It's easy to look at the Arizona Cardinals' 1-4 record, compare it to the undefeated Minnesota Vikings, and come to the conclusion that letting quarterback Kyler Murray go was a mistake.
After all, Murray is now 3-0 as a starter with the Vikings. That's the exact same number of winning starts Arizona has totaled with every single other quarterback combined since Murray tore his ACL four years ago.
It's safe to say this team has a quarterback problem. However, as Mike LaFleur mentioned following the Week 5 blowout loss to the Detroit Lions, their roster issues currently go well beyond quarterback. Hence his decision not to bench Jacoby Brissett heading into another difficult Week 6 matchup against the Los Angeles Rams.
Why the Cardinals were still right to move on from Kyler Murray
While Murray would certainly be an upgrade over Brissett in the short term, the success he's had recently in Minnesota compared to Arizona is telling about the infrastructure around him. He's able to succeed with the Vikings because they essentially already had everything else in place.
The same can't be said of the Cardinals, in the midst of an active four-game losing streak. That's why it was ultimately in their long-term best interest to let Murray go, taking a step back in the short term with Brissett to set themselves up for future success.
The Cardinals would face similar problems should they decide to take a quarterback in the first-round of the 2027 NFL Draft, whether that's Texas' Arch Manning or someone else entirely. But at least in that case it resets the timeline. The Cardinals were stuck in purgatory with Murray.
His newfound success in Minnesota doesn't change the fact that Arizona needed a fresh start to truly embrace this rebuild. If anything, it's further confirmation of how much further the Cardinals need to go to have as complete a roster, and quite frankly, organization from top to bottom, as the Vikings.
That's unfortunately a multi-year project, justifying their decision to prioritize the unknown at the quarterback position over Murray. They already had a large enough sample size to know that the latter wasn't resulting in any meaningful playoff success, so it's hard to fault them for pivoting.
It's hard to fully see the vision as of now, especially since the Cardinals questionably reworked Brissett's deal this offseason just to continue to lose games. At some point in the season, though, the Cardinals should have no choice but to turn to third-round rookie Carson Beck. And even if he's not the answer, it's better to experiment with different options rather than continuing to stay the course with Murray.
That says much more about Arizona's current situation than Murray, which he has already proven through his newfound success. Still, you can be happy for Murray's success with the Vikings while also accepting he was never going to truly be the answer for this Cardinals team to contend.
These organizations are in two entirely different stratospheres currently, and it's making all the difference.
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