Cardinals trade for yet another former Kyler Murray Oklahoma teammate

The Arizona Cardinals are making it a habit to trade for Kyler Murray’s pals from his Oklahoma Sooners days. During the 2022 NFL Draft, they struck a deal with the Baltimore Ravens for wide receiver Marquise Brown, a player who really thrived with Murray during the 2018 college football season. Now, they’ve struck a deal with the Buffalo Bills for one of the guys tasked with protecting Murray at Oklahoma — offensive guard Cody Ford.

The Cardinals are willing to make whatever moves they deem necessary to be able to address areas of need on the roster and make upgrades as they see fit, regardless of the ramifications on their future NFL Draft capital. This time around, they apparently sent a fifth-round pick to the Bills for Ford’s services.

Arizona Cardinals acquire OL Cody Ford for 2023 5th-round draft pick

Kyler Murray has got to be absolutely ecstatic at this point. He’s the former Heisman winner and number one overall pick in the NFL Draft. He just signed a big-money contract worth $160 million in guaranteed cash. His team has not only traded for superstar receiver DeAndre Hopkins to help him out, but they also traded for stud tight end Zach Ertz.

Now, the Cardinals are out here trading for Murray’s old Oklahoma buddies, getting the band back together in Arizona to hopefully have one of the highest-flying offenses in the NFL again in 2022.

Cody Ford is just 25 years old and was the 38th overall pick of the 2019 NFL Draft. For the Bills to get a fifth-round pick for him — someone who was not in their plans, apparently, and is in the final year of his rookie deal — seems like a steal.

For the Cardinals, if Ford can actually prove to be a potential long-term starter at the guard position? Well, getting him for a fifth-round pick is a steal in that case. A fifth-round pick for this kind of player is really the sweet spot of being great value for the team trading him away and a really solid bargain for the team acquiring.

Ford missed nine games in the 2020 season and bounced back to play 15 this past year. Unfortunately, he started only seven games for the Bills and hasn’t been a full-time starter for them since his rookie season in 2019. As a former high second-round pick, the Cardinals are obviously banking on Ford potentially being a better fit for their offense and possibly rediscovering what made him a coveted prospect in the first place with two of his former teammates in the same locker room again.

Free agent Will Hernandez has been penciled into the Cardinals’ starting lineup at the right guard position with the other interior spots going to veterans Justin Pugh (LG) and Rodney Hudson (C), so Ford should have a decent shot to come in and be the starter. The question with this move also then becomes, what is going to happen with former 2020 third-round pick Josh Jones?

There’s plenty of interesting roster shuffling going on around the league and Cardinals offensive line coach Sean Kugler seems to be getting himself a worthwhile reclamation project with just one week left of preseason play.