Irrelevant. The real point is that the Cards used the #10 pick in the draft on a QB and it didn't work out. That is a team killer.
Now we have nothing other than a very raw kid at QB instead of a first round 6 year veteran and the possibility of no OTAs or any other contact with the coaches for that raw kid, or any QB we draft, to improve. Not a good scenario.
As for the nonsense about the other teams in our division, I heard the same stuff last year and what happened? We finished dead azz last. We've lost 4 straight to the 49ers and they outscored us last year 65-13. Because we have no QB. No matter how you look at it we're in a world of hurt if the NFL doesn't get their labor problems fixed.
duck...it's semantics.
The Qb that left...did indeed leave us....with our next guy....
What we were left with, was a bust QB. who was the next guy.
If he hadn't left, the dropoff wasn't there. Therefore we were really thinking the same way, just depends of how you break it down.
Plus given another year, we probably COULD have replaced ML....since every year you are given an opportunity to fill needs. If KW stayed, ML still gets cut. That's what I'm saying. KW left us holding the bag, and didn't give us another year or two to find a backup to replace OUR AGREED UPON HORRIBLE PICK in ML.
Of course it's not a good scenario to have a raw QB and no one else. But as I said, EVERY team is confronting 'bad scenarios'. That said, a plus is that none of our core is getting ancient besides AW. Hell have a lockout for 3 years, and all our core guys would still be in their prime.
When you look at all the marquee qb's are bascially 30+, with many pushing 35, alot of teams WITH Qb's, could be REALLY screwed, if there is a lockout. They might go into 2012 with a 37 year old qb making 17 mill a year who is over the hill and not know it until game 1, 2012. That's WORSE than having Skelton with some game experience, playing catch with LF for 20 months.
So yes, the cardinals, in that way...which is significant...are sitting pretty.
I never said we were a great team, but there would be so much turnover that it would be VERY possible, that the last place team in every division in 2010, could be the 2012 division winner with 10+ wins. Missing a year, if it happens, would be huge to variability and far exceed in variability anything we've seen from one season to the next. No one knows what will happen.
Nonsense? I was looking at it objectively. I never said it would unfold like that. It could though. Mat H might be over the hill. Niners are rebuilding. Steven Jackson isn't getting any younger.
Just because what happened last year, doesn't mean squat for next year or 2012. Don't always believe one's own sophistry. Lots of teams are in a world of hurt. The cardinals are one of 32 teams in a world of hurt. I'm sure even Packers fans could find something to be glum about regarding 2012 if they thought about it.
We are sitting pretty in many ways. Not perfect, because of OL, and QB experience. But again, there are going to be a TON of no experience players playing if there is a year long lockout. Skelton would have more experience than probably 1/4-1/3 of the players in the league in 2012, if there is no 2011 season. So again, take that in consideration. Not all teams at the QB spot, which is more precious even though it's one man, but every team will have significant holes at multiple OTHER spots. Each coaching staff will have less of a peg on where they are. Each one will make MORE incorrect assumptions, and the ones that assume more than the others in the first place, will be screwed by such idiocy even bigger than normal.
Knowing this, and not having gone out and broke the bank, give our smaller pocket team a better chance to come back strong. When FA starts in 2012, if that is the case, us keeping our powder dry would allow us to be more aggressive (I know...yeah right...graves?).
Peyton may be fine, but he might be missing (or old and crappy) say Jeff Saturday, Joseph Addai (not age, I think contract..could be wrong), Ryan Diem, Dwight Freeney, Reggie Wayne, Ken Hamlin.
Again, Arizona just has AW, besides contracts which we obviously haven't been spending on...so no excuse to re-up or spend on like talent.
I don't need to go around the league to figure it out, and perhaps if there is a lockout, for next year we'll all be bored to do just that...but for now...just looking at the Colts, a reasonable person would say the Colts have more to lose than us by the lockout. Some I'm sure even more than that, others, less.
We won't know how much of a world of hurt for any of the teams, and by it's nature, someone has to win or lose less. Thus we could see all 32 teams playing on the level of the cardinals in 2010 or less, and someone still has to win the dang thing.
Dead last was still good enough to be in the hunt to win the division until the last ~3 weeks. It's not like we have the 1990 Niners, 1999 Rams, and 2005 Seahawks in our division. Again, don't put all your eggs in the sophistry basket.
I personally think the variation will be wide. The year after a lockout would be the best year for someone to break/tie the Dolphins undefeated season..because just about every team is going to be down. So if a couple of these well run teams can hold serve, we just might see it. But like I said, after a lockout, there would be so much variation, we really can't say for certain what decisions now will make/break the 2012 season. Every team having ~14 draft picks and two years worth of fa defections/additions compressed alongside two years of aging, and perhaps lack of physical fitness *fatties* could completely change the course of the league.
I just can't say we are hurting so bad, and think much of it, when EVERYONE is hurting so bad....or worse, and 14 draft picks to go.
Of course this whole post is made given the assumption that we don't have a 2011 season.