The Arizona Cardinals are staying the course, even with the losses piling up.
After Sunday’s ugly defeat to the Detroit Lions dropped Arizona to 1-4, head coach Mike LaFleur made it clear Monday that the Cardinals are not planning any sweeping changes to their playcalling setup. That applies on both sides of the ball, where the team’s problems have grown loud enough to draw plenty of public frustration.
The defense has been the biggest culprit. Defensive coordinator Nick Rallis has now gone four straight games allowing more than 30 points, a stretch that has followed the same frustrating pattern all season. Detroit hung 45 points on Arizona and piled up 412 yards of offense, with former Cardinals offensive coordinator Drew Petzing helping direct the Lions’ attack.
The numbers are rough across the board. Arizona’s defense ranks last in the NFL in points allowed with 162, and sits 28th in total yards allowed at 1,817.
The offense has not done enough to bail anyone out. LaFleur handles the playcalling there himself, but the unit has been too inconsistent and too easy to stall.
A drive can start with promise and length, then quickly unravel into a string of three-and-outs. The Cardinals are 30th in the league in yards per play at 4.5, 23rd in total yards with 1,506 and 22nd in total points at 108.
When asked directly whether Arizona might shift playcalling duties or adjust roles on either side of the ball, LaFleur gave a blunt answer: “No.”
He expanded on that later, saying: “My job is to see the issues and handle the issues and have the tough conversations. So if I felt like changes were needed for us to help us win this week, then I’m gonna do that, it’s my responsibility. But I don’t think that gives us the best chance to win this week.
“I think the best thing to do right now is re-evaluate what we’ve done, what we’ve done well, because there are some bright spots. But there’s also a lot of spots that we got to improve on.
And I told the defense, when I talked to the defense today, where our changes are gonna be made. … I’ll keep that in-house.”
That response strongly suggests Rallis is not being demoted, fired or stripped of his playcalling job. Veteran assistant Teryl Austin, who has previous success as a defensive coordinator, is not expected to take over this week unless something changes late.
“He’s kind of right there with Nick. And obviously, taking a deep dive into these first five games, particularly what happened yesterday, to get some things fixed,” LaFleur said.
He added: “There’s gonna be no changes with playcallers, but we’re looking at how to improve this defense and make sure that we are better than what we’re putting out there. … I do believe we have the right guys on defense to play better.”
On the quarterback side, the calls for change have only gotten louder. Jacoby Brissett has been Arizona’s starter for five weeks now, and the results have been uneven at best. He has one strong outing and several games that never really got going.
Brissett is 2-15 dating back to 2025 as the Cardinals’ quarterback. He has completed a little more than 66% of his passes and ranks 14th in passing yards with 1,110, but his 21st-ranked QB rating of 85.2 tells a less flattering story. Much of that production has come late, when the game was already tilting out of reach.
That has already pushed some fans toward third-round rookie Carson Beck. Beck has remained a healthy inactive so far, serving as the emergency third quarterback while Gardner Minshew has backed up Brissett.
LaFleur did not promise any quarterback switch for this week, but he did leave the door open to a change in Beck’s status.
“If we think that’s what’s best,” he said when asked about possibly making Beck active. “Haven’t had those discussions; we’ll end up having that discussion tomorrow at about noon.”
For now, though, Arizona appears headed into another week of patience, uncertainty and the same personnel in place.
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