This Friday, our Arizona Cardinals travel to Green Bay and face the defending Superbowl champions in another preseason match-up. Week 2 of the preseason is usually when teams will play their first stringers for the entire first half. It varies from team to team of course, but I expect we'll see tons of Kolb, Fitz as well as the offensive and defensive starters. This will be a good test for a revamped Cardinals team, with limited practice time and well frankly it could get ugly.
The Packers and Cardinals have given us some wild games over the past few years, ranging from a high scoring meaningless preseason game, all the way to the highest combined score in a playoff match up. One thing you know about the Packers is that wherever they are, they will bring it. Not to mention that this is their first home game after winning the Superbowl, so while this is only a preseason game, it won't be meaningless.
The last time Kevin Kolb played the Packers, it did not end up so well for him, heck he may not even remember playing them because of the concussion he received via a Clay Matthews tackle. The Packers are great at disguising their blitz packages and while it's only a preseason game, I expect them to send pressure and try to confuse Kevin Kolb. Compound that with our offensive line problems and Beanie who while having improved, does still not excel in blitz pickup, we could see quite a few sacks on Friday.
This might also be a wake-up call on the defensive side of the ball for the Cardinals. Not only do we have to deal with both Ryan Grant and James Starks, but their whole complement of receivers and tight ends may be a lot to handle. From guys like Greg Jennings and Donald Driver, to James Jones and Jermichael Finley, we could have a lot of blown assignments with our new defensive system as well as playing rookies and unknown prospects like AJ Jefferson at CB. It will be interesting to see if Horton decides to bring extra pressure to try to force Rodgers into quick throws. Unfortunately, Rodgers has above average speed for a QB and can easily turn what looks like a sack into a 5 or 6 yard gain and that's not including the times he'll thrown a frozen rope completion for a 15 or 20 yard gain. This will surely be a test for all members of our defense.
Even though I think this game has the possibility of turning into an ugly affair for the Cardinals, the plus side is that it's only a preseason game and it will give our entire team a chance to improve against one of the most talented teams out there. Hopefully the organization, players and fans can take this game in stride and use it as a learning tool instead of freaking out and start clamoring for Whisenhunt to be fired and for Max Hall to be our starter. Then again, I could be utterly wrong about how I see this game going.
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