Arizona won in Los Angeles and our model gave the Cardinals two more wins than it had in July, but the defense still grades near the bottom
Updated
For two months the story on Arizona was total agreement. Our model had the Cardinals at four and a half wins, the market had them at four and a half wins, and nobody had much to argue about. Then Arizona went to Los Angeles and beat the Chargers 26-14, a road win over a team we had projected as a playoff club, and when we re-ran the season the Cardinals came out at six wins, a 6-11 finish that sits nearly two above the number everyone shook hands on in July. That is a real move, and it comes from a specific place.
The place is the passing game, which looked far better in Week 1 than its summer grade suggested. Jacoby Brissett went 27 of 37 for 277 yards without a turnover in Los Angeles, Trey McBride caught nine balls for 95 and a score, Kendrick Bourne added eight for 75, and rookie Jeremiyah Love found the end zone. Brissett's projection now reads 4,534 yards and 23 touchdowns with a passer rating above 91, and the interception total has fallen from 19 in the July run to 12. That is the difference between a quarterback throwing to chase games and a quarterback running an offense, and the weapons around him are the reason. Marvin Harrison Jr. climbs to 90 catches for 1,244 yards and six scores, up from the 81 and 1,070 we projected in the summer. Michael Wilson jumps to 82 grabs and 1,059 yards. Trey McBride holds at 83 catches, 929 yards and eight touchdowns, still one of the best tight ends in football. Rookie back Jeremiyah Love adds 784 rushing yards and six scores as the lead ball carrier. The offense now projects for 339 points, 20th in the league, which is a long way up from the bottom-third grade we hung on it in July.
The defense has not moved, and it is why six wins is the ceiling rather than the floor. Our model still has Arizona allowing 425 points, 31st in the league, and surrendering the most yards of any team in football. Josh Sweat projects for nearly 14 sacks and Zaven Collins for ten, so the edge rush is real, but the coverage behind it is not, and when we ran the rest of the season opposing quarterbacks moved the ball on this group at will. Holding the Chargers to 14 was a good afternoon. It was not a change in what this unit is.
That split is the whole projection. A 20th-ranked offense with two star pass catchers and a 31st-ranked defense adds up to a team that wins the games where the offense gets hot and loses the rest, and when we ran the season that came out to six wins. The Week 1 result is banked and it counts. The division is still the same division, with the Rams the best team in football by our numbers, Seattle a contender, and a San Francisco side that just went into Los Angeles and beat the Rams. Six games against that trio with this defense is still a brutal draw.
The market opened Arizona at four and a half, and for the first time our model is on the other side of it. Not far on the other side. A win and a half is a modest lean, and it is grounded entirely in the passing game outperforming its grade in Week 1. If the Harrison and McBride version of this offense is the real one, six wins is conservative. If Brissett settles back toward the low-eighties passer rating we had him at in July, the offense stops covering for the defense and the Cardinals are back at four or five.
The path to more runs through the two young stars. Harrison is entering his prime and just showed what a full season of him at number one looks like. McBride is a mismatch on every snap. If those two force the offense above its grade for seventeen weeks rather than one, Arizona can steal enough shootouts to sniff seven or eight wins. The path to less is the defense, which is the same defense that graded near the bottom in July and has done nothing yet to move the number.
The next month tells us quickly which version this is. Seattle comes to Arizona in Week 2 with a defense that just intercepted Drake Maye three times, then it is a trip to San Francisco, a game in New York against the Giants that our model treats as the most winnable on the early slate, and Detroit at home in Week 5. When we ran that stretch, the Cardinals were favored in one of the four, and a 2-3 record entering October would be ahead of the projection rather than behind it. If Brissett and the two young stars keep the offense in the top twenty and the defense steals a stop or two, that is where this team lands. If the Seahawks and 49ers do to the secondary what our grades expect, the Week 1 win in Los Angeles will look like the high point.
So the read on Arizona is a rebuilding team with a promising skill core that just proved the core can win a game on its own. Our model moved the number up because the offense earned it. It did not move it far because the defense has not. Six wins is the honest projection, the Cardinals are still headed for a high pick, and the young pass catchers are still the reason to watch. The difference from July is that the model now thinks they can carry this team to a few wins nobody was counting on.
