Cardinals Punditry Check: Arizona Was Everyone's Favorite Landing Spot, and the Field Went 0-for-8 | MissedTakes Daily
Between February 2025 and February 2026, pundits kept sending players to Arizona. Aaron Rodgers, twice. Malik Willis, twice. Kirk Cousins, Kenneth Walker III, Breece Hall, D.J. Reed. Every one of those eight calls is now graded at 0 accuracy. The Arizona Cardinals file has 16 graded Trade and Signing Calls in total: average accuracy 50, average skill delta -18.75, the worst skill of any prediction type with a meaningful sample on this club.
The exception is worth naming. In March 2025, Dalton Feely predicted Josh Sweat would leave Philadelphia to reunite with Jonathan Gannon in Arizona. He did. Baseline 0, accuracy 100, skill +200 — the single best graded Arizona take in the database.
The other eight hits are all the same conversation. Seven separate Kyler Murray takes — from Tom Pelissero, Ian Rapoport, Dan Graziano, Tim Hasselbeck, John Middlekauff, Shannon Sharpe and Alex Clancy — graded 100 accuracy and 0 skill delta apiece, because the naive answer (nothing happens, he stays put) scored exactly as well. Across all Murray takes on file: 9 graded, 98.1 accuracy, 0.00 average skill. A year of Murray discourse that beat a coin-flip on nothing.
The draft is where Arizona punditry actually works
Mock picks are the best-populated Cardinals category by a distance: 71 graded, 68.3 average accuracy, +35.5 skill. Arizona picked at No. 3 in 2026 and took Jeremiyah Love. The field split three ways — Arvell Reese (who went 5th), David Bailey (2nd) and Love. Everyone in that cluster scored well; Vinnie Iyer had Love at 3 back on March 2 for a clean 100. Mike Renner is the closest thing to a mind-changer here: Bailey to Arizona in January (95.76), Love to Arizona in April (100).
One honest caveat about our own grading. Three near-identical calls were scored zero because the transcript garbled a name — Field Yates and Pat Fitzmaurice on "Arvel Reese," Lance Zierlein on "Jeremy I Love" — each marked undrafted, while the correctly spelled versions of the same picks scored 91.7 and 100. Read the 68.3 as a floor.
What they're saying right now: 2-15 to over .500
Nothing in this list is graded yet. It's the widest live disagreement on the club.
| Pundit | 2026 call |
|---|---|
| Moe Moton | 2-15 |
| Nick Wright | 3-14, "might be the worst team in the league" |
| John Breech | 3-14 |
| Gregg Rosenthal | "stumble into four or five wins" |
| Donnie Druin | clears last year's three wins |
| Chris Brockman | over .500 |
For calibration: Arizona has only 3 graded season win-total takes ever, averaging 26.7 accuracy. Colin Cowherd said 10-11 wins in May 2025; the team went 3-14, and the take graded 0.
The other live split is Marvin Harrison Jr. Evan Tarracciano is "banking on a rebound campaign"; WalterFootball says he "will probably continue to be a disappointment." The graded record leans hard toward the pessimist: 4 Harrison takes settled, 25.0 average accuracy, -20.19 skill, including Cynthia Frelund's 8 receiving touchdowns against an actual 4 and Fitzmaurice ranking him WR22 in a season he finished WR48.
Who to believe on this team
Only Nathan Jahnke clears a floor of five graded Arizona takes with an unblemished record: 5-for-5, 100 accuracy, +160 skill. Druin, the highest-volume Cardinals voice with 68 takes on file, sits at 90 accuracy across 9 graded — but a -10 MissedTakes Score, because roster-bubble calls mostly restate the obvious. His one miss graded yesterday: Olisaemeka Udoh missing the 53, 0 accuracy, -200.
And note what gets talked about versus what gets settled. Depth chart is Arizona's biggest topic — 128 takes — with 8 graded. The running back room draws 103 takes and grades at -43.7 skill, the worst position room on the club, courtesy of Trey Benson sleeper calls (4 graded, 20.8 accuracy, -150).
The league day in brief
The past seven days graded 1,154 takes, every one of them a Roster Spot Call — cutdown week clearing the books. Another 449 new takes came in. Perfect scores went to Jared Koch on Brevin Jordan and Scott Kennedy on Atlanta keeping three quarterbacks; zeroes went to Paul Schwartz and Tarracciano, both of whom had Darius Slayton cut. Jahnke's sprawling PFF preseason recaps produced both 100s and 0s in the same document.
Zierlein still leads the board at 39.1 on 38 graded takes, with Daniel Jeremiah (22.2, 278 graded) the only pundit rated "established" in the top ten — everyone above him is still on limited confidence. Full standings on the leaderboard.