The Arizona Cardinals enter Sunday’s game against the Bears with a streak of three games without quarterback Kyler Murray being sacked.
In addition, Murray has been sacked only 11 times all season, which is tied with Denver for the second-fewest in the league behind Buffalo’s 10. The Cardinals are also third in sacks per pass play. There were 10 sacks in the first four games of the season and only one in the last four.
Nearly 40 years ago in the final three games of the 1975 season was the last time a Cardinals offense went three consecutive games without a sack.
That was a Don Coryell-coached team that featured a non-mobile quarterback in Jim Hart protected by an offensive line coached by Jim Hanifan that lined up left to right with Roger Finnie, massive Bob Young, Tom Banks, nasty Conrad Dobler and Dan Dierdorf.
In 14 games, there were only eight sacks, but only six were of Hart and all eight came in four games. The Cardinals opened the season by not allowing a sack in their first five games. Dierdorf told Cards Wire it got to the point where Hart was throwing incompletions purposely so he wouldn’t be sacked.
The first two sacks came against the Giants and then there were another two consecutive sackless games, followed by three games with two in each.
In the ninth game of the season against Washington, kicker Jim Bakken was tackled after picking up a botched snap on a field-goal attempt and tried to run, but it was ruled a pass play and a sack, according to Dierdorf. When I told him the sack might have been a better result than had Bakken actually thrown the ball, Dierdorf laughed and noted that the kicker was the team’s emergency quarterback.
The following week, in the final two minutes of a 37-6 blowout of the Jets, backup quarterback Dennis Shaw was sacked on a play in which Dierdorf said he audibled out of a run to a pass. Dierdorf said Dobler was so angry at the quarterback that “I had to keep him from killing Shaw!”
After allowing two sacks the next week against Buffalo, there were none in those final three games making it a season in which the Cardinals allowed no sacks in 10 games.
While this year’s line is not as celebrated as the 1975 version, Murray provided a shoutout to them when he said Wednesday, “I can’t say enough about those guys. That O-line group and that relationship, they’re really the heart and soul of pretty much every team usually. We go as they go. They know that. Just love that group.
“Guys have been hurt. It’s no fun to see guys get hurt, but the next guy steps up. You got young guys playing, you got (Kelvin Beachum) playing as an older guy. It’s good to see.”
The day after last Sunday’s win over Miami, head coach Jonathan Gannon said, “A lot of guys are winning one-on-ones. It starts with (center) Hjalte (Froholdt) getting us in the right things and guys doing a good job. That’s what goes overlooked, too, sometimes are the backs, the tight ends and even the receivers where we’re chipping and chunking and thumping and thudding — all those different ways we term that for different reasons. I think they do a good job. (Running back) Emari (Demercado) was awesome yesterday (on blitz pickup). I thought (James Conner) was awesome in pass pro.
“Then when they (the opponent) get you, they have a say, too. When they attack a protection or they dial an un-scouted look or they bring certain people that you don’t think that they’re going to bring, Kyler, it’s hard to get him on the ground one-on-one back there. I think that’s a thing that makes it challenging for a defense is even if you have a free runner, can that guy get him on the ground? Their premier player has a free run at him and he eludes him and we score a touchdown. That’s playmaking. But it starts with the O-line. They’re doing a good job.”
Froholdt was quick to credit Murray for those sack-avoidance plays.
“You can’t really talk about zero sacks without mentioning Kyler,” he said. “I know there are a couple of plays that I know we need to clean up on protection and we are lucky to have the guy we have back there.”
Mimicking what Gannon said, Froholdt added, “There were a couple of plays where they schemed us up and had a free runner and it was just like, ‘Hey, they got us.’ He just keeps making plays running around. You can definitely see the free runner was like, ‘Damn, I thought I had him,’ but then they were too excited when they got in there, because usually there’s not a quarterback that can move like that.
“They’re like, ‘Hell yeah, sack’ and then he just does his little thing and then he’s all over the field and then he throws a touchdown. I assume it’s pretty (expletive) for them, but we love it.”
Murray also had some timely throwaways, to which offensive coordinator Drew Petzing noted, “Sometimes incompletions are the biggest plays of games.”
Petzing also referred to Murray’s ability to have a sense from where the rush is coming like on a touchdown throw where he was looking to the left, sensed Dolphins cornerback Jalen Ramsey coming from the right and spun around him to the right, came back to the left and hit wide receiver Michael Wilson for a 6-yard second-quarter touchdown.
“That’s all him,” Petzing said. “And I think that’s probably one of the more impressive parts of his game is his ability to feel everything around him without seeing it. It’s really unique for a quarterback to have that type of feel. Coupled with his ability to physically escape, it is really impressive.”
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