The Arizona Cardinals will have the full services of safety Tyrann Mathieu on Sunday evening
Last December, Arizona Cardinals fans held their collective breath for safety Tyrann Mathieu, aka Honey Badger. On a non-contact play, Mathieu went down with a torn ACL against the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday Night Football.
Many complained that Mathieu shouldn’t have been in the game at that point. However the Cardinals pointed out that there was no reason to have him out of the game at that point. Starters play the whole game for the most part.
While it certainly appeared the Cardinals had the game in hand, you never know, especially on the road on primetime television. So, no fault goes to the team for having him in there.
As training camp approached, we knew Honey Badger was close but not 100 percent yet. He missed the first three weeks of camp on the PUP list. Then he came off right before facing the Houston Texans.
More from Raising Zona
- Arizona Cardinals: Could Eric Bieniemy come to the desert?
- Would Jonathan Gannon be a good fit for the Arizona Cardinals?
- Arizona Cardinals: Budda Baker right in his take regarding the next coach
- Arizona Cardinals: 3 reasons new coach should want to work with Murray
- Arizona Cardinals special teams could be completely revamped in 2023
He took it slowly in the last two games but by all accounts was tearing it up in practice. Nothing has changed since those first couple of days back. Mathieu has been grabbing a couple of interceptions in each practice.
For these reasons, Mathieu is now all the way back. He is expected to be in for all defensive snaps on Sunday evening against the New England Patriots.
After a second torn ACL, some wondered how he would return again? When would he return again? After all, his injury came at the end of the regular season. It was a virtual repeat of what happened the first time he tore an ACL in 2013.
With hard work and determination, Mathieu wasn’t going to be denied a chance at coming back and doing his thing. The fact that he will be doing so in week one is really just a testament to his work ethic and attitude. It will be great to see number 32 out there Sunday night.