Arizona Cardinals future comes down to owner figuring out team direction, this sports writer says

The NFL playoffs get underway this weekend – and once again, they will not include the Arizona Cardinals. The team finished the season with a record of 3-14, that includes a nine-game losing streak to end the season.

The Cardinals are also looking for a new head coach after firing Jonathan Gannon, who’d accumulated a 15-36 record over his three seasons leading the team. And they could also be in the market for a new quarterback.

Brad Cesmat, CEO of Sports360AZ.com, spoke with The Show to talk about what the future could look like for the Cards.

Full conversation

MARK BRODIE: Brad, good morning.

BRAD CESMAT: Mark, you want to talk about the Fiesta Bowl, or the Suns, or Diamondbacks' spring training is 3 weeks away, or the WM Open got Scottie Scheffler to commit.

BRODIE: Hey, you agreed to come on to talk about the Cardinals, so I'm going to hold it to that. We don't have time, I think, to get into the what went wrong for the Cards. You only have about six minutes.

So let's look. I want to ask, like, when the Cardinals are looking for a new head coach, which they are doing again, what kinds of attributes do you think they should be looking for?

CESMAT: It's a great question because the Cardinal owner, this is the fourth time in eight years he's interviewing for a head coach. So Michael, what questions are you asking? Or are you just sitting across from people wanting to hear what you want to hear? Mark, since 2018, they're 46-86.

BRODIE: That's not great.

CESMAT: So what are you doing here? No. What exactly is going on here? This isn't about Kyler Murray. This isn't about former general managers missed draft picks. This is squarely 100% on the owner.

And until the owner gets it right, because he likes to be one of these hands-on owners, and I've covered them all. I've covered Donald Sterling. I've covered them all through the years. And this owner is just one that likes the spotlight and likes it to be about him. And it doesn't matter if the team is 40 games under 500 since 2018.

So what's he looking for? I can't read his mind. His track record shows that he likes to go with the young or hot assistant coach names like Matt Nagy with the Kansas City Chiefs. That's great. Hire Matt Nagy. Is he bringing Patrick Mahomes with him? I think the answer is no.

So you can go hire guys that have a great resume in other places. But what we have become here is we're the Cleveland Browns. Every year, we're picking in the top five, top eight, who's the next quarterback's going to be, by the end of October, we're looking ahead to spring training. And that just shouldn't be the case in the NFL. It just shouldn't. And I talk about them on my shows and write about them as the Super Cardinals, because I get this. air of arrogance that we've got it all figured out. And no, you don't.

How about just the simple, "Guys, We've we've tried really hard. Please stick with us. I have been I've done a bad job of hiring coaches and personnel. I am going to take full responsibility for this. I am going to lean in and say, 'fans, please believe in us.'"

You can bring Klint Kubiak in, who's up at Seattle, as our offensive coordinator. Most fans haven't heard of Klint Kubiak unless you really follow the NFL. He's great. He has the top wide receiver in the NFL. Seahawks hit on their number one pick with the wide receiver.

Cardinals, I would say Marvin Harrison Jr. right now. I'm not going to use the B-word. That's not fair to call him a bust, but that's been a miss so far. There's no other way to put it.

BRODIE: Well, so that kind of raises the question, Brad. I mean, you reference Kyler Murray, and there's been some talk that maybe the Cardinals are ready to move on from him.

Do you have a sense of if they are looking maybe for a new quarterback either in the draft or free agency, or they're ready to keep rolling with Murray?

CESMAT: Well, Mark, let's just go to the fans for a minute. I would guess 90% of the people listening to you and I right now would say, please, we've heard enough about is this the year of Kyler Murray.

Kyler Murray, to me, feels like a guy that's let's press reset, he needs to go to another organization. That is easy to say, but there's a big bonus attached to Kyler Murray with his contract, which starts in March.

Early March will be when we know if Kyler Murray is the quarterback or not for this franchise because they've got to decide what they're going to do with him.

You could make the argument, Mark, that this is a good job because you're going to have the third overall pick. You have Kyler Murray that you could probably spin into some assets or maybe not. Maybe his image is too damaged, or maybe the small in stature quarterback deals caught up with him in the NFL. I simply don't know on that. I've heard that from agents. I don't know that to be true.

Is there a loaded roster here in Arizona? The answer on that is mixed. You can point to Trey McBride who's got all these catches.

BRODIE: The tight end.

CESMAT: Yeah, right. And when I hear about injuries, guess what? That's life in the NFL. If you're going to fall every year on, well, look at all the injuries we had, but you guys still need to stick with us because we're 46-86 since 2018.

I don't think the fans buy that. I don't.

BRODIE: So it's kind of sounds like — and please correct me if I'm wrong —

CESMAT: Yeah sure.

BRODIE: It doesn't sound like you think this is, whoever comes in as the new coach, that this is sort of a quick fix, like, hey, we're going to make the playoffs in two to three years.

CESMAT: I wouldn't necessarily say that. You have to hit on a bunch of things.

BRODIE: OK.

CESMAT: I'll just use Seattle as an example, Mark. Seattle hit on a whole bunch of their draft picks. When you have to go out into free agency and hit on players, that means you've missed in the draft.

The Cardinals have had to dive into free agency because they've missed on draft picks. For years, they've missed on draft picks. If they hit on Josh Rosen at quarterback, they don't have to take Kyler Murray. But they missed. So now they're on their second top-10 pick of a quarterback that it looks like that they missed on.

I feel like this all 100% comes down to the owner. Hundred percent. It's not the Monti Ossenfort does a nice enough job, but when you've been in the Valley like I have for 33 years and you've seen the same movie over and over and over, you know the boat sinks at the end, OK?

And so, yeah, 2009, I was at the Super Bowl in Tampa Bay. That's a long time ago. Bruce Arians, great hire. Ken Whisenhunt, great hire. Dennis Green drafted some very good players that got them headed in the right direction.

Since then, you can change out the GM, you can change out the players, you can change out the locker room, but 100% comes down to this owner figuring it out. And 46-86, and he's the one that's making the decision. He'll say, "Well, that's my lieutenants." No, you're the leader. Please take 100% responsibility.

BRODIE: All right. So Brad we have to leave it there but I promise we will have you back on to talk about happier stuff at some point, all right?

CESMAT: So let's see we've got the WM coming up, we've got women's Final Four, Mark. We've got the LPGA.

BRODIE: Lots of good stuff.

CESMAT: I'm always Always happy to come on with you, Mark.

BRODIE: All right, we'll have you back. That is Brad Cesmat, CEO of Sports360az.com. Good as always to talk to you, Brad. Thank you.

CESMAT: Stay well.