The Arizona Cardinals reworked Jacoby Brissett's deal to pay him closer to a starter-level salary at $15.5 million. Brissett was statistically productive last season, yet the Cardinals won just three games. That wasn't quite a compelling case for Brissett to make in negotiations, but he still had leverage of his own in the fact that Arizona really had nobody else at the position.
Well, we just caught a glimpse of what life without Brissett looks like in the Cardinals Hall of Fame Game against the Carolina Panthers, and it wasn't that different. Carson Beck played five non-kneel drives, finishing with 188 passing yards and one touchdown, completing 15-of-19 passes. He even was even pretty similar to Brissett in terms of his presence as more of a pocket passer. Beck certainly didn't look like a rookie with how composed he was.
Jacoby Brissett could just be getting in the way of Carson Beck
Unfortunately, it was the same old story as last season: Arizona's offense was good, but it wasn't good enough to make up for its bad defense. The Cardinals dropped this one 33-30 after surrendering a game-winning rushing touchdown to quarterback Haynes King.
Brissett is the better quarterback than Beck at this point in their careers, but it's a marginal difference when you're the Cardinals. There were still positive takeaways despite the loss, particularly how good Beck looked under new head coach Mike LaFleur's system.
This growing connection is already leading Cardinals fans to wonder how long they will have to wait to see it in the regular season.
Arizona easily could've just ignored Brissett's demands and gone forward with Beck as the quarterback for the season in a low-risk, high-reward audition. Now that they paid Brissett an amount suggesting he's the Week 1 starter, it already brings up the question of how long a veteran should be getting in the way of a rookie on a rebuilding team clearly out of the playoff conversation.
At least the Cardinals maintained future flexibility, and they didn't add years to Brissett's reworked deal. As a team projected to win just 3.5 games this year, they should be expecting to find that answer with a high pick in the 2027 draft class. But what they likely didn't anticipate was the possibility that Beck could actually already be the solution.
It's a slim chance that's the case, despite the impressive start to his preseason career. But he did at least show that there's enough to justify the Cardinals giving Beck an increased role to prioritize him in what is already a wash of a season.
Again, that brings up the question of how Brissett now fits into that picture and how long Beck will have to wait to get that opportunity. He definitely made a compelling case for it with his performance Thursday.
Add us as a preferred source on Google