The Cardinals Growing Pains: Team Endures Turbulent Journey to Reach New Heights
Two things can be right about the 2024 Arizona Cardinals:
Progress was made in Year 2 under the new regime. But man, was it painful at times.
With a 47-24 win over the San Francisco 49ers in the season finale on Sunday, the Cardinals head for the offseason at 8-9.
And you know what? That’s just about where everyone — outside of Arizona Sports’ Dave Burns’ 11-win pipe dream — pegged this team give or take a game or two. Even Vegas had Arizona in the 6.5-win range.
As former Cardinals head coach Dennis Green put it, “they are who we thought they were.”
Like it or not, progress was made in Year 3 under general manager Monti Ossenfort and head coach Jonathan Gannon.
This wasn’t the feel-good-story team from last year, where the bar was set exponentially lower given the mess the new guys took on and the still-recovering franchise quarterback.
Just playing to the whistle was a win for this group a year ago.
