In their second matchup of the 2021 preseason, the Arizona Cardinals weren’t able to do enough to come away with a win over the Kansas City Chiefs.
Well, we got to see a bunch of the Arizona Cardinals starters for the first time this preseason during Friday’s matchup against the Kansas City Chiefs. However, it wasn’t enough to result in the Cardinals leaving the field with a win for the second week in a row as they fell to the Chiefs by a final score of 17-10.
Wins and losses obviously don’t matter in the preseason, but it’s hard to imagine that at least some Arizona players wouldn’t have received a confidence boost by defeating Kansas City, the two-time defending AFC champions.
Despite the result, there were still some positives to take away from the Cardinals’ performance in the second week of the 2021 preseason (heavy emphasis on the some). However, there were also plenty of negatives about Arizona’s play on Friday as well.
Arizona Cardinals starting offense looks sloppy in exhibition loss to Kansas City Chiefs
The Cardinals had six offensive drives in the first half against the Chiefs and none of them resulted in points. In fact, Arizona didn’t get their first points on the board until the end of the third quarter when Matt Prater knocked down a 22-yard field goal.
Of the six offensive drives Arizona had in the first two quarters of the game, quarterback Kyler Murray was on the field for three of them. Unfortunately, the Cardinals offense struggled mightily with Murray on the field and the young quarterback spent too much of his time evading pressure from the Kansas City defense.
Murray ended up getting sacked twice by the Chiefs and that was all Arizona head coach Kliff Kingsbury needed to see before deciding to get his quarterback off the field and out of harm’s way.
It was a forgetful night for the Cardinals defense as well. Arizona ended up allowing Kansas City to rack up a total of 458 yards and this was with Chiefs superstar quarterback Patrick Mahomes only being on the field for three offensive drives.
We mentioned there were some bright spots for the Cardinals on Friday and they included rookie receiver Rondale Moore looking impressive once again, Arizona cornerback Byron Murphy intercepting a Mahomes pass, and Prater making all of his kicks (one field goal, one extra point) for the second week in a row.
We didn’t say they were very exciting positives, but that’s pretty much how Friday night went for the Cardinals.