4. Arizona Cardinals
The last time a homegrown quarterback was drafted by and
started for the Cardinals was early in 1992, when
Timm Rosenbach got the call. Since then the position has been a
revolving door—Chris Chandler, Steve Beuerlein, Dave
Krieg, Boomer Esiason, a procession of recycled
signal-callers. High hopes, followed by same old, same
old.
Thus the state of Arizona was in a frenzy when the
Cardinals made Jake (the Snake) Plummer of Arizona State
their second-round choice last spring. A light at the end
of the tunnel at
last.
Not so fast. The kid will be brought along, but first
there's the matter of winning games—right now. Free agency
has made everyone impatient, and coach Vince Tobin, working
on the second season of a five-year contract, says,
"I'm not interested in
building for the future. This is a win-now league. If you say
the
future, you'll always be in the
future."
Which is why 28-year-old Kent Graham will start the season
as the Cardinals' quarterback, with practically the whole
state rooting for something bad to happen so that Jake the
Snake gets a chance.
It's nothing new for Graham, who's been an underdog his
whole college and professional career. One of the top
quarterback prospects in the country when he came out of
Wheaton (Ill.) North High, the big, strong kid had a cannon
for an arm. But he was
Tony Rice's backup at Notre Dame, and then he played behind
Greg Frey at Ohio State until he beat Frey out as a senior.
In 1994 he lost a preseason shoot-out to Dave Brown for the
Giants' starting job, then was a backup to Scott Mitchell
in Detroit and to
Boomer Esiason last year in Arizona until he took over in the
fourth game. Even then, he lost the job five games later
when he hurt his knee. How much of this could he
take?
"I never lost faith in myself," Graham says.
"I figured if I kept working, kept improving, my shot
would come." He is a pleasant guy, and huge
(6'5", 246 pounds), with one of the lowest salaries of
any NFL regular starting quarterback:
$650,000.
He has had his supporters through the years. There were
those around New York who felt that his tight spirals would
be just the thing for cutting through the nasty winds at
Giants Stadium, but the club had committed $4.6 million to
Brown. No
contest.
Graham has worked on his delivery, cutting down the
velocity and adding touch when he's had to, and that's what
Tobin says he likes about him. "He's got all the
immeasurables, including touch," the coach says.
"There's an awful lot of upside there. His
problem is, he just
hasn't played that much. What's he started, 22 games since
high school? This is the first time since then that he went
into training camp as the No. 1
quarterback."
And what is Tobin's evaluation of Plummer? Guarded but
still leaving the door open. "He looked good in
minicamp," he says. "There was an excellent
presence about him, he threw the ball well. But nothing was
live, and it's easy to go to the second and
third receiver when the bullets aren't flying."
When the Cardinals were clicking last year, it was usually
because they were putting up big numbers through the air.
Esiason hit the Redskins for 522 yards, three touchdowns
and a victory in overtime. When Graham produced three wins
in a five-game
stretch, he had days like his 366-yard, four-touchdown
performance against the Rams. That's what Tobin
remembers.
The running game is deceptive. LeShon Johnson, now a
backup, broke loose for 214 yards against New Orleans, but
Arizona also had five sub-60-yard rushing games. The
defense isn't good enough to keep the team out
of shoot-outs, which is why Graham figures so heavily. Big
man, big arm, small
paycheck.
"If I prove myself," he says, "the big money
will
come.—Paul Zimmerman
SCHEDULE
SKINNY
October and November will be the cruelest months for the
Cardinals, when five
intradivision games are crowded into six weeks. Two are at home,
against the Giants and the Eagles, and three are on the
road, against the Giants and the Eagles again, plus
the Cowboys. Arizona is 6-24 against those three teams in the
past five
seasons.
STRENGTH OF
SCHEDULE
NFL rank: 25 (tie)
Opponents' 1996 winning
percentage: .473
Games against playoff
teams: 6
Next team
| 
