From now till Thursday, September 1 — the day of the final preseason games — FantasyLabs is releasing our 2016 team previews: 32 previews in 32 days. Are you ready for some football?
Arizona Cardinals Team Preview
A 49-15 loss to the Panthers in the Conference Championship overshadowed what was a tremendous year for the 2015 Arizona Cardinals. The loss of cornerback Mike Jenkins in Week 3 of the preseason hinders a secondary still waiting for safety Tyrann Mathieu to return, but Arizona remains as good a bet as any to exceed its 10-game win total, the sixth-highest mark in the league. With an offense returning all of its core players and a defense that added blue-chip pass-rusher Chandler Jones in the offseason, the Cardinals should once again play well into January.
Quarterbacks
Carson Palmer
Palmer’s inefficiency in the Conference Championship is fresh on everyone’s minds (and it doesn’t help that he has been rather Jake Delhomme-esque in the preseason), but it’s impossible to discuss his overall performance in 2015 without first noting the good. He finished just 13th in passing attempts (537) last season but still threw for 4,671 yards and 35 scores, fourth-most among quarterbacks. Palmer also led the league in yards per attempt (8.7). On the season, he finished as the No. 7 quarterback in DraftKings (21.83) and FanDuel (20.02) points per game.
Then there’s the bad. Palmer’s season took a turn for the worst near the end of the season — right around the time that he jammed a finger on his throwing hand in Week 15. He averaged 237.6 yards and a 59.5 percent completion rate over his final three games (including the playoffs). Counting the preseason, Palmer has completed 72 of his last 128 passes (56.2 percent) for five scores and 10 interceptions.
With a top-10 salary among quarterbacks at DraftKings and FanDuel in Week 1, Palmer is suddenly a tournament-only option, as his sinking floor makes him unsuitable for cash games. However, as one of only four teams implied to score over 26 points in Week 1, the Cardinals do make for a perfect stack in guaranteed prize pools, with Palmer at the center of the stack.
Drew Stanton
When Palmer missed 10 games in 2014, Stanton averaged 203.2 yards and 0.7 touchdowns in eight starts. In other words, the Cardinals offense all but drowned. He also showed no favoritism with his wide receivers, as Larry Fitzgerald, Michael Floyd, and John Brown each averaged an 18 percent target share in his time under center. Arizona is a better team when Stanton celebrates from the sidelines than behind the offensive line.
Running Backs
David Johnson
A consensus top-five running back, the 6’1” and 224 lb. Johnson is a dark horse MVP candidate in only his second year. He was used sparingly behind Chris Johnson through the first 11 games of 2015, averaging fewer than five touches and 34.5 yards per game. Still, he scored eight touchdowns in that span, including a 108-yard kickoff return. Once Johnson the Elder fractured his tibia in Week 12, David became Goliath. From that point on, he was the the most valuable player on DraftKings, maybe even in the league.
Including the playoffs, D. Johnson averaged 19.5 touches and 123.4 yards per contest over the final seven games of the season. Palmer’s play may have gotten worse in the postseason, but Johnson recorded 15 carries and nine targets in both the Divisional Round and Conference Championship. Although he’ll constantly be priced as a top-three back across sites, his ceiling, volume, and versatility will make him an elite option each and every week.
Chris Johnson
As the Cardinals’ Week 1 starter last season, the artist formerly known as CJ2K averaged 17.8 rushing attempts in his first 11 games, but he finished with only six receptions on the year, whereas D. Johnson averaged 4.5 catches in seven games as a starter. CJ also recorded -3 yards and only one score on eight carries inside the five-yard line, which is what one might expect from a 30-year-old veteran weighing 195 lbs.
He showed that he could handle the lion’s share of carries if needed, but CJ ultimately has to catch more passes and score more touchdowns in order to return value. Despite the consistent volume, he averaged only a +0.66 Plus/Minus at FanDuel last season. Of course, if D. Johnson were to miss some games, it would be a lot easier for CJ to get more targets and goal-line carries without the superior back around to steal them from him.
Andre Ellington
No one truly knows whether Ellington is the Cardinals’ No. 2 or No. 3 back, but he’s likely still to play a role in 2016. At 5’9” and 199 lbs., Ellington is entirely too small to be anything more than an explosive change-of-pace runner, especially since he’s fearless and runs in a combative manner that seeks contact and lends itself to injury. In three seasons with Arizona, Ellington has averaged five yards per carry and 9.3 yards per reception, all the while battling a strained hamstring, sprained knee, strained quadriceps, sprained foot, hip pointer, PCL sprain, and turf toe.
His athleticism makes him valuable despite his limited touches, but he’s really not viable in DFS unless Arizona’s three-headed backfield somehow becomes a two-man rotation. You can’t totally discount a guy who’s just one year removed from opening his career by averaging over 1,000 yards and 40 receptions for each of his first two years.
Stepfan Taylor
Taylor was actually taken one round ahead of Ellington in the 2013 NFL draft but has yet to receive a real opportunity with Arizona. If that time ever comes, the Cardinals (or whichever team lobbies for his services next) just hope that his collegiate performance at Stanford, where he rushed for nearly 4,000 yards and 38 touchdowns over his final three seasons, translates to the league.
As everything stands now, Taylor’s high school highlights and altar ego are better than any film he’s produced in the NFL.
Wide Receivers
Larry Fitzgerald
Written off before the 2015 season even began, Fitz needed only nine weeks to eclipse his 2014 mark of 784 receiving yards. In his 12th year in the league, Fitz recorded a career-high 109 receptions last season, finishing with at least 1,000 yards (1,215) for the first time since 2011. Only Julio Jones (25.23), DeAndre Hopkins (23.65), Antonio Brown (23.45), Odell Beckham (22.25), Keenan Allen (21.44), and Brandon Marshall (21.28) averaged more DraftKings points than Fitz through the first 12 games. None, however, exceeded salary-based expectations as consistently as he did.
Once D. Johnson becoming the starting running back, Fitzgerald’s stock plummeted. He averaged 5.2 receptions and 44.6 receiving yards per game. He was the No. 33 receiver in DraftKings points over the final five games of the season.
Between Palmer’s struggles, a change in Arizona’s backfield, and Fitzgerald’s age catching up with him over a 16-game season, a number of factors are to blame for the 32-year-old’s sudden tailspin. Priced outside the top-15 at his position on DraftKings and FanDuel, though, Fitzgerald is clearly someone with top-five potential to open the season (despite his initial discount).
John Brown
In only his second season in the league, Brown finished with 1,003 receiving yards and seven scores over 15 games. His targets (102, 101) and touchdowns (five, seven) have stayed consistent this early into his career, but there are reasons to believe his overall production will see a slight dip in 2016. First and foremost, head coach Bruce Arians clearly doesn’t care whether it’s Brown or Michael Floyd who gets the action as Arizona’s No. 2 receiver, going so far as to state, “[Floyd] got hurt, [Brown] took his job and now he’s probably going to take it back.”
As a 5’10” and 179 lb. slot receiver, ‘Smokey’ also received 19 red-zone targets last season. He was targeted only six times inside the 20-yard line in 2014. Brown’s overall targets should stay the same, allowing him to exceed salary-based expectations in the right matchups, but the 6’2” Floyd is all but guaranteed to steal a few red-zone targets from him.
Michael Floyd
From Week 7 on, Arians juggled Floyd and Brown’s snaps without notice. Floyd logged 435 snaps over the final nine games of the season (including one healthy scratch) while Brown logged 399. It wasn’t until D. Johnson started over C. Johnson that Floyd set himself apart. Over the final five games of the season, Floyd out-targeted Brown 41-37 and recorded 104 more receiving yards along the way. As the cheapest of the three primary Cardinals wideouts, Floyd was easily the most valuable at DraftKings down the stretch.
Floyd costs more than Brown at DraftKings and FanDuel in Week 1. Although Palmer favored Floyd during that five-game stretch with D. Johnson as his starting tailback, the Cardinals’ distribution of targets and production at wideout remains anyone’s guess. Floyd is an above-average tournament option until further notice.
J.J. Nelson
At 5’10” and 156 lbs., Nelson is severely undersized even for a slot receiver. That still didn’t stop him from turning 11 receptions into 299 yards and two touchdowns last year as a rookie. Selected by the Cardinals in the fifth round of the 2015 draft, Nelson was so explosive at his pro day (4.28 40-yard dash and 127-inch broad jump) that the Cardinals and the wide receiver whisperer Arians couldn’t pass on him.
Nelson might seem like a guy who can be only a return man — and he is a phenomenal returner, having scored six touchdowns on kicks and punts in his final two seasons at Alabama-Birmingham — but J.J. is more than just a returner. Each season at UAB, Nelson led the team in touchdowns receiving. In his final two seasons, he also led the team in receiving yardage. As a junior, he actually scored a touchdown per game and captured 39.6 percent of UAB’s receiving market share in games he played.
Eventually, he might get a sustained chance to try his hand at being more than a part-time NFL receiver. Till then, he’s simply a strong returner and an intriguing double-dip stacking option in tournaments. He’s the sexiest girl yet to be asked to the prom.
Jaron Brown
The Cardinals’ other J. Brown has continued to take advantage of their injured receiving corps throughout the preseason, securing his role on the team. Since joining the team in 2013, Ja. Brown has played in every game, hauling in 44 receptions for 513 yards and four touchdowns. Like Floyd, Brown has a good combination of size and speed. If Fitz or Floyd were to miss time this year, the former Clemson product would likely see more snaps (and maybe targets) as a big-bodied injury fill-in.
Tight Ends
Jermaine Gresham
Gresham re-signed with the team on a one-year, $3.5 million deal. Evidently the Cardinals’ starting tight end job is worth something to someone.
Since Arians took over as head coach three years ago, Rob Housler has been the only tight end on the team to surpass 350 yards receiving (454). In 2015, Darren Fells and Gresham combined to average four targets and 35.6 receiving yards per game, 31st and 22nd at the position. If you forgot that the 28-year-old hide-and-seeker was even the league, that would be understandable. He might accidentally catch a couple of touchdown passes this season.
Troy Niklas
At 6’6” and 270 lbs., Niklas may be the most underrated athlete Arizona has at its disposal. Although his raw athleticism has led to only seven catches in two seasons thus far, Niklas was selected in the second round of 2014’s NFL Draft for his savvy blocking and combination of size and receiving ability. His ceiling is higher than Gresham’s, although there’s no telling what that will lead to on an offense that prefers to throw downfield. Niklas received only 179 snaps last season.
Two-Minute Warning
The Cardinals are favored in 12 of their first 15 games, finding themselves as dogs only on the road and against Carolina, Minnesota, and Seattle. The team has won at least 10 games under Arians each of the last three seasons. Even if Palmer’s recent performance carries over into the regular season, the Cards’ will likely still be able to win 10 games (and maybe even a championship) with replacement-level quarterback play.
