"In the NFL There's No Easy Teams": Keith Butler Knows Steelers Are No Stranger to Overlooking Teams
PITTSBURGH -- The Steelers travel out west to play the 3-7-1 Arizona Cardinals who have struggled for plenty of unexpected reasons this season. With a first-overall draft pick at quarterback and a new head coach, many expected the Cardinals to make a bigger splash in the 2019.
Still, no team can overlook a group of players who have as many weapons as Arizona. Kyler Murray is a duel-threat phenom in just 12 NFL games. Larry Fitzgerald and Christian Kirk are playing as two top tier wide receivers and with the Kenyan Drake at running back, there's possibilities of hope in the future of this team.
For Steelers defensive coordinator Keith Butler, the Cardinals aren't a team to overlook. In fact, no team in the NFL is. The Steelers are experienced in the art of losing games they shouldn't, and they've learned to never take any record for granted.
"It's always a challenge. In the NFL there's no easy teams," Butler said. "You look at what happened to us last year, if you don't know the history; we were 7-4-1. We went out to the west coast last year too, to a 3-8 team; that don't mean nothing. Everybody says 3-8 teams should be easy, no. This is the National Football League, you can lose to anybody at any time. So we have to go out there and be ready to play."
What makes the Cardinals a team to worry about is their competitive nature. Butler highlighted that the NFL is filled with some of the fiercest competitors in the world, and no one player can be overshadowed.
That's also what makes this league and it's players great. According to the defensive coordinator, everyone in the Steelers' locker room loves when they can prove their the best over others.
"The great thing about the National Football League is the competition," Butler said. "The guys who play the game, they love to play the game because of competition and they're in the competition because they''re good at competition. That's the great part of it. For me and a lot of the other guys who play, they enjoy it."
As for how well the Steelers will need to contain the Cardinals offense, Butler says they're sticking to their normal quota.
"I think they're 27 probably more than anything else. They came back last week, and the Rams did a good job of defending them last week, and then they were off for a week so I'd expect they'll be ready for us," Butler said. "It'll be at home, they've been off the bye week already so they'll be ready for us. Ultimately, if we could keep them under 20, but as always our goal to keep everyone we play 17 and under."
