GLENDALE, Ariz. — It’s only one loss, but given that it came at home in front of a primetime national television audience and against an undermanned Patriots team that was missing several important players, the Cardinals figured they’d hear the critics starting to crow.
And that’s exactly what they woke up to following their 23-21 loss on Sunday night.
“It’s ‘the-sky-is-falling’ Monday and we have to use that as a chip on our shoulder to make sure it doesn’t happen again,” General manager Steve Keim said during his weekly radio appearance on the team’s flagship station.
The Cardinals finished with similar offensive totals as the Patriots and they won the turnover battle, 2-0, but their third-down defense was bad all night and their special teams units were worse.
“I’m as disappointed as they are and they should be disappointed,” Cardinals coach Bruce Arians said of the boatloads of Arizona fans who already are considering jumping off the bandwagon.
But Arians also offered this plea:
“Give us another week,” he said. “There’s another game next week. There’s 15 more of them, but there’s another one next week.”
The defense allowed 10 third-down conversions on 16 attempts. Rookie cornerback Brandon Williams, as expected, got tested early and often and was burned on at least a few key plays. Carson Palmer didn’t seem to be in sync with his receivers much at all in the first half and he was sacked three times.
There also were some dumb penalties, a poor snap that led to a missed potential, game-winning field goal attempt and yes, a few injuries besides all of those who got hurt jumping ship
“Easy things to correct, but it’s too late now,” Arians said. “I think we have enough character on our football team to get it corrected and show up and have a really good Wednesday practice. That’s really all you can do from here. You can sit and reflect as long as you want because you have until Friday to write; I only have ’til tomorrow to coach, really ’til 4 o’clock today, so I have to get over it quicker.”