Cardinals safety Tyrann Mathieu said after Sunday’s loss to the Falcons that the Cardinals are too talented to be under .500, but talented players that don’t play as a team don’t usually wind up with winning records.
On Monday, Cardinals coach Bruce Arians suggested that a failure to focus on team goals is part of the reason for their 4-6-1 record on the season. Arians said that he felt that some defensive players got out of their lane and tried to do too much against Atlanta “to get on the stat sheet instead of just doing their job.”
Arians went on to criticize the “selfishness” of some players “that has crept in” over the course of the season and said that it might be time to look to different players in order to get the desired results.
“I’m very surprised,” Arians said, via ArizonaSports.com. “We’ve been talking about it for four weeks and the veterans obviously haven’t done anything about it, so maybe young guys will step up and make the opportunity they need.”
Arians also said that the team isn’t as physically tough as they need to be, another complaint that puts the onus for the team’s struggles this season squarely on the team’s players. Assuming that opinion is shared by General Manager Steve Keim and others in the upper reaches of the team’s hierarchy, that should mean some big roster changes should the Cardinals remain on the same trajectory for the final five weeks of the season.
