26. New Orleans Saints
Just when we started to say some nice things about Spencer Rattler, right?
The young quarterback for the Saints has been really solid this season, even with the team struggling, but he was horrendous against the Chicago Bears on Sunday. Rattler had four turnovers in total, and the Saints’ offense couldn’t get anything going on the ground. Alvin Kamara led the team with 28 yards on 11 carries, and the Saints dropped to 1-6 on the season.
The bigger questions for this team at this point revolve around who is actually going to be around in a few weeks. When the NFL trade deadline passes, will the Saints look a lot different? It remains to be seen if they are going to be big sellers, but you get the feeling that this team might be interested in stockpiling assets for the future NFL Draft war chest.
And if Rattler has any more four-turnover games, we might hear the cries for Tyler Shough start to get louder. But Rattler has earned a longer runway and we’ll see how he does after flushing this one.
25. Arizona Cardinals
Nobody is going to sit here and accuse the Arizona Cardinals of not playing hard on Sunday, but the latest loss came at the worst possible time.
The Cardinals suffered a narrow loss to one of the best teams in the NFL, the Green Bay Packers, and they were anything but full strength for this one. Arizona’s injuries, especially offensively, are well-documented at this point. No Kyler Murray and no James Conner (among other backs being out) is detrimental for this team.
Even with the Packers racking up six sacks against them, the Cardinals managed to convert 50 percent of their third-down attempts this past week, but it was converting just two of their four red zone attempts that sunk the ship in this one. I said this loss came at the worst possible time, and that’s because instead of being 3-4 and being within range of the other teams in the NFC West, the Cardinals are already an afterthought behind the 5-2 Rams and 49ers, with the Seahawks yet to play in Week 7.