Arizona Cardinals may have played themselves out of No. 1 pick

The Arizona Cardinals are in the midst of a lost season, and are fully in draft season as a fanbase. But, they may have played themselves out of the No. 1 draft pick, likely star pass rusher Nick Bosa.

The Arizona Cardinals have been a disaster in 2018 season. Rookie quarterback Josh Rosen is promising but needs help, David Johnson has been somewhat disappointing and the coaching staff and front office will likely be gone after this season.

Despite all this, the Cardinals have scrounged together three wins this season. In Week 13, they defeated the Green Bay Packers at Lambeau Field, and played a large part in getting Packers head coach Mike McCarthy fired. Although the team showed promise against Aaron Rodgers and his Pack of merry men, they may have ruined any chance they had of landing the top pick in the 2019 NFL Draft.

This season has shown that Arizona needs help anywhere and everywhere, on both sides of the ball. The offensive line is a sieve, Rosen needs receivers to throw to and the defense is largely anemic outside of a couple bright spots. Ohio State star pass rusher Nick Bosa could cure a lot of ailments on the defensive side of the ball. But because of two “unfortunate” wins, the Cardinals are likely ineligible for his services.

Before Week 13’s upset win over the Packers, the Cardinals had just two victories on the season. Both of these wins just happened to come in a division series sweep of NFC West rival, the San Francisco 49ers. Wins in the division are great under almost every other circumstance, but the Cardinals chose the one wrong situation in which to win these games.

The 49ers, of course, currently hold the top pick in the 2019 NFL Draft. Had they beaten the Cardinals one, or both, times they met them this season, they would have overtaken Arizona and firmly held the second spot in the draft order. In reality, the roles are reversed, and the Cardinals have virtually no chance of moving ahead of the 49ers in the draft, at least without trading up a pick.

The eternal optimist thing to do here would be to say that every win is a good thing, and the Cardinals are, objectively, not the worst team in the league. Right now, the 49ers are the definition of incompetent, and have been ever since Jimmy Garoppolo went down with a season-ending injury. But for a team as talent-needy as the Cardinals, that top pick could’ve been franchise-changing.

Even still, the true bright side here is that the Cardinals still have a top-two pick in the draft, and a great shot at a blue-chip player. Perhaps they could go after Alabama’s Jonah Williams to protect their young quarterback, or select Houston’s resident freak athlete, Ed Oliver, to bolster the defensive line for the next decade.

Whatever the Cardinals decide to do, they will almost certainly not be acquiring the best player in the draft in Nick Bosa. They still have a great shot at a player who can shape the team for the next generation, but they have missed out on the 2019 NFL Draft’s one true “can’t miss” prospect. Whether you view Arizona’s three wins as positives or negatives, it’s a real shame that Nick Bosa probably won’t be suiting up to play in the desert next year.