The Arizona Cardinals’ 2026 season has already taken on the shape of a classic whiplash ride: one stunning road win to open the year, then a steady slide back into the same old problems.
They began with a 26-14 upset of the Los Angeles Chargers in Week One, a game that looked like a real step forward. Jacoby Brissett played well, the offense looked sharp, and a defense full of question marks held up. Since then, though, the Cardinals have been dragged into the mud more often than not.
Week Two brought the first hard reality check. Arizona stayed level with the defending champion Seattle Seahawks for a half, going to the break tied 7-7, but the second half belonged entirely to Seattle in a 31-7 loss.
The next week didn’t get any kinder. On the road against the San Francisco 49ers, the Cardinals were still alive late in the fourth quarter, trailing by only two points. But they couldn’t get the stop they needed, George Kittle found the end zone with under two minutes left, and a failed onside kick sealed a 36-30 defeat.
The bad stretch kept rolling in Week Four against the New York Giants. Arizona opened fast, scoring on its first two offensive drives, but the offense stalled after that and the defense couldn’t get off the field. The Giants answered with 17 straight points to grab control, and Brissett’s night ended in brutal fashion with a 98-yard pick-six.
Then came Week Five, and the Detroit Lions made the Cardinals pay even harder. Facing former offensive coordinator Drew Petzing, Arizona scored on its opening drive again, only to lose the game almost immediately after. Jahmyr Gibbs piled up more than 200 yards from scrimmage, and the Cardinals surrendered a season-high 45 points, matching their worst defensive beating since the Week 14 loss to the Los Angeles Rams in 2025.
The roster issues have not helped any of this. After five weeks, Arizona is tied for the 10th most injured team in the league. Five players are listed with injury designations and could return at some point this season, but ten players are already on Injured Reserve and out for the year.
That IR group includes several major losses. Starting left tackle Paris Johnson, Jr. and CB1 Will Johnson are gone for the season, and starting right guard Isaiah Adams has recently joined them. Two important pieces of the 2026 draft class were also lost before the season even began: second-round guard Chase Bisontis and fourth-round defensive lineman Kaleb Proctor.
The offensive line has been hit especially hard. With Johnson and Adams out, Arizona is down to three of its original five starters up front.
The secondary has also been stripped down, with Will Johnson the biggest blow. Of the 15 players currently carrying injury designations, four are safeties, leaving the Cardinals without a settled pairing next to Budda Baker after Jalen Thompson left in free agency this offseason.
Then there’s the Marvin Harrison, Jr. situation, which has hovered over the whole season from the start. The No. 4 pick in the 2024 draft arrived with enormous expectations because of his Ohio State career and Hall of Fame bloodlines, and the buzz around him was immense. His rookie year was solid but not explosive, and his second season began with concerns about his hands and his effort before an injury cut it short.
His 2026 start never really solved the questions. He had a few highlight catches, but he still wasn’t a central piece of the offense, and the noise around his role only grew louder in recent weeks.
That culminated in last Friday’s trade report, which was later finalized on Sunday. The Cardinals sent Harrison and a seventh-round pick to the Houston Texans in exchange for a 2027 second-round pick and sixth-round pick.
That deal makes Harrison the first former Top 5 wide receiver selection since Ahmad Rashad to be traded within his first three seasons. It also carries a strange bit of Cardinals history, since Arizona was the team that traded Rashad in 1974 to the Buffalo Bills for quarterback Dennis Shaw.
With Harrison gone, the WR1 job now belongs to Michael Wilson without any debate. The Cardinals will have to mine the rest of their receiver room for more production alongside Wilson and Kendrick Bourne, who has been a decent addition so far.
Part Two will dig into what has gone wrong for Arizona and where the team might go from here.
In Other News...
Marvin Harrison Trade Timing Leaves Cardinals Fans With One Big Question
The Marvin Harrison move has already become one of those deals Cardinals fans are left to sort through after the fact. Reportedly sent from Arizona to the Houston Texans, the trade was believed to have been finalized before Sundays games, even though it did not become public until afterward, and Texans coach DeMeco Ryans ended up confirming it in a postgame press conference.
For Cardinals observers, the timing is what stands out almost as much as the transaction itself. Harrison still has to pass a physical before anything is official, which leaves one lingering piece of uncertainty in a situation that already felt unusual from the start. [Read more 🡒]
Cardinals Had A Few Bright Spots In A Loss That Exposed Too Much
The opening series offered Arizona a quick jolt and a reminder of what the offense can look like when it gets out ahead of the chains, but the good feelings faded fast from there. Even in a lopsided loss to Detroit, there were a few individual bright spots for the Cardinals, with Kendrick Bourne, Trey McBride and Budda Baker standing out on a day when the team needed steady playmakers wherever it could find them.
What made the defeat sting beyond the final margin was how many problems it exposed on the other side of the ball. Arizona had real trouble matching up in the middle of the field and finished with tackling issues that kept drives alive, a costly combination against an opponent built to punish mistakes. For a defense already searching for answers, the film will not be easy to sit through, especially with so much of the damage coming in ways the Cardinals could not seem to fix in real time. [Read more 🡒]
Cardinals Suddenly Face A Trade Deadline Path Fans Wont Like
The early-season slide has already pushed Arizona into an uncomfortable conversation as the NFL trade deadline nears, and Adam Schefters latest read only sharpens it. In his view, the Cardinals belong in the same bucket as the Dolphins, Chargers and Titans as teams that could end up moving players rather than chasing help, a sign of how quickly a rough start can alter a franchises direction.
Arizona has already shown a willingness to reshape the roster, too, after dealing Marvin Harrison Jr. to Houston. With the Nov. 10 deadline approaching, the question around the Cardinals is no longer whether they need to be aggressive, but whether that aggression turns into selling off more than fans would want to see. [Read more 🡒]