LA Rams: Wednesday walkabout of the NFC West

Arizona Cardinals

So, let’s start right off by looking at the Arizona Cardinals and their young quarterback Kyler Murray. How well did he do in 2020?

Jay Blucher:  The addition of WR DeAndre Hopkins (115 receptions, 1407 yards, 6 TDs) this year (whom the Arizona Cardinals managed to pick up in return for a couple of ketchup packets from the Houston Texans) made a huge difference in QB play in the desert.

It takes two to tango and Hopkins was the dance partner Murray sorely lacked. The supporting cast surrounding super stud WR Hopkins, however, doesn’t scare me all that much for this .500 8-8 team.

Murray’s go-to pass catchers were the always dependable but probably on the down-side of his career now Larry Fitzgerald (54 receptions, 409 yards, 1 TD), a shifty and deceptively speedy slot receiver Christian Kirk (48 receptions, 621 yards, 6 TDs), a running back (Chase Edmonds, 53 receptions, 402 yards, 4 TDs ) and an undrafted TE (Dan Arnold, 31 receptions, 438 yards, 4 TDs). What I fear the most here is the addition of a downfield compliment to Hopkins, someone with sure hands who can make the 50-50 heavily contested jump ball catches, such as the former Anquan Boldin used to make all the time for the Cardinals in the past.

The scary thing about Murray is he’s just 23 years old, still learning the NFL ropes. If he works with a QB coach in person during this off-season (something every team could not do this year because of Covid) on perfecting his throwing mechanics to become more consistent, he’s bound to improve.

With the 16th overall pick in the draft this year, an upgrade at TE, such as Kyle Pitts out of Florida, could be an enticing enhancement for the Cards. Many pundits peg Pitts as the top TE in this year’s class, and several mock drafts have him listed in the Top 10 prospects. He’s shown he can dominate in the middle of the field and is more of a receiving TE than a blocking TE.

Bret Stuter:  The bar for Kyler Murray was set awfully high for his second season, and for some good reasons. The Arizona Cardinals invested in bringing wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins to the Cardinals to give the offense the true one-two punch so desperately needed from the past year. In one season, he rose from the 15th ranked passed (in 2019) to the 13th ranked passer in 2020.

He made a far more significant improvement as a rusher, skyrocketing from the 35th rusher in the NFL to the 17th rusher. But is that what the Cardinals paid for by drafting him? Murray made some improvements in his accuracy and he added six touchdowns, thanks to Hopkins. Still, he continues to throw 12 interceptions per year like clockwork.  The team improved to 8-8. But how much of that was due to the offense improving from 21st to 6th ranked, and how much to the defense that improved from the league’s worst 32nd to a respectable 13th ranked defense.

In terms of a pass/fail/or needs improvement, I have to give Murray a needs improvement grade.