Commanders punter Tress Way isn’t healthy enough to practice with the team right now, so they have brought in another veteran to handle the duties at training camp.
The agents for Matt Haack announced that their client is signing with the team after a workout on Tuesday. Haack appeared in seven games for the Cardinals last season and has also played for the Dolphins, Bills, Colts, Browns and Giants.
Commanders General Manager Adam Peters said that Way is dealing with a pectoral injury. The three-time Pro Bowler is not expected to be out for an extended period of time.
Peters also said that linebacker Kain Medrano will miss time with a hamstring injury.
Cardinals Clips
Zay Jones spent two seasons with the Jaguars earlier in his career and he could head back to Jacksonville for the 2026 season.
The NFL’s transaction report for Monday shows that the Jags reported a visit with the veteran wideout.
Jones played in 27 regular season and playoff games for the team over the 2022 and 2023 seasons. He had 116 catches for 1,144 yards and seven touchdowns in the regular season and 13 catches for 157 yards and a touchdown in two postseason outings.
Jones spent the last two seasons with the Cardinals and caught 20 passes for 267 yards.
Brian Thomas, Jakobi Meyers, Travis Hunter, and Parker Washington head up the receiving corps in Jacksonville.
Jacoby Brissett got himself a $10 million raise, negotiating the deal himself, but serving as his own agent cost him sleep.
The Cardinals quarterback said the stress was limiting him to three hours of sleep a night.
“It’s your livelihood; it’s business; and it’s part of this game,” Brissett said Sunday, via Darren Urban of the team website. “You want to be out there with the guys and that causes another stressor. I’m glad it’s over with.”
It took the entire offseason, which Brissett skipped the voluntary portion of, and into training camp before Brissett got what he wanted. The team’s presumptive starter was scheduled to make a max $5.39 million in 2026, with only $1.5 million guaranteed.
“It definitely got dark a couple of times,” Brissett said.
He said wanting a raise was about “having respect for yourself.”
Now, he begins the process of winning the job. He is the favorite, but coach Mike LaFleur has promised only that Brissett will work with the starters on Tuesday. Brissett will have to beat out Gardner Minshew and Carson Beck to start Week 1.
The hard part, though, is done.
“After the sleep I get tonight,” Brissett said, “I’ll go back to three hours of sleep for work purposes now.”
Cardinals quarterback Jacoby Brissett’s bid for a new contract ended on Sunday.
Brissett is now set to make a base salary of $15.5 million, which better reflects his standing as the team’s likely No. 1 quarterback to open the 2026 season. Head coach Mike LaFleur did not commit to Brissett serving in that role, but he said he will be working with the starters when the team holds its first padded practice of the summer on Tuesday.
LaFleur also said that he’s happy to eliminate a reason to think or talk about anything other than football.
“It hasn’t been a distraction by any means,” LaFleur said, via the team’s website. “We have very much mature and professional players. We have a mature roster. Never thought it was ever a distraction but it’s one less thing we have to talk about, or that they have to read about. We can move on with the football aspect of it.”
Brissett’s contract stance kept him away from the team for the voluntary portion of the offseason program, but the Cardinals will be banking on his experience helping him to streamline the process of getting acclimated to the offense ahead of Week 1.
The Cardinals and quarterback Jacoby Brissett have resolved their differences.
Via ESPN, the team and Brissett have reached an agreement on a new deal.
Brissett signed a two-year deal in 2025 to serve as Kyler Murray’s backup. Brissett was thrust into the starting role during the regular season. He entered 2026 as the default QB1.
And so he needed to be paid that way.
Ian Rapoport of ESPN reports that Brissett will have base compensation of $15.5 million, with a chance to make $21 million.
Even with the upside, it’s the low end of the veteran starter scale. But it’s much more than the $6.5 million APY under his prior deal.
Brissett didn’t hold out of training camp, but he hadn’t been participating in 11-on-11 drills. Now, he’ll start putting in the work to be the starter for the coming season.
We’re in the business of finding and sharing and analyzing interesting remarks from anyone in the NFL ecosystem. But certain supposedly controversial comments aren’t really as big of a deal as some may interpret them to be.
Case in point: Cardinals offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett is catching some heat for comments he made on Saturday about rookie running back Jeremiyah Love.
“He’s definitely a rookie, and — as we’ve talked about,” Hackett said. “And he’ll keep growing every single day. I’m very excited for him. All those guys. Not just him.”
The broader context has to be considered, especially since Hackett specifically added “as we’ve talked about.”
Earlier in the session, Hackett addressed the challenges that first-year players face when training camp opens. The question related to the things that are different for rookies.
“Everything you can imagine,” Hackett said. “I mean, coming to this league is — I mean, just the speed is so different. You talk about the speed, being in a new building. . . . [I]t’s a whole new environment. New people to work with, and definitely new playbooks that are very, very intricate. Due to the fact of all the things that we see and all the different — I mean, just our defense out there. I mean, you get almost everything and more. Which is great, because it helps you for the season, but for a young player to have to be able to adjust and learn just basic system and then apply it to different defenses. It takes some time. So heads are spinning right now, especially after two days, but I think it’ll just get better and better. That’s the goal.”
Hackett wasn’t dismissing or minimizing Love. He’s a rookie. Like the rest of the rookies. Everything is different. Everything is new. “Heads are spinning,” as Hackett said.
Training camp is the time to slow, and eventually to stop, the spinning. They have plenty of time to get Love ready to go. For now, after only two days, he’s beginning the adjustment.
That’s all it means. Which makes the comment not nearly as alarming as some are making it out to be.
Cardinals tight end Trey McBride had some things to say about Cardinals fans during the offseason. He now says he wishes he hadn’t said them.
“Yeah, I probably shouldn’t have said that,” McBride told reporters on Saturday, via Josh Weinfuss of ESPN. “It came out wrong, and obviously the fanbase is great. We have a tremendous fanbase. Arizona’s been here, loyal fans to all the sports teams here, and we’re very lucky to have a lot of these guys, and we’re going to have a great season. We’re going to win games and we’re going to make sure those fans have something proud to cheer for.
“I love it here in Arizona, and I hope they love me too, but it’s a special place. The fans are great, and I’m excited for this year to give them something to be proud of.”
Here’s what he said, in a visit to the Bussin’ With The Boys podcast: “Living in Arizona, no one’s from Arizona. Everyone has kind of moved in from another state, so they’re all fans of their own teams, so now you have the Arizona that sits there and there’s no Arizona fans in Arizona. So it’s a tough deal. Hopefully, we start winning some games and we can bring some of those fans back.”
The simple reality is that the Cardinals aren’t currently competitive. They’ve been to the playoffs once since 2016. And they’re stuck in a division with three Super Bowl contenders.
Winning draws fans. For plenty of franchises, no one wants to show up to watch a team that isn’t competitive.
McBride has apparently figured it out. And he’s one of the bright spots on a roster that needs plenty of work. Until that happens, why should anyone living in Arizona spend hundreds of dollars and waste a day supporting the team?
After the Cardinals placed left tackle Paris Johnson on the physically unable to perform list this week, head coach Mike LaFleur said that he was dealing with a minor knee injury and would be “back before you know it.”
LaFleur was proven correct on Saturday. The Cardinals announced that Johnson has been activated from the PUP list.
The move clears Johnson to begin taking part in practices with the team. Johnson, who has started all 43 games he’s played since being drafted in the first round in 2023, is eligible for a contract extension this offseason.
Linebacker Josh Sweat remains on the PUP list. Sweat missed most of the team’s offseason program, but LaFleur said the move was “just maintenance” and that he has not picked up on any unhappiness from the team’s top pass rusher.
Josh Sweat was the subject of trade chatter in the offseason, as the Cardinals received calls about the outside linebacker. He missed all of the voluntary offseason program, choosing to work out on his own as he has done in the past.
It was unclear whether that was related to the firing of Jonathan Gannon, who Sweat followed from Philadelphia after two seasons together with the Eagles.
Additional questions were raised when the Cardinals placed Sweat on the active/physically unable to perform list to start training camp this week.
Cardinals coach Mike LaFleur said Friday that the move was related to Sweat’s ramp-up for training camp and not any unhappiness from the one-time Pro Bowler.
“I’m going to say no,” LaFleur said, via Darren Urban of the team website, “because I don’t see any discontent, and he’s never expressed any discontent to me.”
LaFleur clarified that while Sweat missed the voluntary work, he was around the Dignity Health Training Center and in contact with the team.
“Everyone is on the same page the entire time,” LaFleur said. “You guys can believe me or not, but I am not worried about Josh Sweat at all in terms of his health. He’s logged a lot of miles in this league, and I think not only for Josh to peak on Sept. 13 [for the opener], but for Josh to also get through the rigors of a 17-game season the way that he plays and the motor he plays with, this is best for him and the Cardinals.”
Sweat led the team with a career-high 12 sacks last season.
Yes, Cardinals quarterback Jacoby Brissett is practicing as he tries to get a contract that pays him like a starter, not a backup. But he’s not really practicing.
As noted by Darren Urban of the team’s official website, Brissett “isn’t participating in 11-on-11 drills yet.”
That’s surely a direct result of his dissatisfaction with a deal he signed under the impression that he wouldn’t be the team’s QB1. Now that he’s the presumptive Week 1 starter, he’s seeking an adjustment.
The current range for veteran starters begins in the low $20 millions and stretches into the $60 millions. With Brissett currently at $6.5 million per year, triple that to $19.5 million and call it a day.
He’d be the lowest-paid veteran starter, while still making much more than he’s due to make.
And it would help get him as ready as he can be with a new coaching staff and a new offense. Which is even more critical, given that the Cardinals are in a division with three Super Bowl contenders.
Who would have thought that the Cardinals would long for the days that they were the which-doesn’t-belong-and-why fifth team in the NFC East?
