Arizona to St. Louis, Why the NFC West is Far From Best

In 2009, the NFC West was a combined 24-40. The best team? Arizona at 10-6. The rest of the West (STL, SEA, SF): 14-34. As a whole, the division lost six more games than the next worst division (AFC West).

The team that dropped the farthest this year? The only good team they had, Arizona, who lost future Hall of Fame QB Kurt Warner and Pro Bowl WR Anquan Boldin.

That's pretty bad.

There isn't a team in the NFL that lost more than the Cardinals.

I blame it on Warner. When he traded in his cleats for a pair of dancing shoes, that left the division with oft-injured Matt Hasselbeck as its top QB, followed by Alex Smith, Sam Bradford, and Derek Anderson/Max Hall.

Seven QBs have been drafted No. 1 overall since 2000. The NFC West has three of them, David Carr (2002), Alex Smith (2005) and Sam Bradford (2010).

Smith has been in the league five seasons, and the 49ers have given him five different offensive coordinators. That’s troubling. For a guy who they planned to build the franchise around, they didn't have much of a plan for him once he got there. Smith is now in his sixth season and second with OC Jimmy Raye.

The Niners are the cream of the crop in the West. Watch out for them to go on a run late in the season. After an embarrassing loss at Seattle to start the season, they looked like a top 10 caliber team in the loss to New Orleans.

Sam Bradford is a large question mark so far. During the preseason, he looked great. During the regular season, I'm not so sure what to think. On paper, his numbers are about where you'd expect a rookie on a bad team to be. In two games, he's thrown three TDs, four INTs, and 420 yards on 80 attempts with a 57.5 percent completion rate.

What sticks out to me is that he threw the ball 55 times in Week 1 against Arizona. Twenty-some of the throws occurred late in the game when playing from behind, but that is still too many pass attempts. How can you call 70 percent pass plays in the first game of the season? What does that say about their confidence in Steven Jackson?

Bradford has shown a lot of promise through two weeks. He looks to have above average decision-making skills, which is a good way to combat bad play calling. The Rams players are better than their coaches. Steve Spagnuolo and Pat Shurmur look like confused puppet masters, not NFL coaches.

Larry Fitzgerald cannot be happy with the Arizona Cardinals right now. Even though they beat the Rams in Week 1, they looked awful in doing so. Derek Anderson threw at Fitzgerald 15 times with only three completions. It wasn't because the Rams defense is ridiculously good either.

How bad does it need to be before he just says, "STOP THROWING ME THE BALL?" Because Anderson clearly cannot hit him on a simple post pattern. For the season, Fitzgerald has been targeted 27 times with 10 receptions for 126 yards and a TD. Seventeen misses to 10 makes is the way I look at it.

I'm not sure anybody can argue that Larry Fitzgerald is Arizona's best player. They need to find him somebody with whom he can connect with better than 37 percent of the time. Even though the offense was shameful, the defense was a bright spot in Week 1, forcing four turnovers. Too bad they followed it up with a 41-7 loss to Atlanta.

Oh yeah, fun fact: Arizona has turned the ball over 7 times (three INTs, four fumbles) and has fumbled the ball a total of 8 times.

Blowout win, blowout loss, I bet Pete Carroll didn't have many back-to-back runs like that at USC. This must be tough for the Seahawks head coach/cheerleader who was publicly thanked by 49ers HC Mike Singletary for destroying them in Week 1.

After looking like a young, spry force to be reckoned with in the win over division favorite San Francisco, they fell flat on their face in the loss to Denver. It really surprised me that Carroll didn't have his boys charged for a game so early in the season.

Did you know that Seattle hasn't had a 1,000-yard rusher since Shawn Alexander in 2005? He also was an All-Pro. Not to mention he carried the team to the Super Bowl and won NFL regular season MVP. After the ‘05 season, Alexander signed a huge free agent deal. He was a bust from there on out, forever cursing the position for the Hawks.

Right now, Seattle has Julius Jones, Justin Forsett, and Leon Washington splitting carries. Don't get me wrong, but the three of them don't equal Chris Johnson, they don't even equal Clinton Portis. If anything they equal six, because, at best, they are each a number two back on any other NFL team.

Arizona, Seattle, and St. Louis fans—plan to wear black on Sundays.

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