Brad Cesmat
Ryan Fitzpatrick stands in the way of the Arizona Cardinals steadying the ship of their season. Nice guy, bad team. C’mon, anyone who’s going to try to give me hours of analysis on what the Cardinals must do to beat a bad Jets team, save it. The Jets are 1-4, they won’t have one of their best offensive players(WR Eric Decker, out with injury), and they are playing at the Cardinals home crib. This all adds up to a “W” for your hometown heroes on Monday night. Cut through the noise and it’s pretty simple. The Cardinals have already lost two home games, they have the Seahawks and Carolina the next two weeks. Losing Monday night to the J-E-T-S, Jets, Jets, Jets, would be unacceptable for ANYONE who’s been buying into the “All of Nothing” narrative..
Arizona State and Arizona football programs got their doors blown off on Saturday. The more dire situation is in Tucson where the Wildcats didn’t put up much of a fight in getting thrashed by USC. People are starting to ask if Rich Rodriguez is running out of time. I myself don’t think that’s the case, but I’m not in the head of Athletic Director Greg Byrne. It’s hard to explain how a program like Arizona is running out six walk-ons for special teams. I don’t know a media person who doesn’t like and appreciate Rich Rodriguez, but the facts are the Pac-12 Title from two seasons ago feels like it happened a long, long, long time ago.
As for the Sun Devils, I appreciate Todd Graham being so straight-forward about the anemic run-defense. Colorado rolled up 315 yards on the ground. “they ran the ball on us like I don’t think anybody has since we’ve been here.” he said after a getting pounded 40-16. Add to that, the Sun Devils didn’t do much of anything on offense. The final score says ASU scored 16 points, but truth be told, 10 of those points came off of special team botches by Colorado. This was a good ol’ fashioned butt-kicking. Looking more and more like another bowl trip to Vegas, El Paso, or San Diego. That script has been repeated over and over and over through the 23 years I’ve been watching Sparky football…
Thumbs up to Arizona State basketball for putting both their mens and women’s teams out on Mill Avenue on a basketball court for anyone and everyone to see on Friday night.The days of just pushing a team out on the floor for a Midnight Madness event in major sports city are over. Sure, in small college towns, those events still work(Tucson), but it’s forward thinking by ASU to put their product on display for strangers to see. You might snag some young blood for the regular season…
Watching the Suns in preseason and looking at their roster, I think Vegas got it wrong. IF..and it’s a huge IF…they stay relatively injury free, It looks more like a 40 win team, than a 26 win group as the “Smarts” like to think in Sin City…
A couple of former Arizona high school baseball standouts are on Arizona Fall League rosters. Diamondback prospect Jamie Westbrook(Basha) is on the Salt River Rafters and perhaps the future first baseman for the LA Dodgers,Cody Bellinger(Hamilton),is playing for the Glendale Desert Dogs…
