Mike Tyson once said of boxing that everyone has a plan to win a fight until they get punched in the face and something similar can be said of NFL offenses.
A lot of work goes into scripting play calls that highlight the strength of your team, but plotting out plays on paper is very different from what winds up happening on the field on gameday. Teams need to be able to improvise and that’s something Cardinals quarterback Kyler Murray has shown a flair for over the course of his career.
Cardinals offensive coordinator Drew Petzing said this week that “we want to make sure we are taking advantage” of Murray’s ability to make decisions on the fly and Murray said that’s something the team has been working on as they prepare for the 2025 season.
“You get to the NFL, there are just better athletes,” Murray said, via the team’s website. “Guys are smarter, angles are different. So anytime I can get in space on this level, I love it. That’s a point of emphasis not only for me but for Drew to find ways to get me out in space, scramble drills, stuff like that. We have to be better in off-schedule plays. I have the ability to extend plays and we have the guys to go do it.”
The Cardinals’ offense took a step forward last season and maximizing Murray’s ability to turn chaotic moments into big gains would be an effective way to build on those strides.
Free agent offensive tackle D.J. Humphries agreed to terms with the 49ers on April 29 but never signed. His representation, AMDG Sports, announced on social media Thursday that Humphries is signing with the Rams.
The Rams have Alaric Jackson as their starting left tackle and Rob Havenstein at right tackle.
Humphries signed with the Chiefs on Nov. 23, 2024, after recovering from a torn ACL late in the 2023 season. The Chiefs anticipated Humphries taking over at left tackle, but in his first game, which came in Week 14, he injured his hamstring.
Humphries returned in Week 18 to play 32 snaps, but he played no offensive snaps in the postseason as Joe Thuney moved from guard to left tackle. Humphries, 31, did play nine special teams snaps in the team’s first two postseason games. He did not get on the field in the Super Bowl.
The Cardinals made Humphries a first-round pick in 2015, and he made the Pro Bowl in 2021. He started 98 games in his nine seasons in Arizona.
In free agency, Isaiah Simmons had one simple question for interested teams. What is your plan for me?
“To me, it seemed like Green Bay had the best plan, was most excited about me and liked me,” Simmons said, via Bill Huber of SI.com.
Packers defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley is asking Simmons to do only one thing — play linebacker. Simmons replaced Quay Walker, who was injured, on the first-team defense, along with linebackers Isaiah McDuffie and Edgerrin Cooper, in the offseason practices.
“I think really what I ran into most of my career is everybody wants me to do everything as opposed to letting me get really good at one thing first,” Simmons said. “I fully believe in Haf’s plan. He’s letting me just lock in and learn a small portion first before we even think about expanding to anything else. That’s something I really appreciate because I never really had that opportunity to really just hone in on one position.
“That’s been huge for me. It’s something . . . that hasn’t been presented to me because my versatility, I feel like it’s a little bit of a gift and a curse, where they want you to do everything but, at the end of the day, I’m still a human.”
With McDuffie, Cooper and Walker all returning, it’s unknown how Walker fits into the Packers’ plan at the position. He also has played in the slot, at safety and at edge rusher in his career with the Cardinals and Giants.
No NFL team, though, has been able to tap into Simmons’ success at Clemson when he won the Butkus Award as the nation’s top linebacker.
He started only five games with the Giants the past two seasons, playing a total of 558 snaps on defense.
“I’m actually very grateful for New York for what they did,” Simmons said. “They lit a fire under me, and I’m ready to go.”
The Cardinals have taken care of some important business before getting on the field for the first day of mandatory minicamp.
Arizona announced on Tuesday that the club has signed first-round pick Walter Nolen to his rookie contract.
The club will decide whether or not to exercise Nolen’s fifth-year option in the spring of 2028.
Selected at No. 16 overall in this year’s draft, Nolen’s deal is worth $19.3 million with a $10.7 million signing bonus, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter.
Nolen spent his first two collegiate seasons at Texas A&M before transferring to Ole Miss for 2024. He was a first-team All-SEC honoree last year.
Earlier this year, a key collusion case filed by the NFL Players Association regarding certain veteran quarterback contracts resulted in a 61-page ruling. The outcome was a mixed bag for both sides. And the document continues to be hidden from view by the league and the union.
And we’ve decided to continue to push for its release.
Beyond the fact that the public has a clear interest in any and all questions regarding a sports league that millions religiously follow and state and local governments routinely subsidize, the members of the NFLPA have a right to know. The document has not been shared with them.
It also hasn’t been given to at least two of the three players who were the focal points of the case — Giants quarterback Russell Wilson and Cardinals quarterback Kyler Murray. (We don’t currently know whether Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson did or did not receive the document.)
It’s one thing for the league and the union to refuse to let the media see the document. It’s quite another to conceal it from the members of the union, including the members who were most directly impacted by the case.
We nevertheless will keep pushing for its release. We’ve asked both the league and the union for the document. And if the answer is no, we hope to get a semi-plausible explanation for that from both parties.
It won’t keep us from continuing to push for its release. We all have a right to see it. Especially the members of the NFLPA. Especially those who were at the heart of the case.
The NFL benefits from an endless stream of bright, shiny objects.
Even in the offseason, there’s always something to distract fans and media from taking a closer look at something the powers-that-be are trying to hide. As it relates to a significant collusion grievance that resulted in a 61-page written ruling from an arbitrator, both the NFL and the NFL Players Association continue to conceal the document.
The grievance focused on the refusal to give fully-guaranteed contracts to specific veteran quarterbacks — with primary focus on Lamar Jackson, Russell Wilson, and Kyler Murray. The arbitrator found, we’re told, that the NFL encouraged teams not to give those players fully-guaranteed contracts. However, the evidence presented regarding the impact of this approach on the three quarterbacks at the heart of the case wasn’t strong enough to trigger damages.
So it was a mixed result. The NFLPA won, to the extent that evidence of collusion was found. The NFL won, to the extent that no money was awarded to any of the players.
But neither side felt sufficiently good about the outcome to disclose it. The NFL danced around it in January. The NFLPA has said nothing about it, either.
If this dispute had played out in court, the ruling would be a matter of public record. The NFL and NFLPA have created a private system for resolving disputes. And while the arbitrators who handle such matters typically insist on confidentiality while the cases are pending, there’s nothing that prevents either the league or the union from publishing the ruling.
From the Super Bowl to the Scouting Combine to free agency to the draft to OTAs, it’s been easy to forget about the 61-page collusion grievance ruling. A ruling that apparently contains something they don’t want us to see.
So what can it be? It could be (and we’re not saying it is) that the evidence in the case includes some frank and candid internal communications that one side doesn’t want to see the light of day — and that the other side has gone along with that. It also could be that the two sides were at one point actively negotiating redactions to the 61-page order to ensure that such frank and candid internal communications would not be communicated externally.
Whatever the explanation, there’s an important document that the NFL and the NFLPA are hiding from everyone. Despite the private nature of the arbitration agreement, pro football is an inherently public entity. It has millions of customers. It finagles billions in taxpayer money. It has a federal antitrust exemption that results in significantly more valuable TV rights.
The NFL should be expected to release this document. The union should be, too. But with no one pressuring them to do it, they can jointly continue to hide behind the various bright, shiny objects that will continue to keep us properly distracted.
Free agent linebacker Dennis Gardeck is heading to Jacksonville.
The Jaguars are signing Gardeck, according to Jordan Schultz of Fox Sports.
Originally an undrafted free agent out of Division II Sioux Falls, Gardeck surprisingly made the Cardinals’ roster in 2018 and played every game as a rookie, exclusively on special teams.
After proving himself as a special teams contributor in his first two seasons, Gardeck began to get more playing time on defense, and he played about half the Cardinals’ defensive snaps the last two seasons before a torn ACL ended his 2024 season prematurely.
If he’s healthy, Gardeck should provide depth on both defense and special teams in Jacksonville this season.
The Lions are adding an offensive lineman to the roster in the wake of center Frank Ragnow’s retirement earlier this week.
Mike Garafolo of NFL Media reports that they will sign Trystan Colon to their 90-man roster. It will be a one-year deal in Detroit.
Colon spent the last two seasons with the Cardinals and he started 11 of the 31 games he played in Arizona. He also played 20 games and made four starts in three seasons with the Ravens at the start of his career.
Colon has seen time at both guard and center over the course of his career, so he will join Graham Glasgow, second-round pick Tate Ratledge, and fifth-round pick Miles Frazier in the mix for playing time on the interior.
In early April, Arizona’s Trey McBride signed a four-year, $76 million contract that made him the first tight end in NFL history to sign a deal averaging $19 million a year. In late April, 49ers tight end George Kittle signed a contract that averaged $19.1 million a year — thanks to an inflated final year structured specifically to make Kittle’s annual average look better than McBride’s.
For his part, McBride is just happy to see tight ends getting paid, regardless of whether he or Kittle has the title of highest paid tight end in the NFL.
“I think it was great that I had the title at one point and that was obviously a huge milestone for me and everything just to be the highest paid at my position at the time, and I thought that was really cool,” McBride told ArizonaSports.com. “Obviously, George is much deserving of that and I’m very excited for him.”
McBride is hoping some tight end is making $20 million a year soon.
“I would love for someone to jump him and everyone just keep jumping each other and the tight ends make a ton of money,” McBride said. “So that’s what I’m pulling for but obviously very excited for George.”
Future tight ends who might break the $20 million a year mark include Sam LaPorta of the Lions, who will be eligible for his second contract in 2026, and Brock Bower of the Raiders, who will be eligible for his second contract in 2027.
In what may be the last year of his career, Calais Campbell has signed with the Cardinals, the team that drafted him in 2008. Campbell will turn 39 before the season starts and is the oldest defensive lineman in the NFL, and he recognizes that he was brought in to be a leader.
“I know when GMs and decision-makers [sign me], they’re looking for me to come into a building, I mean, they know that I come with a lot of leadership capabilities and prestige that a lot of the young guys respect, which is really cool,” Campbell said, via ESPN. “And, so, I don’t take that lightly. I mean, I take that with a lot of pride and I try to do best I can.”
Campbell, whose honors have included the NFL’s Walter Payton Man of the Year Award and the NFL Players Association’s Alan Page Award for community service, says that leadership comes naturally to him.
“I mean it’s kind of been who I am anyway,” Campbell said. “I don’t think I can go somewhere and not be that.”
Campbell acknowledged that at 39 he’ll need a few more plays off than he did in his prime, but he started 17 games for the Dolphins last year and thinks he can start every game for the Cardinals this year. And even when he’s not on the field, he’ll be contributing as a leader.
