Arizona Cardinals: How important is Larry Fitzgerald?
There’s a chance that Arizona Cardinals franchise icon Larry Fitzgerald could be out the door this offseason if he doesn’t take a paycut, as he is set to receive a whopping $8 million roster bonus on top of his $8 million salary. With a cap hit over $23 million, Fitzgerald is untenable for the Cardinals at this point, but there’s continued optimism that Fitzgerald will realize that he needs to take a paycut, since nobody else would keep him at that salary anyway.
Fitzgerald is clearly valuable to the Cardinals organization, and he was their best and most consistent player on offense last season. Despite mostly dealing with poor quarterback play, he averaged 56 yards per game and the most yards per reception of his career since 2011. Even so, his 63 receptions were the lowest since his rookie year, and his two touchdown receptions were clearly the lowest of his career.
These numbers have made some call his value into question, but one of those doubters clearly isn’t head coach Bruce Arians. According to Cardinals official site beat writer Darren Urban, Arians said, “We definitely, desperately want him to stay. He knows that. It’s really his decision.”
Arians added that he’s “expressed” to Fitzgerald how important it is for the likely Hall of Famer to take a paycut, and the head coach also called Fitzgerald the “ultimate team player”.
I have no means of speculating whether or not Fitzgerald will decide to take a paycut to stick around with Arians and extended quarterback Carson Palmer, but it is clear to me that he is their most valuable player on offense. Andre Ellington and Michael Floyd both have more talent and upside going into the 2015 season, but Fitzgerald has more value to the overall offense due to his consistency. I mean, neither Ellington or Floyd accomplished much in their highly disappointing 2014 campaigns, but Fitzgerald was solid.
Let’s take a look at how all of the pass-catchers on the Cardinals did to show you just how important he was to the offense last season. Keep in mind that the Cardinals were forced to receive 240 attempts from Drew Stanton (55% completion percentage) and 93 from Ryan Lindley (48.4% completion percentage).
According to Advanced Football Analytics, Fitzgerald somehow caught 61.2% of everything thrown at him to lead the team in catch rate, and he was the only person with at least 50 targets to move the chains on a consistent basis. His catch rate is incredibly impressive, since he often received terrible passes thrown in his direction. Clear-cut No. 1 possession receivers tend to have this issue, especially when catching passes from subpar quarterbacks.
Fitzgerald’s ability to draw coverage and move the chains helped keep the offense afloat, especially since he opened things up for the likes of Floyd. While Floyd caught less than 50% of everything thrown at him, he led the team with 8.5 yards per target since he averaged over 17 yards per reception. Without Fitzgerald moving the chains, Floyd wouldn’t have been able to be of use to the Cardinals as a deep threat.
John Brown is another example of a deep threat with a catch rate below 50% who was solid in the Cardinals offense, but these guys would have been non-factors vertically without Fitzgerald working the intermediate game to perfection.
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Here’s how reliable Larry Fitzgerald was last season. According to Pro Football Focus, despite the fact that he led the team in targets, none of the Cardinals 12 interceptions were thrown in the direction of the former Pitt star. More importantly, Fitzgerald had just one drop to show that the praise of his hands isn’t solely based on reputation; he really is that good at holding onto the ball. In fact, only Philadelphia Eagles impending free agent Jeremy Maclin, per PFF, had a lower drop rate than the Cardinals No. 1 wideout.
Had he played in all 16 games, Fitzgerald would have likely surpasses the 70-reception threshold, but, as you can see above, you have to go beyond the box score statistics to truly appreciate what he does for this offense. As he’s shown throughout his entire career in Arizona, it doesn’t matter who you put at quarterback or who you put around him at receiver; Fitzgerald will find a way to move the chains, get open, and he’ll do it without complaining openly or dropping the football.
Basically, Fitzgerald doesn’t leave plays on the table, and that’s something both Floyd and the non-existent Ted Ginn Jr. can’t say, based on what they did in 2014. The touchdowns weren’t there for him last season, but that’s more about the offense’s failure to get the ball to him in the red zone, or, more likely, the fact that he drew coverage away from others in that critical area of the field.
Dec 28, 2014; Santa Clara, CA, USA; Arizona Cardinals wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald (11) runs a route during the first quarter against the San Francisco 49ers at Levi
Although he’s no longer an elite receiver, Fitzgerald is still a true No. 1 target in this league, because he’s reliable and still has some playmaking juice left in his legs. It’s easy to see why Arians is so desperate to keep Fitz on the Cardinals, because they were pretty much screwed without him. Everyone gets shut down by the Seattle Seahawks, but the Cardinals loss to the Atlanta Falcons shows just how much they missed him when he went down with a two-week injury.
Without Fitzgerald, the Cardinals failed to move the ball consistently against the NFL’s worst defense, scoring just 18 points in the process. Yes, they averaged 7.5 yards per pass attempt, but that doesn’t account for their lack of a true No. 1 target, though at least Jaron Brown did a nice job of moving the chains.
The Arizona Cardinals have some talent at the wide receiver position in Floyd, John Brown, and Jaron Brown, but none of those guys are true No. 1 receivers and are best off as No.2-4 targets with the Browns moving in the pecking order based on matchup. If Fitzgerald ties the hands of the Cards by not accepting the paycut, then this team will be forced to find another top receiver with the type of reliable ability to keep the offense ticking if Palmer gets injured again. Fitz also allows the guys around him to do what they do best, so Arians’s vertical passing attack would suffer without his main possession guy.