Arizona Cardinals: Who will be the #2 quarterback?

Will Drew Stanton return or will the Arizona Cardinals have to look elsewhere?

With Drew Stanton’s future with the team cloudy, the question comes up as to who the back up quarterback behind Carson Palmer will be. Stanton has been with the Cardinals since 2013 and is now an unrestricted free agent. It is possible that Stanton will look to move on from the desert and hopefully start for another team, possibly the Buffalo Bills, the New York Jets or even NFC West rival the Los Angeles Rams. Arizona met with Stanton at the NFL Combine, but it may look elsewhere if Stanton has a high asking price.

In 8 starts in 2014, Stanton went 5-3 and throwing for 1626 yards and a touchdown interception ratio of 6:5. Stanton proved he wall able to keep the offense functioning to a certain degree in Palmer’s absence. His relative success filling in for Palmer gives Drew Stanton leverage in contract talks. However, Steve Keim is one to never over pay players. You also wouldn’t want to see a lot of money thrown at a back up quarterback. Bottom line is that, if your backup is getting significant amounts of playing time, it is unlikely that your team will win the Super Bowl.

If Arizona indeed lets Stanton walk, another potential candidate for back up is current third stringer quarterback, Matt Barkley. The Cardinals cut both Logan Thomas and Philip Sims and traded a seventh round pick to have Barkley on the roster. It is unclear as to why the team traded for Barkley and what their plans are for him. Nonetheless, there is still a reason they acquired him and it is possible that they promote him to backup quarterback or at least let him compete for the number 2 job.

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The only reason that makes this option questionable is Barkley’s zero career starts and his less than stellar career statistics. In his short career, Barkley has thrown 30 passes for 300 yards and four interceptions. Another thing to keep in mind is that, Barkley hasn’t played a preseason game for the Cardinals and the only glimpses the organization has of him is in practices.

Now to answer the question, who will backup Palmer next season. While Drew Stanton is arguably one of the best understudy’s in the league, it doesn’t seem worthwhile to overpay him. He is a backup, and the team should look to spend money at other positions of need, especially on the defense. If the Cardinals can convince Stanton to take a discount, then by all means resign him. If Stanton’s asking price ends up being too high, then I think the team should bring in a free agent, perhaps Matt Moore, and have him compete with Matt Barkley for the back up job.

Next: How did the 2015 draft class fare?

The ideal scenario is that whoever the backup is, learns the offense and only sees playing time when the Cardinals are in victory formation.

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