Takeaways From Arizona Cardinals Preseason Debut

ARIZONA -- The Arizona Cardinals are officially 1-0 in preseason play after defeating the Kansas City Chiefs 20-17 in Week 1 of exhibition play.

The Cardinals played their starters for a few series and also got to explore some of their depth pieces in the process against a considerably deep Chiefs squad.

For the latest edition of the Cardinals On SI podcast, we discussed each side of the ball and our takeaways from Arizona's preseason debut:

PODCAST: Reacting to Arizona Cardinals Preseason Opener

Comments From Jonathan Gannon After Win

Opening Statement:

“Good game, started not great with the takeaway and then they scored right away. Then we go all the way down the field and turn it over. But I told the team that’s good resilience. That’s going to happen in every game. It’s not going to go your way. But there’s no flinch and they battled. Some guys played some good ball in there today.”

On the health of the team following the game:

“(OL) Christian Jones had a knee (injury). (WR) Trishton Jackson I think had a thumb injury. (TE) Elijah (Higgins) ended up coming back in. I think he got spent and came back in. I think he stepped on his foot wrong there. But relatively pretty healthy.”

On the offense showing resilience after the interception:

“I thought that was good. They went all the way down the field and then we kicked it right there. But I thought that was really good. I thought he operated well and I think we had one explosive (play) maybe to (TE) Trey (McBride) there. But I thought that was really good. I thought the offensive line played well, they controlled the line of scrimmage, kept them pretty upright. (QB) Jacoby (Brissett) got hit twice to start there and then the offensive line settled down and operated pretty well.”

On QB Kyler Murray enjoying playing tonight when playing in the preseason:

“He’s a ball junkie, so he loves to play football. I think the team, not just Kyler, understood why we're doing what we're doing tonight. So they were excited about it. They were excited to get it on under the lights against the reigning AFC champs coming in here. (Chiefs Head Coach) Andy Reid, Hall of Fame coach. They were excited to play a really good team and get lathered up and bang a little bit, somebody other than themselves so it was good to see our guys ready to roll.”

On LB Jordan Burch disrupting the Chiefs offense:

“Tough until I watch it here in an hour but I did see him win some rushes which was good to see and winning the right way too. I can’t remember if he was in some but we lost contain one and I wasn’t happy about that. But I thought the defensive line, outside linebackers as a whole rushed well. I know (DL) L. J (Collier) had the sack but their quarterback seemed like he was under duress a little bit so that was good.”

On RB Emari Demercardo’s reliability and versatility:

“He’s a good football player and he wears a lot of hats. He comes in here, he is quiet, he competes every day. But he goes about his job. He is a pro and he showed up tonight.”

On the defensive line’s performance tonight:

“I thought they did a good job. We’ll always have things to clean up, but I thought for the most part, there was a couple runs that popped early off the top of my head. But then it seemed like that kind of got shored up. And again, not game planning and it sometimes it can be hard. They're in the wrong call to play the run and it's nobody's fault. It's not (Offensive Coordinator) Nick's (Rallis) fault or their fault. It’s just that they're in the wrong call. But I thought that they affected the quarterback and the run game seemed pretty good to me today.”

On DL Dante Stills making plays and what allowed him to take advantage of the opportunity:

“Constant improvement. I told him that on the sideline I feel like when he got here as a pup, he would have a good day and then a bad day, a good day and a bad day. Kind of riding a rollercoaster and he's been steady this camp. As steady as I've seen him over the course of two years and that's typically a good sign. He is consistently playing good ball right now.”

On whether it’s a necessary thing for an offense to throw interceptions in the preseason:

“You guys just talked to a quarterback. I think he just left it a little bit short. I thought that was a really good play by that guy because he was not covering the guy that he was throwing it to. So, that was hats off to him. That was a really good play. But Kyler knows the value of the ball, but again I think it's different when you're going against an opponent and it's live and it's really fast. It’s good to see the space out there and get his legs moving around a little bit out of the pocket and stuff because it’s faster. There's no doubt. I think that'll help him going into Week 1. But I want us to make sure that we protect the football. We overcame the ball today. I think it was three-two. I know we had the two picks, but they had the fumble, the interception and the other interception. So, they beat us on the ball there. You typically don't overcome that.”

On whether the team achieved everything he wanted it to achieve today:

“I think so. We'll look at it tomorrow and then I'll talk to the players too. But yeah, I do. We’re going to travel and go practice versus Denver, which is a loaded up day on Thursday, which will be really good for our guys against a really good team. So, that'll be cool. But I think just to knock a little bit of rust off and play fast when it's live is a little bit different. That’s what we were trying to get done today.”

On whether he was trying to be careful with LB Josh Sweat:

“Yeah, he could have played.”

On the three fumbles on returns:

“Live. We have to do a good job. We have to look at our ball security. We have to coach it. We have to drill it and we have to do a better job of that. Those guys know that. And defensively in practice, we need to create more attempts on the ball to make sure that our ball carriers, receivers, backs, whoever, they're ready for those shots. But they'll correct it.”

On if he wanted kicks to be returned when they looked like they may go out of bounds:

“Yeah, they had the green light. That's a new play. I thought (RB) DeeJay (Dallas), the one that he caught on the sideline, (WR Greg) Dortch the first one, you could make the case (that) maybe you should wait, but you can't really wait too long there. So again, for everybody in general, it's good to be under the lights live and we'll correct some mistakes and talk about some certain things that came up tonight and we'll learn from it.”

On WR Xavier Weaver and his improvement at the point of attack:

“Yeah, I thought he played well. I've told him I think (during) camp he's been a touch up and down, and he showed up today. I have a lot of confidence in him. He's a tough cover. The one slant that he caught before the touchdown in that drive I thought was really good. It was right in front of me, so I saw it. He beat press off a really big corner. He created space and won on a slant, catch and run. The slant, then the touchdown was a good play. He's a playmaker and he just has to make sure that his game stays consistent.”

On CB Darren Hall looking like he’s going to have another good preseason:

“Yeah, I thought it was great. He tackled well. The interception was awesome. ‘D’ Hall to me, he's a very fast processor. He is extremely intelligent. He has great movement skills and he can play multiple positions. He has good ball skills. You saw that tonight. That was a great pick, I thought. But he's a good piece for us, there's no doubt.”