Cardinals start fast, fall flat vs. Bills

The Arizona Cardinals’ robust begin wasn’t sufficient of their 34-28 season-opening loss to the Buffalo Payments on Sunday.

After placing up 10 unanswered factors and taking a 17-10 benefit into the half, the Cardinals merely couldn’t sustain towards a Josh Allen-led Payments squad that responded within the second half with a trio of touchdowns and a game-sealing subject objective.

Arizona Sports activities’ hosts, editors and reporters gave their largest takeaways from the Cardinals’ season opener:

John Gambadoro, co-host of Burns & Gambo: Lot of the identical outdated, standard. Cardinals performed effectively for a half and had a 17-3 lead however ultimately, misplaced one other one rating recreation. Final 12 months they had been 2-5 in such video games. This 12 months they begin out 0-1. The issue with this recreation was easy — the offense is meant to hold the group and it stopped doing that after the 17-3 lead. Arizona’s protection allowed Buffalo to attain touchdowns on the finish of the primary half and starting of the second half to wipe away all the nice the group had completed in constructing a two-touchdown lead.

However the lack of ability of Kyler Murray to maneuver the offense is what led to this loss.

Within the second half, the Cardinals went three-and-out, turnover on second play, eight performs for a subject objective, kick return for a landing, three-and-out and turnover on downs after 9 performs. The offense accounted for a whopping three factors within the second half. An offense that had 190 complete yards within the first half completed with 270 for the sport. Fast math: They’d 80 second-half yards. Murray handed for 131 yards within the first half and he completed with 162 — yup, that’s simply 31 yards within the second half and all however three of these yards got here within the remaining two minutes on the final possession.

For a quarterback that to me nonetheless has rather a lot to show, Sunday was not a day he proved something. He did all of the work within the offseason — and all of us give him a ton of credit score for that — however now the outcomes matter. And Sunday, he didn’t get the job completed.

Dave Burns, co-host of Burns & Gambo: Final 12 months we might have been nice with this. Shedding an in depth recreation in an atmosphere like Buffalo to one of many 5 (two?) greatest quarterbacks within the NFL would have been trigger for encouragement. These days are lengthy gone. Now, when Jonathan Gannon says issues like “Sundays (are) the place you get measured,” we take these phrases and apply them to a unique commonplace.

Regardless of the stuff to love there was loads of stuff to not like. Murray’s second half. A number of the play-calling within the second half. A protection that earned the doubt that has been solid on them. It doesn’t imply the good things didn’t occur or doesn’t have its place, however main 17-3 on the street solely to lose simply doesn’t present the consolation it may need a 12 months in the past.

In some methods, the sport was a validation of what many have stated concerning the Cardinals; the offense must be elite to make up for a protection that lacks distinction makers. Sunday’s recreation adopted that idea to the letter.

The hope is that the protection will enhance and never quit six yards per play (that quantity was hovering round 7.5 for a giant chunk of the sport). Possible although, that is going to come back all the way down to Murray and Marvin Harrison Jr. fast-tracking their chemistry. Our ballot query on Friday requested the query who would lead the Cardinals in receptions on Sunday. I didn’t assume MHJ can be first in that class, however he ought to by no means ever be final.

Tyler Drake, Arizona Sports activities Cardinals beat author and Cardinals Nook co-host: Precisely what the Cardinals wanted to do proper out of the gates, they did. Arizona went proper at Buffalo’s new-look protection behind a heavy dose of James Conner and Murray. The end result was a 17-3 benefit that included an added enhance from a defensive takeaway. For Arizona to have an opportunity in soccer video games, that is the type of begin that’s wanted week in and week out.

Arizona, nonetheless, didn’t replicate any of that early success over the remaining quarters.

The Payments clearly made the suitable halftime changes. The Cardinals? Not a lot, with Murray struggling to finish a move behind an offensive line that was getting beat left and proper and already down a person within the second half. Not getting Harrison greater than three targets is one thing that can’t occur transferring ahead, both.

Allen in the meantime took it to Arizona’s protection behind a pair of passing touchdowns and a dashing rating within the second half. Even with the added items introduced in, Arizona’s defensive expertise simply couldn’t sustain with the handful of Payments playmakers.

If not for DeeJay Dallas making noise with a 96-yard kick return late, this might have appeared a complete lot uglier for the Cardinals regardless of the promising begin.

Kevin Zimmerman, ArizonaSports.com lead editor: It’d take time to guage whether or not that was an in depth name towards a playoff group or perhaps a Tremendous Bowl contender, however within the one-game vacuum it’s, all indicators level to the Cardinals being a mean soccer group. Arizona didn’t win the halftime adjustment recreation, as Murray’s first half (16-of-19 for 131 passing yards) withered right into a 5-of-12, 31-yard second half. And 28 of these yards got here within the remaining determined drive.

A few of it’s on Murray. However his second half was additionally a shot of actuality concerning the expertise base. Murray was focusing on Greg Dortch down the stretch and Harrison solely bought three targets all recreation. There have been drops by everybody. The Cardinals’ assortment of talent gamers is numerous. However is it distinctive?

Additional, the offensive line depth is already an issue. And the protection, whereas with out egregious errors, simply doesn’t have the expertise to compete even towards a Payments group that had loads of questions on its offense heading into the 12 months.

Kellan Olson, Arizona Sports activities at Evening co-host: It’s an odd angle to take when the Cardinals scored 28 factors on the street towards a contender, however I left this recreation extra involved concerning the offense than the protection. We knew the protection was going to suck. It did. However the offense was extremely reliant on the run recreation and quick throws, which labored fantastically till it didn’t. James Conner solely averaged 3.1 yards per carry because the Cardinals oddly spammed exterior runs when he clearly wasn’t creating sufficient room. Murray hardly ever threw intermediate passes, not to mention going additional down the sphere.

We’re doing “speedy reactions” right here, so I’ll maintain off on who deserves blame for Harrison solely having 3 targets till the all-22 footage will get checked out, however somebody deserves it. Misplaced within the shuffle of that was Trey McBride being restricted to little stuff over the center via 5 catches for 30 yards. This offense both has to gash opponents within the run recreation or have constant big-play skill through Harrison and McBride. In the event that they don’t, the Cardinals will lose a complete lot of video games and we noticed none of that from the offense in Buffalo.

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