Cardinals Clips
Last month, retired quarterback Derek Carr said he’d return to football for a chance to play with a Super Bowl contender.
As of Scouting Combine week, the Saints hadn’t heard from any team regarding a potential trade for Carr’s contract rights. Through the first week of free agency, we’re told, the Saints still haven’t gotten any inquiries.
In the interim, plenty of teams with needs at the quarterback position have filled them, from the Dolphins (Malik Willis) to the Jets (Geno Smith) to the Vikings (Kyler Murray) to the Falcons (Tua Tagovailoa).
With the Raiders presumably waiting to make Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza the No. 1 overall pick in the draft, only two teams currently have a hole in the QB1 spot: the Steelers and the Cardinals.
The Cardinals, with all due respect, aren’t a Super Bowl contender. The Steelers arguably aren’t, either. In a wide-open AFC, they could be.
Carr becomes a potential option in Pittsburgh if Aaron Rodgers decides not to play for the Steelers again in 2026, and if they don’t land Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson in the first round of the draft. (Some in league circles think the Steelers will take him if he’s on the board when Pittsburgh makes the 21st overall pick.)
For now, there are no takers for Carr, if he were to unretire. Injuries could change that; if a starter on a contender suffers a serious injury before the trade deadline, Carr becomes a potential alternative to the next man up on the depth chart.
The Texans are adding another piece to their offensive line.
Evan Brown, a guard who was cut by the Cardinals this week, has signed a one-year deal with the Texans, according to Ian Rapoport of NFL Network.
The much-maligned Texans offensive line also added free agent offensive tackle Braden Smith this week. Improving the line has been a top priority in Houston.
The 29-year-old Brown started 28 games at guard in Arizona the last two seasons. He has also spent time with the Seahawks, Lions, Browns, Dolphins and Giants.
The Cardinals re-signed core special teams player Simi Fehoko in a one-year deal on Friday, the team announced.
Fehoko, 28, did not make the 53-player roster out of training camp last summer but re-signed to the practice squad. He later signed to the active roster before breaking an arm in Week 10 in a game against the Seahawks.
Despite playing only eight games in 2025, Fehoko had a career-high 116 special teams snaps and seven tackles. Offensively, he saw 37 snaps and did not see a target.
He returns to a wide receivers room with Marvin Harrison Jr., Michael Wilson and newly signed Kendrick Bourne.
The Cowboys made him a fifth-round pick in 2021, and he played two seasons with the Cowboys and two with the Chargers before joining the Cardinals.
The Cardinals agreed to terms with defensive end Jonah Williams, the team announced Thursday.
Williams, 28, spent last season in New Orleans.
In 2025, he appeared in 15 games, with one start, seeing action on 319 defensive snaps and 193 on special teams. Williams totaled 18 tackles, three sacks and five quarterback hits.
Williams went undrafted in 2020, signing with the Rams, and he has also played with the Vikings and Lions.
He has 98 tackles and 5.5 sacks in his career.
Williams will join Josh Sweat, Baron Browning, Jordan Burch and Zaven Collins at the position in Arizona.
Kenneth Walker isn’t the only running back the Chiefs are signing.
They agreed to terms with running back Emari Demercado on a one-year deal on Thursday, Ian Rapoport of NFL Media reports.
The Chiefs needed help at the position with Isiah Pacheco leaving in free agency and Kareem Hunt still a free agent. Brashard Smith and ShunDerrick Powell are the other running backs on the roster.
Demercado, 27, totaled 176 touches for 1,143 yards and four touchdowns in his three seasons with the Cardinals.
In 13 games in 2025, Demercado rushed for 312 yards on 44 carries and caught 13 passes for 101 yards and a touchdown.
Sometimes, the thing that feels inevitable inevitably doesn’t happen. This time around, the clear outcome occurred.
Per multiple reports, the Vikings have agreed to terms with quarterback Kyler Murray. Murray’s agent, Erik Burkhardt, told NFL Network that it’s a one-year deal for the veteran minimum of $1.3 million. The Cardinals will owe Murray $35.5 million in 2026.
The deal includes a no-tag clause. That’s a key term, one that guarantees Murray will become a free agent in 2027, with neither the franchise tag nor the transition tag restricting him.
Murray, the first overall pick in the 2019 draft, was released by the Cardinals on Wednesday, after seven seasons. He was the offensive rookie of the year and a two-time Pro Bowler in his first three seasons.
He joins a depth chart headlined, for now, by J.J. McCarthy, the 10th overall pick in 2024. Whether and to what extent Murray and McCarthy have an open competition remains to be seen.
The Cardinals made a pair of moves involving offensive linemen on Thursday.
They announced the signing of veteran Elijah Wilkinson. They also released Evan Brown.
Wilkinson is a familiar face in Arizona. He played in 10 games and made nine starts for the team during the 2023 season. Wilkinson moved on to Atlanta and started all 17 games at right tackle last season.
Wilkinson also saw action at guard for the Falcons in 2022 and saw action at both positions during stints with the Bears and Broncos earlier in his career.
Brown started 28 games at guard in Arizona the last two seasons. He’s played 85 overall games for the Cardinals, Seahawks, Lions, Browns, Dolphins and Giants.
On multiple occasions in recent months, Aaron Rodgers pointed out that he will be a free agent in 2026. Four days into the process, he still is.
Near the end of the 2025 regular season, he expressed confidence that he’ll have options if he decides to play another year.
“Whenever the season ends, I’ll be a free agent,” Rodgers said at the time. “So that’ll give me a lot of options if I still want to play. [Not] a lot of options, but there’ll be options I would think, maybe one or two, if I decide I still want to play.”
It’s getting harder to identify those options, as quarterback-needy teams address their needs. The Dolphins signed Malik Willis. The Colts re-signed Daniel Jones. The Falcons reportedly will sign Tua Tagovailoa. The Vikings are focused on Kyler Murray. The Raiders, who weren’t interested in Rodgers last year, seem to be poised to make Fernando Mendoza the No. 1 overall pick.
The only obvious remaining option, other than Pittsburgh, is Arizona. Nathaniel Hackett, one of Rodgers’s trust-tree coaches, is the offensive coordinator. Mike LaFleur, the Rams’ offensive coordinator a year ago when Rodgers was Plan B if Matthew Stafford was traded, is the head coach. But the Cardinals are caught in the basement of one of the best divisions in football; it would be a steep uphill climb for Rodgers to cap his career with a playoff berth.
That leaves Pittsburgh as the only viable option. And Pittsburgh seems to be waiting for him, even if (as Rodgers said last week) there have been no “progressive conversations” about another run.
As Cam Heyward put it last year, you either want to be a Steeler or you don’t.
Meanwhile, the Steelers’ potential alternatives are landing elsewhere. Of the remaining possibilities, Kirk Cousins would make the most sense for Pittsburgh.
The lack of suitors for Rodgers makes Pittsburgh’s apparent willingness to wait even more confounding for Steelers fans who wonder whether their favorite team is content to watch potentially better options go elsewhere while showing patience for someone who has yet to decide that he’s willing to run it back without Mike Tomlin.
The situation seems to require more urgency from the Steelers. They surely need a veteran, if they decide to let Will Howard show what he can do. Maybe they’ll bring back Justin Fields if/when the Jets cut him. Maybe they’ll sign the best available option (like Joe Flacco) if/when Rodgers tells them he’s not coming back.
Regardless, Steelers fans who were dismayed by the team’s willingness to wait and wait and wait for Rodgers in 2025 are feeling that same angst all over again. This isn’t Rodgers in his prime. This is a 42-year-old veteran who seems to be trying to recapture a little of the glory of MVP seasons gone by.
Wherever it goes from here, it won’t be easy for the Steelers to end a drought of playoff wins that, as of this year, could hit double digits.
The Cardinals re-signed cornerback Starling Thomas V, the team announced Thursday.
Thomas, 26, missed all of last season when he tore his left ACL in a training camp practice. He posted on social media that he is sprinting over 20 mph.
Thomas tore his right ACL when he was in college.
He started 22 games in his first two seasons, the most of any undrafted player in the NFL in that time period, after the Cardinals claimed him off waivers in 2023 from Detroit. He played 75 percent of the defensive snaps.
Thomas has logged 85 tackles with 11 pass breakups.
Yes, quarterback Kyler Murray will visit the Vikings on Thursday — his agent, Erik Burkhardt, has confirmed that to NFL Media.
But here’s the interesting twist, via Tom Pelissero of NFL Media: Burkhardt told him that Murray plans to meet by Zoom on Wednesday night and Thursday with executives from three to five teams that potentially have a quarterback need in 2027.
Possibilities (as we see it) include the Jets, the Steelers, the Browns, the Falcons, and the Rams.
It gives Murray an opportunity to get a head start on free agency next year, which underscores the likelihood he’ll sign a one-year, $1.3 million deal for 2026.
That makes a no-tag clause critical. He needs to be able to hit the market next year, if for whatever reason he plays well and doesn’t get a solid offer to stick around with the Vikings, or whoever he signs with.
The Vikings continue to be the clear favorite. There’s really no one else. And, as of last season near the trade deadline, the Vikings were one of the teams in which Murray was interested.
