Arizona Cardinals: Sam Bradford, Josh Rosen shine against Saints

Sam Bradford and Josh Rosen had strong performances as the Arizona Cardinals defeat New Orleans 20-15

The Arizona Cardinals defeated the New Orleans Saints, 20-15, after a sloppy start in Week 2 of the 2018 preseason. Sam Bradford and Josh Rosen played well leading the offense. Most of all, the Arizona coaching staff has to be excited about those performances.

After the defense created a turnover, the Cardinals offense took the field for a sloppy start. David Johnson was stuffed on a first-down run. A penalty set Arizona back five yards to set up second-and-long. On fourth down the Cardinals punted.

The second offensive possession began after the Cardinals defense recovered a fumble. On first down, there was another flag thrown on the Arizona offense. Three Johnson runs later, the Cardinals punted the ball back to New Orleans. To that point, it didn’t look good for the Cardinals offense.

Bradford took the field for his third offensive series. Suddenly, everything clicked in the Arizona drive. Bradford hit four-straight completions to march into the red zone. Two Johnson rushes later, Arizona led the game, 7-0.

Bradford had an amazing statistical line in his three possessions of work. He was a perfect 6-of-6 for 61 yards. He averaged 10.1 yards per completion, which moves the chains. Sloppy penalties marred his first two possessions, but the overall body of work was impressive.

Rosen came out firing on all cylinders when his number was called. In his first possession with the starting offense, he marched the Cardinals down the field into the end zone. New Orleans committed two defensive penalties which set Rosen up with a first-and-goal situation.

It seemed as if the Saints defense briefly rattled Rosen. Two offensive penalties and an incompletion forced third-and-goal. New Orleans were in full pursuit of Rosen on each previous down. Rosen regathered his thoughts, however, and calmly delivered a dart to Christian Kirk. Kirk’s 13-yard touchdown reception pushed the Cardinals to a 14-0 lead. Rosen finished the night completing 10-of-16 passes for 107 yards.

Both quarterbacks were very efficient with the ball. Bradford finished with a quarterback rating of 109. Rosen’s quarterback rating was 102.9. The quarterback play for the Cardinals looks really promising.

Expect the coaching staff to clean up the sloppy penalties with the offensive line. Dallas comes to town Aug. 26 for the nationally televised dress-rehearsal preseason Week 3 game.