Sports blog information from USA TODAY.
They activated one from IR, placed two on IR and brought up five players from the practice squad to play in Week 12.
The Arizona Cardinals made a number of roster moves on Saturday to get ready for their Week 12 game against the New England Patriots. They reactivated one player off injured reserve, placed two players on it and moved five from the practice squad to the active roster using three different methods.
The Cardinals lost three players, including LB Isaiah Irving, who was carted off the field with a neck injury.
The Arizona Cardinals trailed the Seattle Seahawks 27-17 at halftime in their Sunday night matchup at State Farm Stadium. The half was filled with big plays but there also have been some injuries.
Three Cardinals players left the game with injuries and the Seahawks lost a couple of players.
Arizona lost defensive end Zach Allen to an ankle injury in the first quarter.
Late in the first half, starting cornerback Dre Kirkpatrick had to leave the game. He had a foot injury during the week that made him questionable for the game.
Recently signed linebacker Isaiah Irving left the game on a cart and strapped to a board. On a kickoff, he took a shoulder to the helmet and appeared to get knocked out. He was ruled out for the rest of the game with a neck injury.
For the Seahawks, offensive lineman Damien Lewis left the game and so did starting running back Chris Carson. Carson was ruled questionable to return after exiting with a foot injury.
Isaiah Simmons and Zach Allen could be used to help with the void created by Jones’ injury.
The Arizoa Cardinals are expected to lose linebacker Chandler Jones for an expected period of time and likely for the rest of the season. The Cardinals have options on the roster to replace him, although it will not replace the potential r production.
Assuming Devon Kennard returns, he and Haason Reddick can start. Of course, as solid as Reddick has been this season, he is undersized for the position, especially in the run game.
They also have Kylie Fitts.
However, they can also have Zach Allen move out to the edge and play some in Jones’ spot. He is bigger and doesn’t have the length, but he would be strong enough to set the edge.
And while they have Fitts and Dennis Gardeck, Jones’ absence could also be an opportunity to give rookie Isaiah Simmons the opportunity to play more snaps, this time as a pass rusher off the edge.
Between using the players they already have at outside linebacker and using Zach Allen and Isaiah Simmons some, they might not necessarily need to go out and sign someone.
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Their unit comes in at No. 18 overall.
The Arizona Cardinals should have a better defensive line in 2020 than they did in 2019. After all, they were decimated by injuries last season. Darius Philon was released after his arrest for assault. Robert Nkemdiche showed up to camp overweight and was cut. Zach Allen, Jonathan Bullard and Clinton McDonald all ended up on injured reserve.
But they signed Jordan Phillips and drafted Leki Fotu and Rashard Lawrence in the fourth round.
Even still, the defensive line is a slightly below average unit, according to Pro Football Focus.
In their rankings of all 32 defensive line units, the Cardinals come in 18th.
PFF looks at the interior defenders and the edge rushers, so they get extra consideration because Chandler Jones is included.
Chandler Jones is the star player on the Cardinals’ defensive front. Jones is always just outside of the very best edge rushers in the league in terms of total pressures or PFF grade, but he has managed to consistently generate more sacks than his pressure total should generate — something that is typically not a skill. Last season, Jones posted a pass-rush grade of 90.0, good enough to rank in the top five among edge rushers, and he pressured the quarterback 75 times.
He is by far the team’s best pass-rusher and should be among the league leaders in pressures again in 2020. The lack of help for Jones could be a significant problem, as nobody currently on the roster had more than 26 total pressures a season ago. Jordan Phillips had 10 sacks and might be confused for a legitimate pass-rush presence, but those sacks represented 10 of the 26 total pressures he managed all season long. The tape shows a series of unimpressive plays on those sacks. Phillips hasn’t topped 30 total pressures in a season and will likely be a run defender only this season.
Corey Peters offers the same type of impact, albeit a more proven version, and fourth-round pick Leki Fotu makes a trio of run-focused interior defenders. Second-year player Zach Allen may be the player most likely to take a step forward and make an impact, but his rookie season lasted an underwhelming four games before injury landed him on injured reserve. Allen needs to show major improvement for the Cardinals to be anything more than reliant on the skills of Jones again in 2020.
PFF is not as high on Phillips as the Cardinals. They did not pay him $10 million a year to be just a run defender. They also believe Fotu has some pass-rushing upside as well. Allen does need to make some sort of an impact for the defensive line to improve because Peters shouldn’t play more than about 40% of the snaps at his age, although he is still solid. It’s just that other guys need to step up and be better.
Although he did not grade out all that highly according to PFF, Jonathan Bullard was surprisingly effective in 2019 before his injury. Despite playing in only nine games, he had a career-high in sacks, tackles for loss and QB hits.
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Ep. 269
Ep. 268
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Ep. 267
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The starting lineup is mostly set, but right tackle, defensive end, inside linebacker and safety all will have competition to start.
The Arizona Cardinals mostly have a starting lineup on offense and defense set, but not every spot is completely secured. Here are the starting jobs that will be a battle as minicamp takes place (sometime) and training camp begins later this summer.
Gilbert is the favorite to start, as he was the starter last year until he tore his ACL, he has the most experience and is arguably the best lineman they have.
However, his injury history screams at you that he can’t be trusted to be the guy, as he has only played 12 games in the last three seasons.
Murray gained the praise of his coach and general manager, while the team is super high on Jones, a steal in the third round of the draft. He wants to play right away.
This could be fun to watch.
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The Cardinals’ free agent additions will have the same numbers they did with their previous team.
The Arizona Cardinals now have jersey numbers assigned for all their players, including their newcomers. That has meant, in some cases, that players who were already on the roster had to change theirs.
Here are the jersey numbers for the new Cardinals players.
These returning players have changed their numbers, some because of the newcomers.
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Listen to the latest from Cards Wire’s Jess Root on his podcast, Rise Up, See Red. Subscribe on Apple podcasts or Stitcher Radio.
Ep. 264
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Ep. 263
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These players need to be counted on for more in 2020.
The Arizona Cardinals had two of their rookies play prominent roles in 2019. Quarterback Kyler Murray and cornerback Byron Murphy, the team’s two top picks in the draft, started every single game as rookies.
As we look ahead to 2020, a few of the 2019 rookies should see their roles increase.
While the team was not disappointed in him, he certainly was disappointing to fans, who were very excited about the prospect of someone with his frame and speed. He still has Larry Fitzgerald and Christian Kirk ahead of him in the slot but he needs to be a much bigger part offense in his second year than he was.
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Basically an entire defensive line room has either landed on injured reserve or gotten cut.
From 2016-2018, the Arizona Cardinals were ravaged by injuries on the offensive line. That has changed this year, as only one position has really been affected by injuries.
However, the defensive line has been dealt a bad hand. Between injuries and disappointments, the Cardinals have lost six defensive linemen, all of whom were either projected starters or key contributors.
It started in training camp. Basically an entire roster of defensive linemen has been lost. As of now, the starters will be Corey Peters, Zach Kerr and Caraun Reid. Peters has been a rock. Kerr was signed off the street in October and Reid was signed last week, cut and re-signed on Tuesday.
Who are these missing pieces?
Philon was the biggest loss. He was one of their big free agent acquisitions. However, an arrest on assault charges led to his release in training camp. He was expected to be the best player on the line. It is hard to blame the Cardinals for this miss. He didn’t have a checkered past and it would have looked terrible to keep him on the roster.
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He had not played since Week 4 with a neck injury.
The Arizona Cardinals have been without rookie defensive lineman Zach Allen for the last six weeks of the season. The team announced Wednesday he was placed on injured reserve, which will end his season.
To replace him on the roster, they elevated undrafted rookie defensive lineman Miles Brown.
It was a move the Cardinals were trying to avoid. According to Kliff Kingsbury, it is something the organization had discussed.
“The big thing with Zach is the reps are so valuable as a rookie,” he said on Monday. “With our bye week coming up, we’ve kind of targeted that for a while that hopefully that could be a point to get him back for the last five and get those valuable reps.”
Now Allen won’t be able to even practice.
He has not played since appearing in three snaps in Week 4 when he suffered a stinger. At some point, he had a setback and has not practiced in weeks.
What is unknown is why the decision was made to do it now. The first injury report of Week 11 was not out at the time of publishing, so it is not known if the team was going to short on players on the defensive line. Clinton McDonald was placed on IR last week and Rodney Gunter had his leg looked at during the game on Sunday, although he finished the game.
Allen began the season as a starter after getting drafted in the third round of the draft this year. He appeared in four games and finishes the season with eight tackles, one for loss and three QB hits.
Listen to the latest from Cards Wire’s Jess Root on his podcast, Rise Up, See Red. Subscribe on Apple podcasts or Stitcher Radio.
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