Harry
ASFN Consultant and Senior Writer
There's no question Steve Keim gets tremendous credit making the Cards competitive. Last night, however, he must take much of the blame.
The league has seen what Keim's been doing and there was a great deal more competition for those veteran cast-offs this season. So the Cards were left with an extremely weak corner, a thin offensive line and no experienced kick returner. All of that contributed to last night's loss.
I don't know if Keim or BA made the decision to barely play the vets in the preseason. On defense the front 7 looked uncoordinated. Despite playing against NE's second string offensive line they couldn't create constant pressure. NK was invisible except for the penalty he picked up.
Bettcher is taking heavy heat. He deserves some of it, but Keim left him hanging. Williams, who was barely trained as a college corner, was clearly not ready to play man defense. So the Cards were forced to play zone most of the game. That's almost always a formula for disaster against a veteran group of receivers and neutralizes Peterson's impact. This was further agravated by TM not being in peak form. The safeties were often invisible in coverage. They missed Rashad Johnson. This all figures to be a problem for several games.
On offense it was clear that not using the preseason to ready the offense caused the first half to be wasted. The final bad snap is being blamed for the loss, but if the Cards had secured a capable O-line backup that kick might have happened in a more controlled fashion. I kept hearing the Cards sing Watford's praises this off-season. He supposedly could play every position great. This is the same guy who couldn't unseat Larsen so he could start last year. BTW Larsen was rated the worst starting lineman by PFF. Watford's second holding penalty was what really killed the key drive.
Special teams were atrocious. Clearly the Cards needed to draft or sign a return man. This is the kind of problem that drives me crazy. How can this go unsolved for so many years? BTW forget about a coaching change. BA feels it's a loyalty issue.
In the end there was plenty of blame to go around. BA failed to fully utilize a potentially dominating run game, which could have kept the defense off the field. No tight end caught a ball except for Gresham. Several individual players played below their skill level. Floyd only occasionally made an appearance when he should have been able to dominate. He didn't help his free agency case. Nelson was as fragile as I said he'd be when they took him. Jaron Brown didn't get enough snaps.
The season's not lost. The team will get better. However they need to clean this up because they're going to have to win with the offense.
The league has seen what Keim's been doing and there was a great deal more competition for those veteran cast-offs this season. So the Cards were left with an extremely weak corner, a thin offensive line and no experienced kick returner. All of that contributed to last night's loss.
I don't know if Keim or BA made the decision to barely play the vets in the preseason. On defense the front 7 looked uncoordinated. Despite playing against NE's second string offensive line they couldn't create constant pressure. NK was invisible except for the penalty he picked up.
Bettcher is taking heavy heat. He deserves some of it, but Keim left him hanging. Williams, who was barely trained as a college corner, was clearly not ready to play man defense. So the Cards were forced to play zone most of the game. That's almost always a formula for disaster against a veteran group of receivers and neutralizes Peterson's impact. This was further agravated by TM not being in peak form. The safeties were often invisible in coverage. They missed Rashad Johnson. This all figures to be a problem for several games.
On offense it was clear that not using the preseason to ready the offense caused the first half to be wasted. The final bad snap is being blamed for the loss, but if the Cards had secured a capable O-line backup that kick might have happened in a more controlled fashion. I kept hearing the Cards sing Watford's praises this off-season. He supposedly could play every position great. This is the same guy who couldn't unseat Larsen so he could start last year. BTW Larsen was rated the worst starting lineman by PFF. Watford's second holding penalty was what really killed the key drive.
Special teams were atrocious. Clearly the Cards needed to draft or sign a return man. This is the kind of problem that drives me crazy. How can this go unsolved for so many years? BTW forget about a coaching change. BA feels it's a loyalty issue.
In the end there was plenty of blame to go around. BA failed to fully utilize a potentially dominating run game, which could have kept the defense off the field. No tight end caught a ball except for Gresham. Several individual players played below their skill level. Floyd only occasionally made an appearance when he should have been able to dominate. He didn't help his free agency case. Nelson was as fragile as I said he'd be when they took him. Jaron Brown didn't get enough snaps.
The season's not lost. The team will get better. However they need to clean this up because they're going to have to win with the offense.
