Instant Reaction: Cardinals Can’t Close

The Arizona Cardinals’ inability to close games offensively finally caught up to them on Sunday and the Cards fell by a score of 16-15 off a last-second field goal by the San Francisco 49ers.

The opportunity to take a huge win over a division rival presented itself numerous times, but another failure to pick up a critical first down gave Kyle Shanahan’s team exactly what they needed to march down the field and win the game

Instant Reaction: Cardinals Fall to 49ers

Arizona played an excellent defensive game. Their defense was spectacular and did enough to warrant a win. In fact, they even did the dirty work of getting the lead for their offense with an interception and go-ahead fourth-quarter safety. The game was there for the taking, if the offense could simply execute.

But the offense was unable to move the ball consistently for most of the contest. It doesn’t appear changes are being made, and playing an opponent of quality (even considering how banged-up San Francisco was) exposed Arizona on Sunday.

When two first downs could have won the game, the Cardinals couldn’t get the job done. It was a discouraging performance, similar to the previous two weeks, but without the benefit of playing inferior coaching staffs. Once again, it should not have even come down to the final drive.

Arizona squandered an opportunity to take the lead in the division, and the loss could be extremely costly down the stretch of the regular season — if the Cardinals’ offense is even capable of getting them into playoff contention.

Sunday’s game illustrates the brutal reality that teams cannot simply play one-dimensional football in the NFL. It may work against the Saints and Panthers, but not against the top coaching staffs in the league. Without getting too far ahead, it looks like the NFC West may be a brutal challenge for the Cardinals, and they’re not playing football that does (or should) inspire confidence that Arizona is ready to contend in the toughest division in football.

One thing is clear: this iteration of Arizona’s offense is not good enough to beat quality opponents. With a short week and a matchup with Jonathan Gannon’s kryptonite (the Seattle Seahawks) on Thursday, it almost feels as if the Cardinals are 2-2 already.