GLENDALE – When the Arizona Cardinals inducted wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald into the team’s Ring of Honor at State Farm Stadium and retired his iconic No. 11 on Sunday, it was more than an historic day for the franchise and its Hall of Fame wide receiver.

It also served as a reminder that since Fitzgerald left the field for good after the 2020 season, the club has been searching for a replacement at the position he filled for 17 remarkable seasons.

“I started here. I wanted to finish here. And now my name gets to stay here,” Fitzgerald said during the halftime induction ceremony.

Fitzgerald wasn’t just one of the best players in Cardinals history, he ranks among the greatest pass catchers in league history. Only former 49ers great Jerry Rice ranks above Fitzgerald in career receptions and receiving yards.

During Arizona’s 2008 season that led to the Super Bowl 43, he led the NFL in receiving touchdowns and ranked second in receiving yards. 

At the ceremony, he became the 20th member of the Ring of Honor and just the sixth former Cardinals star to have his number retired.

The Cardinals have had only one winning season since Fitzgerald retired after the 2020 season, and they lost again on the day his career was celebrated, falling to the Broncos 30-16 with the Red Sea replaced by a sea of orange-clad Broncos fans.

The loss raised the same old questions about the wide receiver position, namely, who is going to fill the giant void he left behind.

Over the past six seasons, the team has run through wide receivers young and old. There was  A.J. Green and DeAndre Hopkins, once great receivers who were beyond their prime when they arrived in Arizona and never became the reliable No. 1 target the team needed.

Arizona also experimented with wide receiver Marquise “Hollywood” Brown, who was young and fast when the team brought him in. Coming off a 1,000 yard season with Baltimore, he looked like a possible option to be the long-term answer at the position. While he showed flashes, his stint only lasted two years, and the search continued. 

Then came the 2024 NFL Draft and the Cardinals appeared poised to finally fill the gap with the fourth overall pick in a draft that experts considered to be rich in wide receiver talent. The team used the pick to select wide receiver Marvin Harrison Jr. from Ohio State. Harrison had been called a generational talent, groomed by his father Marvin Sr. 

Harrison didn’t pan out and was traded to Houston this season, adding to the long list of the team’s recent draft misses. While the search for Fitzgerald’s replacement continues, Arizona has found a franchise cornerstone pass catcher in  tight end Trey McBride, who is regarded as one of the best players at his position in the league. 

But outside of McBride, the only Cardinals wideout to record a 1,000-yard season since Fitzgerald’s departure is Michael Wilson, who showed enough promise in a career-year in 2025 to receive a three-year extension reportedly worth $75 million during the offseason. 

Cardinals leading receivers since 2021

2021: Christian Kirk – 982 receiving yards (77 receptions, 5 TDs)

2022: DeAndre Hopkins – 717 receiving yards (64 receptions, 3 TDs)

2023: Marquise “Hollywood” Brown – 574 receiving yards (51 receptions, 4 TDs)

2024: Marvin Harrison Jr. – 885 receiving yards (62 receptions, 8 TDs)

2025: Michael Wilson – 1,006 receiving yards (78 receptions, 7 TDs)

2026 (through Week 7) Michael Wilson – 375 receiving yards (37 receptions, 1 TD) 

Wilson hasn’t kept up last season’s pace, catching just 37 of his 66 targets through seven games this season. 

It hasn’t helped that the Cardinals have also been unsettled at quarterback, but that’s something Fitzgerald was all too familiar with during his career in Arizona. 

Sitting at 2-5, the Cardinals can look ahead to the draft to try again to address the issues on offense. 

The Cardinals would have the seventh overall pick idf they finish where they sit today and are likely to try to address their need – again – for a franchise quarterback with that pick. In the ensuing rounds, the search for another wide receiver to pair with McBride, Wilson and rookie running back Jeremiyah Love in coach Mike LaFleur’s system is an option. 

Wide receivers such as Arizona State’s Reed Harris, Texas’ Ryan Wingo, and Clemson’s Bryant Wesco Jr. could all be viable options in the second round, as the franchise tries, once again, to find Fitzgerald’s replacement.

In his closing remarks on Sunday, Fitzgerald told the crowd, “I’ll be a Cardinal forever.” The franchise can only wish they had him forever. In the meantime, the search continues. 

This article first appeared on Cronkite News and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.