Cardinals will be a formidable opponent especially in the desert where the weather conditions will be perfect and their impressive passing game, which is fueled by the two best WRs in football, Boldin and Fitzgerald and a revitalized Warner at qb, can really put up some yards and points. Cardinals have scored 289 points, tied with the Jets for second in the NFL, trailing only the Giants with 292. As good a thrower as Warner is, his reputation is that he tends to hold the ball a little too long - at least he did when he was playing for the Giants, he can be bothered by a pass rush (what qb isn't?) and he tends to fumble a lot when he gets hit. I once did an analysis of which qb's have fumbling problems, because I felt that simply looking at total number of fumbles was not an accurate enough indicator. Some qbs may not fumble because they have a great OL and never get hit, for example. The converse of course is also true; qb's that play behind an awful OL are more likely to fumble. In order to do my analysis I needed to look at the number of times the qb was hit, the number of times he fumbled and therefore could develop the fumble rate. To get the number of times the qb was tackled, I looked at number of runs and number of sacks and used that as the denominator to calculate the fumble rate. I didn't do this for every qb that was then playing in football, but I did take about 20 of the starters in the league at the time. The qbs that scramble and run a lot were near the top of the list - Daunte Culpepper was very high up there, as was former Saints qb Aaron Brooks, but right near the top of the list were Kerry Collins and Kurt Warner. I haven't done this in a few years so the stats surely have changed, but it was an instructive exercise. Kerry Collins started fumbling less the year after I did this analysis so maybe Warner has cleaned up his act also, but the point remains - if you get after Warner with a pass rush, because he is not mobile, you can bother him and you may be able to force him into some turnovers. The converse is certainly true - if you don't pressure him and he is allowed to sit back in the pocket all day, he will kill you in the passing game with those outstanding receivers.
From the statistics, it appears that Arizona's OL is pretty good and they protect Warner well. Cardinals have allowed 18 sacks this year, while Giants have allowed only 12 of Eli Manning. But the Cardinals have attempted way more passes than the Giants, 386 to 305, so the rate at which the Cardinals allow sacks is only a little worse than the Giants. Cardinals allow Warner to be sacked on 4.7% of his pass attempts, while Eli is sacked 3.9% of the time, not a huge difference. Incidentally, the lowest rate in the NFC is the Saints at 2.0% and the worst is the Lions at 11.2%. The Cardinals average only 3.4 yards per rush and have run for 869 yards on the year. They have passed for 3,058 yards - an incredible average of 305.8 yards per game, so clearly they are a pass-based offense. Whereas the last few weeks, the Giants came in with a defensive game plan to stop the Ravens, the Eagles and the Cowboys from running the ball, clearly this week they have to come in with a game plan to stop the pass and to rush the passer. The Cardinals have turned the RB duties over to rookie RB Hightower and benched Edgerin James, so maybe their running game will be more dangerous and they will be more balanced offensively.
Last week Flacco made some plays against the Giants in the passing game particularly when the Giants were sitting back in zone defenses. Giants gave a cushion underneath in their zone and Flacco was able to find and hit his men. They blitzed selectively against the Ravens, which is a pattern they have been following the last few weeks. I think the Giants will be a little more aggressive in their pass rush and their defense this week for a few reasons: (1) they will not be afraid of Warner scrambling away from them and therefore will come with more blitzes, more line stunts, wider pass rushes that don't require the rushers to stay in their lanes and keep the qb in the pocket. (2) they may show some zone, but I think they will play more man-to-man with safety help because the Cardinal WR can make yards after the catch if they give up easy stuff underneath a soft zone.
Corey Webster and James Butler came out of the last game healthy and Kevin Dockery practiced fully on Wednesday, so he should be coming back this week, meaning that the db-field will be at close to full strength. I would like to see a lot of K Phillips this week at safety instead of Butler, because speed and range at the safety position will be more important this week to contain the passing game than a strong tackler like Butler who does well in giving run support.
Because the Cardinals pass so well and run relatively little and not very effectively, Giants should play a lot of nickel, getting an extra DB on the field, even when Arizona is not in a sure passing down and when they don't have 3 or 4 WR's in the game. Giants should trust that they can control the running game even without the extra LB in the game. Danny Clark and Chase Blackburn are not great in pass coverage, so I think this is particularly important against the Cardinals this week.
On defense, the Cardinals front is very quick and athletic but a little undersized. Giants run the ball well with a power running game, so the strong temptation will be to pound the ball with that power running game against their defense, even if Jacobs has to sit out the game with his sore knee. However, I think the Giants can't rely purely on the running game this week, they have to be prepared to pass the ball and put up some points against the Cardinals defense. It's hard to imagine that the defense, as well as they have played, will be able to completely neutralize the Cardinals incredible passing game. AZ will make some plays in the passing game and will put up some points - Giants have to be prepared to answer. Furthermore, the Cardinals are a little banged up in the secondary and they are in the middle of the league as far as passing defense, having allowed about 210 yards per game. But here is where I think they might be a little vulnerable in the passing game: they have allowed 19 TD passes which is the most in the NFC and they are allowing 7.3 yards per pass attempt, which is fourth worst in the conference, ahead only of the Seahawks, Rams and Lions. Teams have a passer rating of 91.2 against the Cardinals, also fourth worst in the conference, ahead only of those same three teams. I think they are vulnerable in the passing game and Giants should not take the approach that they only need to control the clock and shorten the game by running the ball. Giants should go after the Cardinals with a balanced attack and not be afraid to pass.
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