How the Arizona Cardinals Can Still Win Games with Ryan Lindley

The Arizona Cardinals don’t have a quarterback. In body and mind they have one, but they're lacking something pretty important at the position: trust.

Ryan Lindley will take snaps this week and beyond, with Drew Stanton set to be out for up to a month, according to ESPN's Chris Mortensen. Behind him is Logan Thomas, a fourth-round rookie who might be pushed into action again if Lindley stumbles. As we saw earlier this season, Thomas is raw right now and not nearly far enough along in his development for meaningful game action.

About meaningful game action: Games don’t get any more meaningful than what’s facing Arizona over the next two weeks and into the playoffs when Lindley (or Thomas) will likely still be the quarterback in spirit.

With only an unpolished rookie and a sixth-round pick available during two games that will decide the NFC West, the Cardinals should begin making offseason vacation plans, right? It’s probably for the best, because wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald presumably needs time to find the next ice wall he’s going to climb (or elephants he’s going to live with, or whatever zany adventure he has planned this year).

Wait, and pump those brakes. The Cardinals can still win games with a third-string quarterback. Maybe even a playoff game too, and they won’t need Lindley/Thomas to go full T.J. Yates either.

There are three not-at-all-easy steps to follow. It all starts with something that’s been happening all season.

The defense needs to minimize Lindley’s role

The Cardinals host Seattle this Sunday under the bright prime-time lights and then travel to face the San Francisco 49ers for their season finale. Though a loss to the Seahawks would be a swift roundhouse kick to their shot at an NFC West title, home-field advantage in the playoffs and a desperately needed first-round bye, it wouldn’t be an absolute death blow.

The math for Week 17 in that scenario is simple: If the Cardinals win and Seattle falls to the St. Louis Rams, those golden holiday gifts of a bye and a home playoff game are still available.

That’s the scenario ahead in its most black-and-white form. Now it’s time for a little more blackness:

Many rosy words have been said about Lindley this week. Fitzgerald called him “cerebral” during an interview on NFL AM (via NFL.com's Kevin Paltra), and Cardinals head coach Bruce Arians dropped the ol’ “calm as a cucumber” in reference to Lindley’s general demeanor and his relief appearance in Week 15 after Stanton went down.

But there’s no dodging the reality of what Lindley is, and what he really, really isn’t. Which is why if the Cardinals are to win at least one of their two remaining regular-season games and maybe even a playoff game too, they’ll do it through defense.

Or more directly, they’ll do it by making Lindley matter as little as possible.

That concept isn’t new or even much of a change for these 2014 Cardinals. It will just be a matter of cranking the knob further toward an approach that’s generally simplified.

To do that effectively, the first step is a game centered around field position and giving Lindley short fields while making life uncomplicated.

The Cardinals’ suffocating defense we’ve seen all season and even more so recently needs to provide that field position and keep the score well within reach. They've accomplished the latter task consistently.

Points allowed	Number of games
Less than 10 points	2
11-14 points	5
15-20 points	5
21 or more points	2

Only allowing the equivalent of three touchdowns twice after 14 games is remarkable for any team—during any season. But for a Cardinals team that’s had players miss a combined 90 games due to injury—with most of those breaks and rips on defense—it’s an impressive feat of strength.

And one that needs to continue. Overall the Cardinals have one of only three defenses allowing less than 18 points per game, sitting third at 17.4.

They’ve arrived at that tiny number with a pass rush suddenly alive and averaging three sacks per game since Week 6. A ball-hawking mentality that’s led to 18 interceptions (fourth) and 25 total takeaways (also fourth) has helped to win field position too.

Which is how the Cardinals have won, and how they’ll have to keep winning, because this average is scary: 12.8. That’s how many points an offense led by Stanton averaged during his five starts after Carson Palmer went down.

There won’t be a surge with Lindley. No, if there’s an offensive surge of any kind to take some of the heavy lifting away from the defense, it’ll come from somewhere else.

A surging running game needs to keep, well, surging

Since Week 14, the Cardinals offense has totaled 284 rushing yards. That doesn’t make any sense at all, because a Week 14 win over the Kansas City Chiefs was also their first game without running back Andre Ellington after he suffered a season-ending hip injury.

Enter Kerwynn Williams, the latest reason why running backs aren’t drafted in the first round ever or paid anything more than a Big Mac.

The seventh-round pick who was unearthed off the practice-squad scrap heap has partnered with Stepfan Taylor to give the Cardinals something that was previously a foreign concept this season: a running game.

Combined, Williams and Taylor have averaged 4.7 yards per carry over the last two weeks. Williams has been impressive while identifying holes and cutting abruptly to find open space for extra yards. He’s already forced seven missed tackles on only 34 carries, according to Pro Football Focus (subscription required).

You see where this is heading then. Much like the defense that’s making opposing offenses nearly vanish, the chunks of yards from Williams and Taylor need to keep coming.

That’s a tall and pretty much laughable order against the Seahawks. But in Week 17, a 49ers defense likely without linebacker Chris Borland awaits.

Then if the Cardinals have to play in the Wild Card Round, they’ll probably draw the NFC South winner, a team that should be relegated to some league in Morocco. The Atlanta Falcons, New Orleans Saints and Carolina Panthers currently have run defenses ranked 20th or worse.

But there’s still hope if running fails and Lindley has to come from behind while chucking footballs deep. Just not much.

Arians will have to change the offense, but not beyond all recognition

Immediately when Stanton went down, Arians made it clear the offense won't be changing, or at least not drastically. He communicated that with his words on Pardon The Interruption, but he also did so with his actions first.

Lindley replaced Stanton halfway through the third quarter of an eventual Week 15 win over the St. Louis Rams. His first throw was a short six-yard completion to wide receiver Michael Floyd to set up a field goal. But the difficulty level was raised right away on his second throw, and Arians cared little about Lindley’s nearly two full years without a regular-season pass attempt (his last one came in Week 11 of 2012).

On 2nd-and-11 at his own 41-yard line, Lindley was in the shotgun with three wide receivers spread out. To his far left was John Brown, who ran a straight vertical route. Lindley’s assignment: place the ball into a tight window along the sideline with a back-shoulder throw deep downfield. (The ball sailed about 30 yards through the air from where he released it in the backfield.).

Doing that is difficult even when you're well into the rhythm of a game. Doing it as a third-stringer coming off the bench who has a career completion percentage of 51.4? Not fun, so considering all that, let’s give Lindley a generous slow clap for this…

Credit: NFL Game Rewind

His throw was only slightly off line and placed a touch too far toward the sideline. But he still gave Brown a chance to come down with the ball in bounds.

Only some pointy elbows that barely caught chalk stood between Lindley and a fine low-percentage completion.

Credit: NFL Game Rewind

Then, of course, on the very next throw, Lindley was wildly inaccurate while leading Fitzgerald too far on a crossing route. He was also incredibly lucky when the resulting interception was overturned.

Between those two throws, we see the juxtaposition Lindley can often present as a passer. In his limited career sample size, he’s sometimes displayed a sufficiently accurate deep arm, like on that near completion to Brown, or on a 55-yard connection with Jaron Brown during the 2013 preseason.

But even more often, he sprays throws. Consistency and a lack of it is why backups remain backups. It’s why that feeling of confusion settles in after a deep completion into tight coverage is followed by a ball that sails high on a short checkdown.

Funny, that sounds a lot like Drew Stanton.

Above all, everything needs to be simplified

Lindley is Stanton, just even more inconsistent. That’s why he needs to live a simple, though still fulfilled, life during whatever time he has as a starter this season.

Arians has said he won’t change his team’s offensive identity. And he shouldn’t, because being able to throw a ball far with even impressively alright accuracy is the minimum qualification to be an Arians quarterback.

But still “slinging it,” as Arians told Pardon The Interruption he intends to do, will become both stubborn and dangerous. Risks can be taken downfield because Lindley has the arm for Arians’ deep-passing desires. But they should be minimized in favor of safety.

Regardless of the approach, even the most minor misstep by the Cardinals defense will lead to Lindley getting exposed and a short postseason.

When that conclusion comes, appreciating what was accomplished this year in Arizona will be difficult at first. But it’ll be a lot easier when Arians is named Coach of the Year.