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Monday Morning QB: Cardinals win was chock-full of fun storylines
Arizona Cardinals receiver Marvin Harrison Jr. has been derelict in his rookie duties.
“He owes us a joke because he hasn’t given us a joke in front of the offense yet,” right tackle Kelvin Beachum said.
Apparently, this is a thing. Beachum reminded Harrison of his longstanding debt after a big-time performance in which Harrison caught four passes for 130 yards and two touchdowns in the Cardinals’ 41-10 beatdown of the Los Angeles Rams on Sunday at State Farm Stadium.
“That was the first thing that I asked him,” Beachum said. “‘Now that you got your touchdowns, we’re gonna get some jokes in. Being shy, all that stuff is over with. You done scored touchdowns so it’s time to start participating in some of the rookie endeavors that we like to partake in.'”
Harrison laughed when informed that he had been called out.
“They’ve been on me,” he said. “All the rookies kind of have to say jokes before the meetings. It’s not really my personality. I kind of just sit there and listen to the coaches, but I told them, ‘We’ll see. We’ll see about that.’
Harrison is just glad his peers had his back as he adjusted to life in the NFL.
“The receiver room, they did a great job of not having me do too many outlandish things,” he said. “I guess I couldn’t ask for a better receiver room.”
More Marvin
Before Harrison did the deed on Sunday, the last NFL rookie with 130-plus receiving yards in the first half of a game was Darius Slayton for the New York Giants on Dec. 9, 2019.
As we noted in Sunday’s column, Harrison was just as focused on the four incompletions he caused QB Kyler Murray as he was on his own breakout day. That said, Sunday’s performance quickly put to rest any doubts about Harrison’s ability to live up to the No. 4 overall draft status be brings.
For what it’s worth, Harrison was clocked at 20 mph on his second touchdown, making him one of the 15 fastest ball carriers in the NFL this week before the Bears-Texans game was complete, and before Monday Night Football. After his velocity numbers in the Bills game, some critics were suggesting that he was slow. Of course, NFL analytics often ignore a host of variables, arguably making NFL analytics the least reliable of the four major sports.
Harrison insisted that the over-analysis of his week-one performance didn’t affect him, but it was nice to have his number called early and often.
“You just try to approach each game with the same mindset, have the same preparation, same routine, no matter how the results are,” he said. “Obviously, if things are going bad, you’ve got to change some things, but I’ve never had any lack of confidence in myself or the rest of the team. I’ll continue to get better each and every week, and continue to grow.”
milestone for Beachum
There was little fanfare made about the number, but Kelvin Beachum knew what Sunday’s start at State Farm Stadium meant.
“That was my 150th NFL start,” he said with obvious pride. “I’m proud of that number.”
Beachum could also take pride in his performance. One week after drawing media criticism in Buffalo after he allowed four pressures and two sacks in place of injured right tackle Jonah Williams, Beachum gave the Cardinals the professional performance that the team will need with Williams and Christian Jones both on injured reserve.
“He played well,” Gannon said. “That’s what I expected, though. Honestly.”
The Cardinals offensive line allowed just one sack and committed two holding penalties (one on Beachum) while helping the offense generate nearly 500 yards. Even so, Beachum had plenty of critiques.
“It wasn’t clean from my perspective,” he said. “They did a really good job, especially going into the late second, third and even to the fourth quarter where they started moving the line of scrimmage quite a bit. I don’t think I did a good enough job of helping us as offensive line get in the best position to handle some of those things.
“We ran for 200-plus yards, but we knew what we needed to do going into this game, which were combination blocks. We’ve got to be able to do a better job of handling those combination blocks, especially when they start moving as much as they did. If we had lost the game, those would be the things we’d be talking about.”
(Getty Images)
Dennis Gardeck couldn’t recall the last time he had a three-sack performance.
“(Against) Minnesota-Duluth, my fifth-year senior team,” he said with less than certainty.
He actually had five for Sioux Falls on Aug. 31, 2017. But that was a different stage. In addition to the sacks on Sunday, Gardeck had six solo tackles, four tackles for loss and a forced fumble that L.J. Collier recovered in a shockingly dominant performance by the much-maligned defense.
“I love playing football with my friends,” Gardeck quipped.
The Cardinals pass rush has endured heavy criticism for the past year. GM Monti Ossenfort did little to address it this offseason, and when BJ Ojulari and Darius Robinson went down with injuries, the expectations were low at the start of the season.
Gardeck was almost an afterthought among analysts despite leading the team last season with six sacks and posting seven in 2020. That made Sunday’s performance a cause for celebration.
Odds & ends
1. It was surprising to see defensive lineman Dante Stills listed as one of the inactives before Sunday’s game. Stills did not post a high PFF grade against the Bills but he was not the lowest on a line that earned little praise.
Roy Lopez —- 84.6
Khyiris Tonga —- 66.0
Dante Stills —- 52.0
Justin Jones —- 43.3
Bilal Nichols —- 43.3
L.J. Collier —- 39.0
We didn’t get the chance to ask Gannon above the decision after the game. We will on Monday.
2. For the second straight game, the Cardinals opened with a steady diet of running back James Conner. OC Drew Petzing likes to establish Conner and the run early in the game. LA never really had an answer for him.
Conner had runs of 16 and 13 yards on his first two carries, and he finished with 122 yards. He also scored a third-quarter touchdown, giving him at least one TD in seven consecutive games dating to last season. That tied the franchise record for consecutive games with a TD held by John David Crow (1959-60) and Mal Kutner (1947-48).
3. Budda big-time: Budda Baker had a team-high eight tackles, including two for loss. One of those was a huge stop of running back Kyren Williams on third down with the Rams trying to climb back in the game before the half. Baker admitted with a grin that he sniffed out the play early in his reads.
“Last week, we let that touchdown happen, and this week we focused on getting the stop,” Baker said. “That’s all we cared about was getting the stop.”
We all know that Baker is in the last year of his contract as he nears his 29th birthday. With Jalen Thompson and Darion Taylor-Demerson in the fold, this could be his last season in Arizona so it’s worth enjoying the fire that he brings to the field.
4. Through two games, tight end Trey McBride has 11 catches for 97 yards, giving him the sixth-most receiving yards by a tight end in the NFL, and in a tie for second in receptions. It’s clear that McBride will be a key part of the offense again this season, even with Harrison in the fold.
The two plays that stood out on Sunday?
This high-point catch on a perfectly thrown ball by Murray.
And this heady fumble recovery for a touchdown that let the Rams know that even when things went wrong for the Cardinals on Sunday, they were still going to turn out right.
5. Take these Pro Football Focus grades with a grain of salt. Many analysts have questioned PFF’s methodology on everything from their data collection to their lack of knowledge of individual assignments, but they provide a little more insight.
6. To put Kyler Murray’s perfect passer rating into perspective, it has only happened one time since the Cardinals came to Arizona in 1988, and Murray’s performance was just the 79th such regular-season performance in NFL history.
As Next Gen Stats noted, Murray completed all five of his pass attempts of longer than 20 yards, totaling 156 yards and three touchdowns. The probability of Murray completing all five of his deep attempts was just 0.3%. It helped that the Rams defense played a lot of zone coverage, and that their pass rush was spotty, but Murray was in his own zone on Sunday.
Injury front
Gannon said the Cardinals came out of the game clean, with only bumps and bruises expected. We’ll know more when Gannon addresses media on Monday afternoon.
Up next
The Detroit Lions come to State Farm Stadium for a 1:25 p.m. kickoff on Sunday. Detroit is 1-1, beating the Rams in Week 1 and falling to Tampa in Week 2.
Top illustration via Sidney Pinger, ALLCITY Network
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