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The Rise Up, See Red podcast

Cardinals preseason Game 1 takeaways: QB battle, standout rookies, studs and duds

Jess and Seth look back at the Cardinals' preseason opener and give their thoughts on the following things:


  1. The battle between quarterbacks Desmond Ridder and Clayton Tune
  2. How the rookies did in the game
  3. Other studs and duds in the game
  4. What we want to see this week in Indy

Duration:
1h 4m
Broadcast on:
14 Aug 2024
Audio Format:
mp3
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Forward, we're prohibited by law. 18-plus terms and conditions apply. 4-0! 3-0! 3-0! 3-0! This is the Rise Up C-Red podcast. All about the Arizona Cardinals and the NFL. Featuring insider and outsider perspectives. Enjoy the best hour of Cardinals Talk on the web. Now, here are your hosts, Jess Root and Seth Cox. Hello, Arizona Cardinals fans and welcome to the latest edition of the Rise Up C-Red podcast, the best star of Cardinals Talk on the web. I'm your host, Jess Root from CardsWire.com, the USA Today NFL Wire Side of the Covers. You are Arizona Cardinals and we're in episode 577. This is one of the regular shows on the podcast, as you've known, we have added kind of a second feature to the podcast, still all the same podcast, but Howard Ballz are doing his audio updates from Cards Camp. And that's something I anticipate he will be doing over the course of the regular season practice notes and commentary like that. But this is the OG Group, Seth Cox from RevengeOfTheBirds.com. Espinations, Arizona Cardinals site with me in Show 577 as the Cardinals had their first preseason game of the season. It wasn't a David Blau comeback, but it was almost a Clayton Toon comeback. They take a 14-13 lead with under two minutes left in the game thanks to a touchdown pass from Clayton Toon to Tony Jones. Only to have, what did it feel like kind of this last year, like anytime I was going to say it was just a low scoring version of last year with Kevin Murray. Yeah, and then the defense would just give up the final score, and that's exactly what happened. Spencer Rattler, a pinnacle high school kid from here who went on to play at Oklahoma and then South Carolina. Highly touted for a little bit, was a Heisman favorite, and at some point, people thought he would be the favorite to be like the number one pick. And then he was bent for Caleb Williams, he transferred, he was fine in South Carolina to being the fifth round pick of the New Orleans Saints. Interestingly enough, he was the seventh quarterback taken in the 2024 draft, but the first taken after the first round. The first taken after the first 12 picks is there were six quarterbacks, gone in the first 12 picks of the draft, which is something ridiculous. And then none other till Rattler in the fifth round, which is wild, but we're not going to talk about Rattler. Are we set? That's not why we're here. We're here to talk about the Cardinals and their preseason contest, but honestly, who cares about the who cares about the final score in the preseason? We don't care about the final score in the preseason. It matters in terms of competitive play by the backups at the end, but, I mean, Seth, how many times have we seen a 3-in-1, a 4-0 Cardinals preseason team to go on and win 4-in-5 games in the season? Yeah, exactly. And, you know, people are getting overly worried about certain things and/or the lack of certain things, and it's like, you know, everybody has to do their own thing and find it. And with this group, you're seeing that they really are comfortable with their starters, but they have a lot of questions about their backups. And you and I have talked about this quite a bit. This group is talented, but it seems to be -- it seems to be top-heavy right now, still, right? I mean, honestly, yes. At some positions, you feel better than others. Like, running back, you feel pretty all right. The offensive line is okay. The defensive line is much better, but, yeah, in fairness, I think a lot of teams are that way, but especially the Cardinals, they're still at the core, not a good team yet. And until they -- Well, until they prove it, right? Right. Until they prove it, until then, there's that roster is suspect, absolutely. Yeah, and that's just the way you kind of have to look at it. And so this group is just interesting in general, and I think we're going to see how this compares over the next several ways. Several weeks as they kind of get down, because, I mean, even today, we're recording on Tuesday night, they added a wide receiver and a running back, which makes you assume that, like, we're not going to see Marvin Harrison, Jr., the rest of the preseason. And you wonder if Amari DiMecato is going to even get me run at this point, right? Like, they'll probably end up kind of just holding them out the whole preseason. So, so they're adding, you know, what we unfortunately have to refer to as camp bodies, right? For the last, what, three weeks of camp in two preseason games? So, you know, we'll see how that all works out, but it's an interesting dilemma, and we've seen different things pop up over the last several -- over the last several weeks and questions that we'll have. And questions that we hope to get answered, but quite frankly, I don't think we're going to get the answers for probably the -- I mean, the better part of the rest of the preseason, because just not seeing the starters, right? Right. The fact that they're really difficult. Right. They didn't play the starters at all. And then we talked about this last week. None of the players, I thought, would play, ended up playing. In fact, even Mac Wilson sat out. And can we really even say Marvin Harrison, Jr., played? I mean, no, like, he was out there for three total snaps. He wanted to -- now, they wanted to get him the ball. But unfortunately, Desmond Ritter getting sacked on second and nine, kind of ruined that. And then they go in with the draw, play to Michael Carter, three and out, and they're like, "Okay." But it was more about getting him game reps than it was more than just getting him game reps. They wanted to get him the ball just, you know, to get the feel for it. But it was about making sure that he was in the mindset that he knew about game preparation in the NFL. It's like he knew he had a routine about getting ready for an NFL game, that sort of process. And it's kind of interesting, something that the Cardinals have done under Jonathan Ganon that they did not do before. And I don't watch enough other preseason games to see this, but it pretty much standard operating procedure has been -- there would be a whole bunch of players, like the starters or the veterans, if they weren't playing, they wouldn't even dress. That's not the case for the Cardinals. They have, unless they are medically out, everyone dresses, everyone warms up, everyone goes through the walk room, some store, everyone stretches on the field, they're all in pads. And honestly, it makes my job more difficult because, you know, when we would scour the sidelines to see who's on the sideline not dressed, we could put -- we could tweet and write, "These guys are not dressed." And now we're like, "These guys are all on the field." And then we have to scramble and, you know, publish. These were the starting lineups, these players aren't playing. But yeah, and so it ended up being that the outcome and unfairness, as we're looking at things, we couldn't really compare apples to apples because of the fact that the Cardinals had no starters minus Marvin Harrison Jr. And then maybe if you want to nitpick a little bit, maybe star Thomas on defense might be a starter. And so as a bunch of second stringers against all of the Saints' starters were basically the first quarter. And so Arizona's offense looked pathetic. But we're going to reason, right? When we talk about the preseason a lot, their better players should look good against lesser players. Like, when we seem Blaine Gabbard -- Blaine Gabbard looked right. He should have been the best player on the field. He was a former first-round pick when he was the backup last year and carved up the Cardinals defense when he came in and their preseason went over the Cardinals. Of course he looked good because he's a capable NFL quarterback going against practice squatters. So he should look good. And so that was really hard to judge for the fans. And that leads us to our first topic. And that is the quarterback battle for the backup spot between Desmond Ritter and Clayton Toon. And from the general, if you're a basic fan, just a casual fan, or even if you're a hardcore fan, it was hard not to come away from that game and think, "Ooh, Ritter's not that guy. He's not that guy." And then to see Clayton Toon in the second half because, you know, putting aside the Ritter performance, if we remember Clayton Toon a year ago as a rookie, there wasn't a single thing he did in the preseason in his preseason action that led you to believe that, "Oh, he's got it." This preseason game, his throws were on target. They were anticipatory. They were, he looked like an actual quarterback. I was really impressed with Toon's play. Again, it's important to note that he was also, he played the second half going against second and third stringers and guys who won't be playing football in the NFL this September. So, but that said, he was pulling against those same guys last year and looking not good. Yeah, and that's, that's growth. And that's kind of what we talk about all the time, right? Like, let's see some growth from this guy. Let's see something, some improvement from this guy. And, you know, we've seen that at least this year, this portion of the year. And that's good to see, man. I mean, that's all you can ask for it. And when you get a fifth round pick or six round pick, whatever he was last year, you look at it. You look at it as a, can you develop this guy into a backup? You know, everybody wants Dak Prescott. Everybody wants Brock Purdy. But that's just not a realistic, you know, scenario, most of the time. So, you, you, that's how you look at it. That's how you go about it. And you hope that you hope that this guy turns into something as a serviceable backup in the vein of like a Colt McCoy, right? That's been a lot of time in the NFL. And then if he is anything more, it's just a bonus, but that's, that's how you have to look at rookie quarterbacks outside of the top, probably the top two rounds, but definitely the top 100, right? Yeah. Yeah. What do you think about Ritter's play? Now, in fact, like we do have to add this, Ritter has not looked good. No, no, neither Ritter nor tune in camp looked good. And while Kyler has been dropping dimes and throwing dots everywhere, that has not been the case for Ritter and tuned. They have struggled in their throws. They've been the one turning the balls over. But what would you say about Ritter's play in the first half? You know, it's just one of those situations where you watch him play and you see why he's available. I mean, unfortunately, he's just, you know, he's a guy that has struggled with consistency, especially as a thrower of the football. And, you know, he's got some Josh Dobbs like a game to him where he ends up running better than you expect, right? That is exactly the comment. I think that's the thought that came to mind is what I think I mentioned that we all mentioned in the group chat in our group text during the game and like watching Ritter play. The best thing about his play, the best thing about his game is his playmaking with his legs in that sense. He looks very Josh Dobbs. Now, he's a more accomplished quarterback than Josh Dobbs was, but at least within the context of what we saw from him. In this game action is that there was accurate accuracy problems. Like he had that fourth down throw to Andre Bachella. That was, that was a, that's a first down. Heck, that's a touchdown. If he doesn't throw it stupidly to Bachella on that fourth down when they passed on the field goal. He was a little bit skittish that granted he was pressured early. So he, he didn't, wasn't able to give me on a spot, but he wasn't sure with where he was going. It didn't, he didn't look confident in the past game. But the one thing that you do get from him is that he can, he's very athletic. He can make plays with his legs. And part of that, I'm sure is a new system playing behind backups. I still believe, I honestly, and while I did, I, I'll admit it. This was, this was a, you know, prisoner of the moment. I think when I made my 53 man roster projection post that preseason game that I put out earlier this week. He put Clayton tune in over Desmond Ritter, but that's not a, that's not a belief. I believe, I truly believe that it's going to take an extraordinary effort from Clayton to, to, to outdo Desmond Ritter. Because the coaches and the organization have two years of pro film that they can look at Ritter and see that when you look across the board while he's not a good starter, he is a mediocre average NFL quarterback, which is probably the best case scenario you can have in a backup. You know, we went over this when they, when they traded form, started 17 games, they're eight and nine and the Falcons were eight and nine in those 17 games, 14 touchdown passes 12 interceptions, incredibly good. If we're going to talk like the kids. Ritter is incredibly mid as a quarterback, but offers a playmaking ability with his legs that allows him to do that to do more. And he had like, if you add that in, he's got five career rushing touchdowns. He's got 19 touchdowns combined to 12 interceptions, which is, it's pretty okay. And they're going to go with that experience. I think they'd rather you. I think the coaches trust that more, even more than tuna and everything Jonathan Gannon has said, dating back to last season. He is a big fan of Clayton tune. Is he so much of a fan that they were going to ride with him as their backup? No, clearly not as they traded for Desmond Ritter. I don't know that, but that's not, I mean, they also didn't give up anything right and no offense are on no more. And so we know Rondelle Moore was was on the chopping block anyway. Right. And so it was just more of a situation where you look at it and you go. Oh, this is, you know, let's take another stab at a backup quarterback and kind of let the best man win, but we'll see how it turns out to, right? Yeah. Yeah. And I anticipate we'll kind of see more of the same. I wonder if we'll see. Here's the thing. We'll know how much of a competition it is. Obviously, of course, they're competing for the backup spot, but we'll see how much of a competition it is or how close the competition is. If Ganon decides to swap Ritter and tune for their roles this weekend, right? Because if it's truly like, even, they're going to give them the same type of reps so that it's a, you know, sort of comparing, comparing apples to apples, right? And they would put tune in the same situation that they put Ritter in last week. If it is again, Ritter and then tune. They have already made the decision. It's more or less made the decision. And my guess is, unless Ritter is just so bad again. Right. Now it comes to conversation. Yes. And my guess is going into preseason finale against against the Broncos. The plan will be tuned. We'll play that entire game and Ritter would only go in an emergency. Correct. Correct. And yeah, which is fine. Although I will say this. I was like, while I'm mildly concerned about the play of Desmond Ritter. It was really good to see the progress of Clayton tune because a number of late round quarterbacks that we've seen come through Arizona over the years, whether it's Ryan Lindley or John Skeleton or. Or goodness, Logan Thomas, who then became a tight end later on. I'm sorry, a great tight end, right? Yeah. Yeah. But not so great that he didn't, like, remember we're talking about Logan Thomas and what a great addition he was the 49ers. Right. They cut him. I know. I'm like, what? Oh, well, so much for that. So much for that. But if we've ever seen that is that those young quarterbacks rarely show progress, Ryan Lindley, as bad as he was at a rookie. Guess what? I remember when we were on the show. I remember when I was recording podcast in my closet back in 2014 when we were recording. And we were trying to hype up everyone for this is, this is not rookie, Ryan. This is not the same, right? It was. It was completely the same Ryan Lindley Logan Thomas didn't look better. In fact, between Logan Thomas and and and Ryan Lindley in the preseason. They keep neither of them and went inside and when traded for Matt Barkley that year. Remember, John Skeleton had the had the nice rookie season. Well, actually, he had the nice, you know, come in for Kevin Cobb 2011. But then that next year looked. Trousious and after Cobb got hurt in 2012 and he got that he looked bad and was got benched for Ryan Lindley. And so for the first time in a long, long time. We've seen a project quarterback make improvement where you're like, oh, this is nice. Right. And now you just kind of want to see that growth continue and hope that the growth can continue in Arizona. Coming up next to the Rise Up's Year podcast, the best of our Cardinals talk on the web. Let's talk about the rookies. We've got a couple other things to talk about. Let's specifically talk about their draft picks and how they look. Let's come up next to Rise Up's Year Ed. 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Granger offers over a million industrial grade products for all your operations, including warehouse HVAC maintenance. And even better, they offer access to experts and fast delivery, so you and your warehouse can both keep your cool. Call 1-800-GRANGER. Clickgranger.com or just stop by. Granger for the ones who get it done. We're back on the rises here at Podcasts. We've got to start Cardinal's talk on the web, and let's talk about the play of the rookies. There were a handful of guys that really stood out. If we kind of want to go down the list, let's start with Marvin Haverson. Harrison can't really see much. Can't really get him a grade. He played three snaps and ran one route, and that one route and resulted in a sack. So not much there going on. Excuse me. Darius Robinson, though. He looked good and limited playing time. Yeah, ten snaps looked good in those ten snaps. I mean, that's all you can ask for from the, you know, small amount of reps that he got in that situation. You know how to tackle, how to pressure. Just kind of what you wanted to see from him overall that you feel like this is a guy heading in the right direction. It was a good starter. It was a good starter. It was against the starting Saints offense. So you're like, oh, he's a guy who could have a nice, tough role. Trevor Penning and Talisi Fuaga. So, yeah, he did a nice job. It's just one of those things. I mean, ten snaps. You can only glean so much, but you can tell that he's still more comfortable and effective right now as a run stopper, like an athletic run. Stopper with pass rushing upside, which I think everybody's kind of expecting an okay with, right? Yeah. And honestly, especially since it, I think they view him primarily as an interior guy, that's kind of what you want to see. And the pass rush juice is kind of a bonus and you can throw him out on the edge in certain packages. It's fun to see. Now, this is kind of tangentially related. It's a G, it's, you know, game adjacent. Jonathan Gannon, when he was asked about Robinson on Monday, Darren Urban asked him that there's a chance that he could compete for a starting job. And Gannon said 1000% yes. Although when we look at the, like, if we look at the personnel on the defensive line, Justin Jones, Belal Nichols, Roy Lopez, he's not starting. Like, Roy Lopez, you know what? No, side note, Roy Lopez, is this year's Lucky Foto, like quietly has found himself a nice role that the trust, the coaches trust him in that role. Lucky Foto kind of flipped and flopped for a while. And last year, you know, nose tackle. They put him in nose tackle and he did a pretty good job. And that's kind of what Roy Lopez is here. Like, how, how seriously do you think that Gannon said that 1000% yeah, was that lip service was that just, hey, every job's up for grabs, or, or does, does he have a chance at being a starter quote unquote starter this year. Yeah, I think it's, I think every job in this, in this situation's up for grabs. I think also that you have to realize that this, this team, you know, is like we said, top heavy in their talent. Round, so they're going to have work to do in order to continue to, to get better and grow as a team and. And so, you know, from that perspective, you're going to have to look at it and see what he can do and I think right now you're seeing that he is a little bit of ability to do a bunch of different things along the line. And hopefully he'll continue to grow into that. And now, you know, you and I know this, but it's important to note that when it comes to a starting role, starting doesn't necessarily mean anything because let's go back to 2020. Isaiah Simmons, number eight overall pick. You know what he did. He was a starter the first four games of his NFL career. And you know how many snaps he played those first four games. 44 total. He was, it was, and we saw this also kind of in a couple other season, I think in 2021 as well. And he ended up with a larger role, but I think for, I think it was to appease Mr Steve kind who insisted that he be a starter. It was putting him in the starting lineup and then taking him out. I could see, I can see for show sake. For a couple of reasons. One, Darius Robinson, you know, they may be like he's going to be impactful. And two, with the sort of uncertainty about the outside linebacker position. I could totally see him in week one, technically lined up in the starting lineup and outside linebacker on that first down play, opposite saving call. And so you've got Justin Jones, you got the long nickels, you've got Roy Lopez, and then you've got, instead of Victor Dimecage, he had a few starts last year, or even Dennis Gardek, you've got big old Darius Robinson playing the edge as in their run package, which I could see. I don't think that would mean he'd play more than a handful of synapse on the edge because I think he will have a role that way in there, and a couple in their in their speed package. I'm certain that he will get to stand up and do that but I could see that happening just for in just for appearances sake, you know. Yeah, and, and, you know, I don't think this group is as worried about that as the last guy was at the end where he, and I'm not talking about Cliff Kingsbury obviously but like where he felt like he needed. Yeah, wins here and there because of how bad things are going. I mean, that's, that's kind of the always the last ditch thing that we hear about so. Max Milton did not play. He was, whether he was healthy enough to play is one thing. He didn't get the practice reps during the week. And perhaps that is already like, whether it was health related. And I'm sure they wanted to play but also protecting him because they anticipate him being a starter, though. I'm not 100 convinced 100% convinced that he will be the starter. I think the way start Thomas has been playing. I think Max Milton might be relegated to Buddha Baker rookie your delegation relegated special teams because of the guys in front of them, you know, Buddha Baker, second round pick played special teams his rookie season was a provost special teams player. But the reason why I played special teams is because they had Taiwan branch in the lineup, a guy who played, who was arguably a pro level player the previous year in 2016, and it was Taiwan's injury that put Buddha in the lineup and then that's kind of all she wrote. Max might be in that same role, but we'll see this week, hopefully plays against Indy. The third round picks Isaiah Adams. What did you think of Isaiah Adams in his in his the time that he played because there were a couple of notable bad plays. Yeah, not good. Not not good. You know, did we skip Trey Benson. Oh, yeah, let's go with Trey Benson and play, you know, a few plays and look. Yeah, he looked like a running back that was running. Now, he looked like a running back going behind a second team offensive line going against starters. Right. And you know, I've seen some people out there saying he was hesitant this that and the other. I'm like, it's an interesting take. There's one thing about that. And he said it after the game is like, this was the first game he'd been against pro competition other than other than his teammates. He noticed in a sense going against starter because he really, like in camp, he hasn't been going against first teamers. He's been going against backups. He said that. They're faster. And like, things happen faster in the NFL. And Darius, Darius credit, Darius said, like, these guys are bigger and faster, but he's like, I played in the SEC. So he didn't, he didn't feel like the size and speed was significantly bit better than what he was already useful. But, but Benson noticed it because things that you have to, you have to make your decisions more quickly. Right. Exactly. And so it's, it's a work in progress. And, you know, again, there's a reason he was a third round pick and they're not expecting him to be an impact starter day one. Right. And we talked about Isaiah Adams. I mean, I don't think it was as bad as everybody said, but I definitely think it shows that one, he was out of position for a full year and he's trying to get back into working. But two, he's a really good run blocking. I think we need to acknowledge that. Like he's very, very good run blocking. Tip Reiman was fine. There was nothing that stood up out of his play. Again, another, another great run blocker. Yes. Just another great blocker. I guess we should say Elijah Jones did get beat notably. Not not good, man. And we could just lump in Jaden Davis. And I know he's the seventh and final pick. Yeah, he's not making the team alive. Elijah Jones and Jaden Davis were overwhelmed. I think that's the best way to say how they looked like they just looked. They looked like guys that were overwhelmed. We go now. I will say this. Holy cow. Did did rabbit, Daedrian Taylor Demerson. Did he not look like Buddha out there the way he played. Yeah, but he's also just slightly more athletic than Buddha the way and he just, you know, it's really interesting because he's a guy that he still needs some work and coverage, especially just recognizing things he's relied on. He's just insane athleticism for a little too long. But for a guy that's, you know, sub 200 pounds that's sub six feet tall, everything this guy does is like he shot out of a rocket. Right. That's like, that's the one thing if we notice if we watch an NFL guy say it. The thing that's most notable about Buddha Baker is his play speed, his closing speed, the angles that he takes. And there were a couple of plays from from rabbit where it looked like food out there like there was so much space like it was the play I think it was to a tight end out on an out route that it was near the sticks. And there was there was all sorts now was a slow developing play. But once rabbit recognized it, the closing speed, and it would end up being like a one yard game like what that that's exactly how Buddha plays. And, you know, he did a lot of things. Well, he said good things after the game coaches like what they saw from him. But, you know, as one of the guys that that's not likely going to play this year. But to see him to see him do the things you're like, Oh, oh, like, this is why they got him because he's built like Buddha Baker and like if we're going to be honest, like, there's a higher end ceiling in some ways. Buddha was a more more polished for certain because Daedrian was an incredible playmaker defensively ball hawk at Texas Tech incredible on ball production. Yeah, and that's the thing is like, you know, we're never going to say or assume that a guy that's close to 25 already in rabbit. Is going to be at the level that Buddha Baker has reached. However, it's unequivocal that he was better. On ball production in college than good. Oh, absolutely. That was that in fact was the biggest knock about Buddha coming out of college is his inability to pick up passes. But it'll be a thing to watch because at the end of the day. The NFL is completely, you know, a different game it is and and rabbit. Again, that was, I think the biggest thing we saw I saw in this one is that he just, he just, his eyes aren't as disciplined as they need to be yet. It's not surprising. I mean, we're talking about safety, but he's Texas Tech, right, who's gotten away with it because he's so athletic. And he may use in I and T's are now going to be completions until his eyes get better and that could be the difference between a guy that's a good safety in the NFL and a guy that could potentially, you know, be the heir apparent to Buddha Baker. Christian Jones, I didn't see anything notably good or bad about Jones. Oh, you skipped a good one. You skipped a good one. Exave your Thomas. That's correct. Oh, okay. I knew that was the one in the fifth round. I just could remember which one they were. Yeah, Xavier Thomas. Oh, he looks good. Yeah. And it's something that you and I joke about all the time, like all the time. But, and I think we've mentioned it on here and passing, but never really kind of broken it down. It's definitely something for another day, but like. The amount of ways that that kind and Monteasanthor differ are, you know, massive, but the biggest one seems to be that you see them drafting. Either very intentionally. On day three or athletic freaks, who they're like, let's just see if there's something there. I mean, we go back to last year, a guy in on papo right that. Starting to look like he's starting to get it a little bit. And that dude was a complete freak of nature. Xavier Thomas, you know, Taiwan Palmer, you know, those guys, we talked about rabbit, obviously, those guys all just freaky, freaky athletes. You know, and, and our guy Steve preferred. Either small school guys or hard workers that were like athletically, maybe just not as gifted and, and you know that, and it was just always interesting because it was all over the place, honestly. But I mean, you look at it, the guys like, you know, you had guys like, you had guys like Keshan Johnson, right, who just was a, was a JAG, right? And you're like, all right. And then Lamont Guyard, who was an undersized kind of. No, the undersized unders, they always drafted every single year, Mason Cole, the monkey. Right, it was like Michael Menette, man, Michael. Oh my gosh. And it's just, it's funny to go back and look, because I feel like that's where Monty would really swing things in his favor in terms of, like, we've talked about this before, but if you end up getting a guy who makes. Who makes an impact that's a fifth or six round pick, not, not a, you know, not a guy like Clayton tune who we would love to see be a long for backup, but like a guy that is heavy rotational or starter at a, at a key spot like an edge. Holy cow, you're talking about like, you're talking about like shifting the entire balance of your, your draft class because, oh, absolutely. And I'm not saying this is Xavier Thomas, but if Xavier Thomas becomes a guy like who was the guy that that Seattle just signed that was in, I want to, is it Nawazu that had the Uchana, that had like the one really good season, you know, like if he becomes a guy like that or, you know, a guy that, that is a, you know, six to eight sack a year guy, or even a four to five sacks in a rotation or like, man, like, that's just such a massive, massive win for a, for a GM. So like, that'll be interesting to watch because this guy. He's undersized, man. I mean, that's just the reality. I mean, he's the thickness, the load of the ground that athleticism all play out, but, you know, he's still going to get pushed around a little bit and run, run defense, but he looks like a guy that can help off the edge and they just so desperately need that, right? Yeah. Christian Jones, I was talking to, and this is a guy that we both had a very interesting athletic profile because you look at his overall numbers, you know, like athletic. But then he has that, that athletic red flag with his three cone. And, you know, we're watching him to see, okay, is he Dorian Johnson? And Jones has been, there was nothing for me. There was nothing notable about his play good or bad, which, honestly, for a fifth round tackle, who's probably practice squad this year. Yeah. Fine. Can we be honest? He was better than the third round guard. That's true. Because, because like you said, there was no discernible things where you're like, oh, this was bad. Whereas like, whereas like Adam's had, well, one, he had the, like he just completely got ran by on one of the sacks. He got flagged for that, a holding call down the field on DJ Dallas is 25 yard run. A draft pick who did not do well. And we already mentioned Jay Davis, Taejeon Palmer had a terrible game. Yeah, and that's just, I mean, again, that's just one of those things where you look at it and you go. The moment's just way too big for this guy right now. And that's not a shot at Taejeon Palmer, but like coming from Alabama, Birmingham, where you, you know, didn't do a whole lot didn't play a whole lot of great. Talent around you. And now, you know, I mean, think about that ball tune through in that, that instance in that situation. That was a dime, man. That was, that was a beautiful throw. And Palmer just jumps it. And, and he looked, if you go back and watch the play was not the one that he obviously pushed off on to. Yeah. And you go back, and you go back and you watch it, though, and you watch, you watch the excitement. Tyler was running down the sideline. And then he sees the ball squared out. And, and, you know, it's just like, Oh, no. And, but yeah, I mean, it's just, it's one of the situations that, you know, Jayden Davis, Taejeon Palmer, Elijah Jones just overwhelmed by the moment. And, and, you know, I will say this, Jayden Davis, like on the very first play you got in the game, he, he tipped pass. I mean, he did not. Right. And, and that's what I will say. The rookie would not have drafted. See if you're weaver. Guess what? Looks pretty decent. Yeah. And pretty decent. And it's going to be that guy we talked about, right? He's going to be the guy that pushes that. For that position or the return position guy that, you know, he's one of those funky guys that just doesn't like he's not overly athletic. Like he's not, you know, a burner or have any outstanding testing numbers. But he just, he just seems to like make guys miss and his hard to bring down. And that's, you know, just quite frankly, not a coachable thing. No. And he, he can play in the slot. He can come across the mill. They used him on one of those jets. So you've got that. If you're looking for a, you know, if you need a guy who can fill the Greg Dorch role, like Dorch is out, you've got that guy. He may play in the return game. And if they're going to keep six receivers and I had the weaver making the roster based on what we saw this. This week if they keep six receivers. And then, you know, Joe Shimco. I don't know. They had Brewer snapping for, what was it, Brewer snapping on kicks and. Shimco snapping on punts will be interesting to see how they do that. That's one of those comes like, so what. Who's ahead? Like, what, how do they view that competition? It's kind of the thing with the quarterbacks. Like, are we going to see their roles switched next week in that? I don't know. Yeah, and that'll be interesting to kind of wash them forward because. How do these, you know, how do these battles kind of end and where do they go from here and, you know, we'll see. Where everything ends up at, because right now it's, it seems like the top of what, like 30 or pretty 35 probably or pretty calls, but, but it's like, I don't know what to do with the rest of these. Coming to next on the rise of secret podcast, Mr. Carvel's talk. Let's talk about the other standouts and the other duds that we saw in that game. That's coming to next in the recipe. You read it. Step into the world of power, loyalty and luck. I'm going to make him an offer. He can't refuse. With family, canoles and spins mean everything. Now you want to get mixed up in the family business. Introducing the Godfather at Champa Casino.com. Test your luck in the shadowy world of the Godfather slots. Someday I will call upon you to do a service for me. Play the Godfather. Now at Champa Casino.com. Welcome to the family. No purchase necessary. VW Group, boy rep prohibited by law. Eighteen plus, terms and conditions apply. We're back on the rise of secret podcast. Mr. Carvel's talk of the web. We've talked about tune versus red. We've talked about the rookies and the draft picks specifically. Who are the other players that stood out and maybe the studs? The other studs and duds, let's call it as you'll often see on the internet. Winners and losers, studs and duds. Like there were two guys in particular. I'll say honestly four guys that I thought were like, okay. A guy that I never would have expected. And I don't think he's got much of a shot to make the roster. But maybe Darren Hall looked really good. Was a cornerback. He's playing safety now for the Cardinals. He played for the Colts. They signed them. He didn't listen as a cornerback up until recently. I saw him working with the safety. So he's been working with the safeties all off season. He covered some in the slot. He played some safety. He was real physical. He looked good in coverage. He forced a fumble. He broke up a pass in the end zone. It's one of those guys. I'm like, you know, that's a guy to pay attention to, especially in that safety room. I'm like, it looks like Joey Blunt is ahead of Andre Shacheray. We know three guys are locks. Is it going to be blunt? Is it going to be sacheray? Or then you're like, oh, maybe Darren Hall. That was the biggest revelation to me was Hall's play. Yeah, and I liked what Hall did. You know, I thought it was interesting that he is kind of a defensive back more than anything, right? Yes. He is a corner, like you said, but like he's got time at safeties. He's been a nickel like he's kind of done everything and he's looked decent. We talked about Owen Papo earlier. I'm not going to harp on that. I thought I think he's, I think he's genuinely on the cusp of being a breakout player. But the guy that like stood out to me defensively, and I think there's two and I'll let you take the other one because I think we're on the same page. But so, but I'll go with Starling Thomas, right? Oh, that he was the guy, he was the guy for me. I'm like, I've said it since OTAs. I'm like, he's the guy that's going to make it hard for Max Melton to get in the lineup because they liked him last year. He didn't like his, his, his numbers and coverage were not great. If you look at the analytics from PFF, but Jonathan Ganon loves him that he's gotten praise from Ganon. He's been making plays in camp. He made a play in coverage in the game. Dave Sears mentioned Thomas by name, the assistant GM on the, on the Dave Pash podcast that came out today. Thomas is going to be tough to supplant. He is, for me, he's the wild card of that group. And he's a guy I felt didn't really have a chance at making the roster. He might be like, I think he's walking up a starting role. Yeah, and he's doing a really good job. So you had Starling. The other guy was going to say it was a quick brief thing was, was Roy Lopez. I mean, you know, you mentioned him a little bit earlier, but I thought he was really, you know, he looks like a guy that's just going to give you what 30, 35 snaps a game and they're going to be really, really solid and something that. You don't worry about it. And what would be fantastic is if the rest of the line stays healthy, he can simply play the role of nose tackle. Lecky ended up having to do a little bit more last year. But this is exactly what we were saying about Lecky photo last year because we all thought like we thought Richard Lawrence was going to step up and it turned out Richard Lawrence can't, you know, he can't get a job right now. And Lecky really stepped up. He held that starting role in the nose tackle position got hurt, got himself an okay contract to go to the Jets. But Roy Lopez looks like that guy this year. And, you know, in that role of big, big, big, big guy in the middle of the defensive line, taking double teams. It's, it's good. Now, on offense for me, the two players that that stood out for me were Michael Carter and Tony Jones, neither of whom I think are going to make the roster but they both for me. They looked good Michael Carter played in the, and they both actually play it was interesting how they had the rotations because the Benson started and then Carter was in the third down role, which if we're going to look at the regular season right now. It looks like it'll be James Connor and Amari Demarcato coming in for passing downs, but they had Carter in the third down role. And then they had him in the lead role with DJ Dallas. Then they had Tony Jones as well. And, and Carter, as, and honestly, I'll say this. Because I believe Carter is an incredibly talented player. I think he is like on most rosters and most years. He's not a player that's playing late in the game in the fourth quarter of a free season game. Yeah, he should look good against those guys. And he did, though. He did. Yeah. But Tony Jones, a guy who also won't be making this team, but, but showed like it showed some versatility like they brought him in last year. You know, we kind of joked about like how much impact he could make because he had a career 2.9 yards per carry. He in the handful cares that he had. He averaged five yards of care for the Cardinals, but he's a big body. He can run between the tackles. He can pass back a little bit and he can catch the ball. And so he's a guy that you anticipate will find a role somewhere. He spent four seasons doing, you know, appearing in a handful of games for the Saints before Cardinals signed him. So, but I thought both of them showed well. I just don't think it's going to make a difference because. The four running backs that are going to be in the roster, unless there's an injury to one of them. It's going to be Connor. It's going to be Benson. It's going to be Demarcado and it's going to be DJ Dallas because DJ Dallas has the guarantees in his contract. He's probably their primary returner. And so there's just not room for Carter Benson. I mean, for a cover Carter or Jones, but both of them stood out to me. Yeah, and I thought they both, you know, did a nice job. I would say that for me, the guys that stood out or that played well. You know, you kind of mentioned Dan to Senna earlier, but I wanted to mention Marquis Hayes. I made fun of you come earlier, so. I'll go back and talk about, you know, Hayes. What seventh round pick in times last year. Yeah, he's hung on somehow some way in Arizona and he looked good. He looked good this in the first preseason game. You give him a little bit of love for that. But you know, for the most part, it was a rather mundane offense performance. Can you say? Yeah. Yeah, it was. I was glad to see it pick up in the second half because the first half was slowly, really bad. It was really bad. And like in terms of duds, like the biggest duds that we saw again, I think Desmond Ritter had a dud of a game. Yeah. Tejan Palmer had a dud of a game. Isaiah Adams was one of the, was disappointing things. Other than that, like all. Oh, I thought Elijah Wilkinson was awful. In fairness. He was playing a new position. I get that. Would we ever like, do we ever want to see Elijah Wilkinson playing left tackle? We've seen him. I've seen him play. I know he plays tackle and he's got a spot on the roster. His salary is 100% guaranteed this year. But I think they're working with different spots. Like he can play guard. He can play like his in his career in the NFL. He's played left guard. He's been right guard. He's played right tackle to see him at left tackle. I'm like, why, why are we doing that? Right. Exactly. So it'll be interesting to see how it works out, but yeah. He didn't do great defensively. You know, we kind of hit on it already. I feel bad. I don't want to double down too much. I will say I was a little disappointed. I was just a little bit disappointed with. Victor de McCagie. I just, you know, is he a lock for this roster, you think? That outside linebacker who I'm not sure. I don't know. I think so right now, but I'm not sure. And, and, and I was like, this is, he didn't, he didn't do anything. But the fact that they used Cameron Thomas, both on the edge and on the interior. I'm like, I think that means he might have a role on the team. But yeah, de McCagie was unimpressive. Yeah, I don't know what to think about that. I was outside linebacker room. I'm like, all right, Dennis Gardec. You know, smattering of Cameron Thomas, Mack Wilson and Darius Robinson. I think that might be the way they have to, and Xavier Thomas. That might be the way they have to go. I don't know because the after, after, after Zave and after Dennis Gardec. Like, like you're looking at the group. You're like, this is last year again. And de McCagie at least looked good early last year. Right. But yeah. Let's see one, one more spot. So coming on next on the Rise of Sierra podcast. Mr. O'Connell's talking about, let's look at, let's talk about what's happening this week in Indy. What do we want to see? Let's come to next in Rise of Sierra Red. With the Lucky Land Sluts, you can get lucky just about anywhere. This is your captain speaking. Yeah, we've got clear runway and the weather's fine. But we're just going to circle up here a while and get lucky. Oh no, nothing like that. It's just these cash prizes add up quick. So I suggest you sit back, keep your tray table upright, and start getting lucky. Play for free at luckylandsluts.com. Are you feeling lucky? No purchase necessary. BGW Graboid, we're prohibited by law. 18 plus terms and conditions apply. We're back on the Rise of Sierra podcast. Let's start Cardinals talk a little bit. We're recording Tuesday nights. The Cardinals are now in Indianapolis. And by the time this hits, the Cardinals will probably be on the field or about to be on the field. At least Wednesday, they will have their first of two joint practice with the Colts. And if it's going to be anything like they did last year against Minnesota, these are where they're going to have their most intense types of practices, game-like simulations, and it will give the starters the work so that they don't have to play this week. This will be there. This is going to be the starters preseason, I'm guessing. And I'm just told, like, don't get hurt. Nobody gets hurt. We're seeing guys get hurt all over the league. And this is the part about training camp in the preseason that is just awful is because you got to get guys ready for the season. And then what happens in Minnesota? Jay-Z McCarthy goes down with an injury. My league neighbors go down with an injury. Christian McCaffery's down with an injury for San Francisco. You're like, those are the guys. Like, have back of the roster guys get hurt, you know, because then they can go on iron and get paid. But the guys that teams are counting on, it's just a rough time. It's like, why injuries when they don't count, when games don't count? That sucks. Right. And that's the hard part. I think the first thing you look at is you want to see, you know, the rookies we discussed outside of Marvin Harrison really, you know, kind of continue to grow, um, improve from, from game one to two, especially the guys like Isaiah Adams, um, you know, Elijah Jones. Um, and, and those guys, um, so that, that way they can, you know, you're comfortable with them making the roster. And you're not just saying like, Oh, they're on the roster. Cause, you know, there were draft pieces here. Um, I hope Max Bell plays this week. Yeah, I agree with that. And then the second thing is you just want to see guys that had good week ones carry over, right? So Dan Trissena, Marquis Hayes, um, you know, Tony Jones Jr. obviously Michael Carter. The guys you mentioned earlier, starting Thomas, if he plays, you know, those guys carry it over in a week two, if, if they're on the field. Um, because that's the thing is we don't want to see one offs and then have go back to having questions. The more consistency that we see from this, the easier it is to be to visualize, you know, like, Oh, this is what next year can look like from a, from a positive standpoint. And absolutely can somebody do something and I'll save your Thomas if he keeps showing up. I mean, but. I also don't want the Cardinals to have to count on Xavier Thomas for any significant role. I want, I want anything that he does this year. To be a bonus, to be gravy and not have to count on him. So I'm like, please, please somebody in the outside linebacker or do something. Honestly, Cameron Thomas Cam. I've loved you as a draft pick as a prospect. I thought that he was and he looked at that rookie year. There wasn't anything about his game that said he was going to fail. Like he has the athleticism. He has the versatility. He has the effort. Why hasn't he done it yet in this defense? Cause he looked like he was about to advance Joseph's defense. Why hasn't he done it? Cam Thomas do it. Then it would just make us all feel better. Correct. And then make our life easier too. And then the Cardinals. Yeah. Is right right now. We're like, is he going to make the team? I don't know. Maybe that we don't know anything. And they didn't sign an outside linebacker. They did sign a car loss and they didn't sign a Justin Hall. And so who knows. But you know, in the game, I would anticipate, do you think Harris in place? I think though, I think they'll, I think they'll try and get Harrison. Cause I think they wanted to, you know, maybe a series, maybe two, like, like last week. And get him, get him a throw, get him, catch the ball once. And then then get him out of the game. Yeah, exactly. It'd be nice to see, you know, and. I thought what, what Ganon said was interesting talking about, like, it was important for Marvin Harrison Jr. to get a his, you know, find his game day routine for the NFL. Cause it is wildly different than college, right? So you wonder if he'll have a similar idea about that for. For the road, right? Yeah. That wouldn't absolutely make sense. Yeah. Yeah. Like, Hey, you know, two snaps, three snaps, four snaps, whatever. And then he's out of there and you don't worry about it. And you're like, okay. So now you've done it on off or at home and on the road. No, ideally he's playing 10, 11 snaps, right? Because ideally the first offensive series gets a couple of first downs. Maybe they score a touchdown. So you don't think the reason they pulled him is because it was the first series. So that was a plan. Stupid. Maybe I'm what I would guess. I don't know. Are the Colts going to play starters? I think that's a question. I'm going to have to ask Paul Brittle. Yeah, you're definitely going to have to ask the other because I just don't know what other teams do at this point. Like you see some and then Hollywood gets hurt and now now people are like, Oh, you know, is it smart? I don't know. Like, I just don't know what the right answer is. I don't, I don't think that there's a right or wrong answer. It just football sucks sometimes. Right. Exactly. We love football and football is the worst. Why? Why does football do this? And it's such a game. It's just impossible to guarantee everyone's health. It's just so hard to do when you've got you have to do the things that football requires them to do. Right. But with that said, we might have something from Howard later this week, but since it's still preseason, Seth and I will be back next week. And we're still a little bit away from before we start doing the multiple shows. So that wraps up this edition of the Rise Up Secret Podcast. Mr. Cardinal's talking about that. Seth Cox. I'm Jesse Rool with Back Again Next Week. Thanks for listening as always. You slept through your alarm. Missed the train. And your breakfast sandwich. Cool. Sounds like you could use some luck. I'm Victoria Cash, and Lucky Land is where people go every day to get lucky. At Lucky Land, you can play over a hundred casino style games for free for your chance to redeem some serious prizes. Go to LuckyLandslots.com and get lucky today. No purchase necessary. VGW Group. Point where prohibited by law. Eighteen plus. Terms and conditions apply. Thanks for listening to the latest edition of the Rise Up Sea Red Podcast. Listen to previous episodes and subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher Radio, Audio Boom, or many other podcast platforms so shows are delivered directly to your mobile device. Please give the show a five star rating and always support the sponsors who support the show. Stay back soon for the best hour of Cardinals Talk on the web. Rise Up Red Sea, B Red Sea Red, and of course, Rise Up Sea Red. Rise Up Red Sea Red, and of course, Rise Up Sea Red, and of course, Rise Up Sea Red. Step into the world of power, loyalty, and luck. I'm going to make him an offer he can't refuse. With family, canollies, and spins mean everything. Now, you want to get mixed up in the family business. Introducing the Godfather at ChampaCasino.com. Test your luck in the shadowy world of the Godfather Slots. Someday, I will call upon you to do a service for me. Play the Godfather. Now at ChampaCasino.com. Welcome to the family. No purchase necessary. VDW Group. We're prohibited by law.