Pre Season Game 1 in the Books for Cardinals; Chargers are Next

Picture Courtesy: Arizona Cardinals

By Francisco Romero. –  The Arizona Cardinals lost the first pre season game 34-19 against the Kansas City Chiefs on Saturday; in reality, during preseason, the score is what matters least.

First of all, the Cardinals came out of the first game without any serious injury. 

One of the highlights of the game was the return of Carson Palmer to the gridiron after being injured at the end of the season; he was perfect on his passes, finishing with 4-4 with 77 passing yards.

Palmer is slated to be the starter at the quarterback position, but Drew Stanton and Logan Thomas are in the hunt for playing time.

“I thought we executed at a high level, that’s what you want, you know you are not going to get many opportunities and many plays and the ones you do get you want to execute them and make sure you are firing in all cylinders and I think we did that,” said Cardinals quarterback Carson Palmer after the game.

Overall head coach Bruce Arians was pleased with what he saw on the field, but he also mentioned that the team will grow from this first game, “We got a good start from our first team offense and defense, set a nice tempo where we can be and where we are at, at this time and then we found out a lot of things about young guys.  Some can’t tackle, others hold on running plays,” said Arians during his postgame interview.

Running back Andre Ellington finished the game with 3 rushing yards on 3 attempts, but finished with 59 receiving yards on 2 catches. 

Ellington who was injured last year is looking forward to feeling completely recovered, “I still got a lot of work to do, I just got to get my cardio back up and I’ll be fine,” said Ellington.

The Arizona Cardinals will host the Sand Diego Chargers on Saturday August 22^nd at University of Phoenix Stadium for their second preseason game.