Kyler And Company: Several Second-Year Cardinals Making Strides

Big Red

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Mar 16, 2019
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Murray seems to be on a star trajectory after an Offensive Rookie of the Year debut, while safety Jalen Thompson – who is currently on injured reserve with an ankle injury – also had a promising first season.


If Sunday is any indication, Murphy and Allen could soon join them as integral cogs.


"All of our second-year players have taken huge strides," defensive coordinator Vance Joseph said. "Zach Allen played really well on Sunday. He's a fast, twitchy defensive lineman. He's not a 300-pounder, so his best trait is his speed, and you could see it on Sunday: he won with speed, he won with quickness. And when a quarterback breaks a pocket, he has the speed to track quarterbacks down.


"And to watch Murphy, after last year playing the most snaps of any rookie in the whole league, and taking some good and some bad, he's obviously learned from it. He's a different player now when you watch him play on Sundays. He's more relaxed. His football IQ is higher. He made a fourth-down stop he wouldn't have made last year."


Gaillard sat his entire rookie year and was a backup heading into the opener, but ended up playing 46 snaps against the 49ers. He had some struggles in the run-blocking department, according to Pro Football Focus, but earned a sterling 83.2 grade in pass protection.


"I hadn't played for a whole year, so I knew that if Sunday was going to be my chance, that I had to take full advantage of it," Gaillard said. "When I got in, it felt good."


At 23, Murray is the youngest starting quarterback in the NFL, while Murphy and Thompson are full-time starters at 22, but's important to them to never let youth be a crutch.


"We kind of pride ourselves on holding ourselves accountable and being able to play well come Sunday at a young age," Murray said.


Murray's presence makes the 2019 draft class immensely valuable already, and if others ascend, the Cardinals will have several key pieces on rookie contracts for the next three years.


There are plenty of veterans essential to the Cardinals' trajectory, but the group that arrived with Kingsbury feels ownership in creating happier times for the franchise.


"When we came in, we were like, 'Yo, we've got to do something different. If not, we're going to be the same culture, the same team,'" Gaillard said. "It's really showed, and we hope to keep moving that way."

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