Arizona Cardinals Can't Win with Ryan Lindley as Their Postseason Quarterback

It’s fine to be confused about Ryan Lindley right now. It’s normal to have mixed feelings, with optimism trying to fight through. And it’s understandable to be downright lost, wondering exactly what the Arizona Cardinals will get from their third-string quarterback during the playoffs.

Let’s start the process of de-cobwebbing after a 20-17 loss to the San Francisco 49ers with a simple observation: Winning a playoff game with Lindley running the offense will be a monumental challenge, and a deep playoff run will be impossible.

In fact, if the Cardinals manage to win a single playoff game with Lindley and beat the Carolina Panthers on the road (because a 7-8-1 team deserves a home playoff game), one of the NFL’s awards would then need a slight alteration, as Bleacher Report's Kyle J. Rodriguez noted:

You may have experienced a tingling sensation while watching Lindley Sunday. It was hope, and Lindley provided ample spoonfuls of delicious optimism despite the final result.

Let’s step back and focus on those sunny thoughts for a moment before diving into the darkness. On the Cardinals’ first two drives, he threw for 92 yards. He did that against a severely battered 49ers team missing defensive backs Tramaine Brock, Perrish Cox and Eric Reid.

Regardless, the Lindley we saw during those first two drives was far more accurate than the other guy who was thrashed by the Seattle Seahawks in Week 16. That’s when Lindley passed for only five yards over Arizona’s opening two drives. Five.

His first quarter this week was a massive, bounding leap forward then as Lindley picked himself up off a rocky bottom. It was a quarter that included his first career passing touchdown after 229 attempts.

He needed some flea-flicker trickery to end that statistically remarkable streak, deceiving 49ers cornerback Dontae Johnson before hitting wide receiver Michael Floyd 20 yards away in the end zone. That was an easy enough deep pitch-and-catch, though later Lindley responded well when the degree of difficulty was raised.

Overall in the first half he completed six 20-plus-yard passes. One was a long, sailing heave to Floyd that needed to be placed perfectly along the sideline, and he caught it for a 41-yard touchdown. It capped an impressive drive to end the half with Lindley throwing for 75 yards over only four plays.

Another came earlier in the half when Lindley placed a ball high and deep along the sideline toward Floyd again and away from any defender's reach. But it was a little too far away, lacking the exact precision expected at the NFL level.

Then Floyd made the sort of bailout catch that’s absolutely necessary with a third-string quarterback firing away, and his crosshairs aren't quite calibrated.

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His sprawling, one-handed 27-yard reception was upheld after a review.

If the Lindley who threw both that ball and the much-deeper touchdown toss to Floyd was present for all four quarters, then winning would have been not only possible but also likely. Even if trickery was needed at times along with receivers going full Spiderman to haul in some wayward balls, that Lindley gives the Cardinals an opportunity to win.

A backup quarterback—and especially the backup to the backup—is doing his job if he provides even a chance to win. Sadly, the realities of a depth chart dictate that even during merry times of improvement, happiness can be fleeting. Eventually inconsistency will always prevail when a backup on Lindley's level is exposed to more playing time.

Soak in that image above of Floyd’s one-handed grab again. At the time the Cardinals were down by three points early in the second quarter, and Floyd’s catch advanced them to just outside San Francisco’s red zone.

Then three plays later Lindley faced 3rd-and-13 after a sack. Protection broke down, and instead of being cautious, Lindley went with an approach that rarely ends in success.

He attempted to jam a ball into tight coverage. The result was lost points and a long drive erased.

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The Lindley experience features sprinkles of optimism promptly wiped away by a split-second lapse in judgement. It’s not his fault, because all Ryan Lindley can be is Ryan Lindley. He’s true to himself while playing like a desperate, emergency option plucked off a practice squad in early November and seeing his first extended NFL action since 2012. That’s who he is and who he’ll keep being.

The third-string quarterback's identity is rooted in survival. Barring something truly miraculous, that’s their goal on every snap. The Lindleys of the NFL haven’t logged nearly enough snaps to navigate exotic blitzes and coverages. They have the talent and—in Lindley’s case specifically—the arm to execute certain throws and move an offense. But when confusion grips them, so does inconsistency.

That was evident Sunday when he threw for 260 yards with a passer rating of 108.8 in the first half and only 56 yards in the second. And it was especially evident when he threw into triple coverage on his third interception…

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Lindley stared down wide receiver John Brown. With the quarterback’s intentions clearly advertised, 49ers safety Craig Dahl jumped the route to make an easy play.

At that point Dahl’s interception didn’t matter much. Seattle had already beaten the St. Louis Rams to secure a bye and home-field advantage throughout the playoffs.

But his interception to quickly halt a potential game-tying drive with less than two minutes remaining served as a reminder that wasn’t needed: Offense has been rare in Arizona.

The Cardinals have now scored 23 points over two games with Lindley as the starting quarterback. Even if we go back further to happier times when Drew Stanton was still healthy, there’s still a wretched odor coming from the offense. Since Week 11 Arizona has averaged 12.4 points per game.

After the game Lindley spoke about feeling confident despite the loss. The good Lindley—the guy who threw those pinpoint deep passes in the first half, and not the other guy who made the crushing mental errors—needs to show up a little more often in the playoffs.

"I felt the most comfortable I've felt since I've been in the NFL," he told Darren Urban of Cardinals.com. "But there are still ample plays that kill you. I'm always super hard on myself, but [the picks] were all kind of bonehead plays."

To beat Carolina and avoid watching an 11-win season drown in a pool of tears, an exhausted and injury-battered Cardinals defense that’s given up 991 yards over the past two weeks will have to produce a near-shutout.

The chances of that happening feel remote after two mobile quarterbacks (the 49ers’ Colin Kaepernick and Seattle’s Russell Wilson) gashed the Cardinals for a combined 151 rushing yards, and Panthers quarterback Cam Newton is teed up next.

There’s still hope if the game falls into Lindley’s hands. But it’s far more likely a successful season would fizzle and flame out fast.