Arizona Cardinals fire a couple of assistants
By Scott Allen
The Arizona Cardinals also decided to retain defensive coordinator Vance Joseph
Well, we are going to get another year at least of Vance Joseph but the Arizona Cardinals did decide to remove a couple of assistants from their jobs on Monday morning. One of them was defensive line coach Chris Achuff.
Achuff was a holdover from Steve Wilks staff. He was the assistant defensive line coach and was promoted under head coach Kliff Kingsbury. Also reportedly let go was Randall McCray, who was the assistant special teams coach.
The Cardinals defensive line had its issues in 2019. Most of the damage done on pass rush was thanks to linebacker Chandler Jones who played closer to the line.
The Cardinals special teams had its good moments and questionable play at times as well this season. Whatever went into the decision to fire those two coaches, there were reasons. The Cardinals have not made an official announcement.
It is a sign though the Cardinals are willing to make changes however. No matter who it is, you never like to see someone lose their job but when your team goes 5-10-1, changes are inevitable no matter how big or small.
The one good thing about retaining Joseph is that they will have continuity on defense, something missing recently. The Cardinals are going to have to re-tool the defense from top to bottom.
Defensive line, linebackers, corners, safeties, all should be impacted this offseason. Look for the Cardinals to complete the building though both free agency and the draft.
The Cardinals defense could easily be blamed for a number of their losses this season. However the offense had plenty of missed opportunities as well, settling for field goals instead of touchdowns. There was a lot of that early in the season but the Cardinals seemed to rectify that somewhat as time wore on.
The Cardinals are likely not done with personnel movements so stay tuned. It could be a very interesting couple of months.