Arizona Cardinals picked to cause chaos in NFC West in 2022

The Arizona Cardinals got the nod to be the ones who cause chaos in the NFC West this year.

Well, well, well, this is a fun title to have, isn’t it? As the Arizona Cardinals’ offseason slowly gets closer to training camp (even though it’s less than a few weeks away), fans of the team need something interesting to distract them about how bad this offseason has been.

Enter NFL.com’s Bucky Brooks, who picked one team from each division as its “chaos team.” The Arizona Cardinals were Brooks’ pick for the NFC West.

It’s way more fun to look at the Cardinals’ season this way, as the news about Rodney Hudson’s potential retirement and DeAndre Hopkins’ suspension have been absolute buzzkills over the past few months.

Brooks didn’t give the most straightforward reason why the Cardinals were chosen for this “title,” if you will, but I’m here to offer my inferences of what he wrote.

Arizona Cardinals were picked as the NFC West’s “chaos” team.

Brooks talked about what Kyler Murray and Kliff Kingsbury need to overcome (a collapse and Hopkins’ time off). But what Brooks probably forgot to mention is that at least in the regular season, the Cardinals split with the L.A. Rams.

The first game was a decisive win for the Cardinals in L.A., and the Rams won a nail-biter in Arizona later in the year after holding off a furious Cardinals comeback. So just imagine if Murray never throws that pick on the goal line in the two teams’ second meeting.

Regular season-wise, if the Cardinals can stay healthy, they can run with the Rams. Hopefully, new Arizona Cardinals guard Will Hernandez (who’s gone up against Aaron Donald before) will be more effective than Max Garcia.

If the Cardinals do finish the job they never completed last year, they could be looking at a high seed for the playoffs. They just need to take better care of the opportunity once it arrives.