Arizona Cardinals set to open preseason on the road against Cincinnati Bengals

The Arizona Cardinals will take on the defending AFC Champion Cincinnati Bengals on Friday.

For the Arizona Cardinals, their first dress rehearsal of the 2022 preseason will be a tough one. The Cardinals are traveling to Cincinnati to take on Joe Burrow’s Bengals. However, the Cardinals will most likely not see Burrow as he is recovering from his appendectomy. Instead, the starting QB for Cincinnatti will be Brandon Allen, who spent two seasons in Denver.

The Joe Burrow-Kyler Murray will have to wait for another year, but that doesn’t mean the rest of the Bengals will be a pushover. There’s a reason why the Bengals made it to Super Bowl LVI last season, and their depth is a reason why.

Arizona Cardinals face the daunting task of covering the Bengals WR corps

Ja’Marr Chase, Tee Higgins, and Tyler Boyd were arguably the NFL’s best trio of wide receivers last year. While it seems doubtful the Bengals would play Chase; they may want to do so to reset a narrative that plagued him last year when he dropped a ton of passes.

With Marco Wilson not expected back for another week, there could be a lot of scoring by the Bengals through the air. Byron Murphy may only play so much, and once he’s benched, this game could get out of hand very quickly.

That would give us a potential look into how Kliff Kingsbury has made changes this offseason, but once again, it’s preseason, so who knows if this is the real playbook. What Arizona Cardinals fans should watch for are the following:

• The tempo of the offense
  • How fast are they moving? Traditional or NASCAR-style?
• Who is being used as the primary target or a decoy in the passing game
• How the rookie offensive lineman and Keontay Ingram perform
• Who handles the middle linebacker spot?

There was a rumor that Darrel Williams didn’t get a lot of work in the Red and White practice, but that cannot be confirmed or denied after further research. Ingram has the best chance of making the roster out of the other running backs (Ronnie Rivers, T.J. Pledger).

There will be more clarity later in the week once we know who the inactive are. The Cardinals could be seeing a lot of Trace McSorley and Jared Guarantano.