2017 and led the greatest five-year run in franchise history. With a coaching staff that was mostly made of the same guys as in Arizona and with a number of former Cardinals players all over the roster, the Bucs closed the deal and get Super Bowl rings.
On the one hand, Cardinals fans have to like to see Arians and all those former players and coaches win. On the other hand, it was tough to see then do what they couldn’t do in Arizona.
After all, the Cardinals ended up with three straight years of what ifs. In 2014, they were 9-1 and lost Carson Palmer to a torn ACL. Then, backup quarterback Drew Stanton injured his knee and the Cardinals finished 11-5 and losing in the playoffs to a 7-8-1 Carolina Panthers team when Ryan Lindley started at quarterback for Arizona. They had the offense. They had the defense and looked like they could have won it all.
The next year, they went 13-3. Palmer had an MVP-like season. The defense was great. But Tyrann Mathieu tore his ACL at the end of the regular season and really deflated the team. Then Palmer wasn’t right after injuring his finger on a helmet, and they were blown out by the Carolina Panthers in the NFC Championship Game.
In 2016, the Cardinals openly spoke about winning the Super Bowl. They had the offense to do it. They had the defense to do it. Special teams were the issue. Chandler Catanzaro missed a potential game-winning field goal in Week 1 and that send the team reeling. They went 7-8-1 and special teams directly cost them four or five games.
Arians had the defense in Tampa. But this time, he had Tom Brady. He didn’t get hurt and put up even better numbers than Palmer did in 2015.
Tampa went all in for a title and got it. Arians is closer to home, has a better quarterback and is in better health. It was great to see. But his being able to do it somewhere else hurts just a little.
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