Jacob Lintner’s Opinion

This week, we take a trip down to sunny Glendale, Arizona for this match-up between the Detroit Lions and the Arizona Cardinals. The Lions are coming off of a well-deserved rest, while the Cardinals just finished up an impressive fourth quarter comeback against the St. Louis Rams in which they lost their $50 million-dollar man in Carson Palmer to a torn ACL. Because of this, the Cardinals are surely headed for a swift and painless downfall to the Detroit Lions.

As previously stated, the Cardinals lost their starting quarterback in their 31-14 victory over the St. Louis Rams. Luckily for the Cardinals, they didn’t need their quarterback in their 21-point fourth quarter comeback as they recorded two interceptions and one fumble recovery, taking one interception and the fumble to the end zone for two touchdowns and 14 points. Palmer did complete 25 of 36 passes for 241 yards and one interception, so it wasn’t too much of a loss to replace him with Drew Stanton. The Lions’ quarterback, Matthew Stafford, on the other hand, is still playing as well as he did in Week 1. He will only be able to perform better against the Cardinals because his team is coming off of their bye week, giving them much longer to rest and prepare for this game.

In addition to the Lions’ advantage at quarterback, they own the NFL’s best defense. They’re allowing a league-low 283.4 yards per game, while the Cardinals are giving up 352.8. That gives the Lions almost an entire extra offensive drive from kickoff to end zone. The Cardinals’ defense isn’t bad, though, making this a very low-scoring game. The Lions and Cardinals are allowing only 15.8 and 18.9 points per game, respectively. This type of game greatly favors the Lions, as they have forced an NFL-leading 28 turnovers, while the Cardinals have forced just 20. These extra possessions give the Lions a much better opportunity to win this low-scoring, grind-it-out game.

In conclusion, the Detroit Lions will surely hand the Arizona Cardinals their second loss of the season. Not only will the Lions’ defense dominate the Cardinals’ offense, but the Lions will take a great advantage of their superior quarterback. This gives the Lions an overwhelming advantage, even though they’re playing against the team with the best record in the NFL on the road (drops mic and walks out.)

Alex Connell’s opinion

This week’s match up is the Arizona Cardinals versus the Detroit Lions and it will be a great game. The winner of this week’s game will be the Arizona Cardinals. So far this season they are eight and one which means they are having a great season so far, last week they defeated the St. Louis Rams 31-14 and are on a roll. They are on a five game win streak and are looking better this season then they have in a long time. The Lions are having a pretty good season as well with the record seven and two but I think they will go into next week seven and three.

The Cardinals are missing their leader Carson Palmer who has 1626 passing yards this season and is the peak of his career. He is out this week with a torn ACL so second string quarter back Drew Stanton is starting this week. So far this season he has a total of 614 passing yards and is at about 50% accurate this season so far. He will be crucial key to this game because he hasn’t thrown an interception so far this season. The strength of this Arizona offense is the run game lead by Andre Ellington who has a total of 582 yards so far this season. Which means they not only have an effective pass game, but they have a strong run game to balance the team out. Which means they will have a fun day against the Detroit defense.

The Cardinals defense is going to be key to winning the game this week, their defense has a total of 14 interceptions this season which means they’ve been giving quarterbacks a hard time this season. Their secondary is lead by Antonio Cromartie who has a total of 3 interceptions and Jerraud Powers who also has 3 interceptions this season. Their defense has also been trapping the quarterbacks in the pocket quite a bit this season. Alex Okafor and Calais Campbell are going to be Matthew Stafford’s biggest fear this week, with a combined 6 sacks between the two this season and a total of 14 as a team, means that he has a solid reason to be afraid this week.

This week the Cardinals will continue to overcome the loss of their leader Carson Palmer, and the offense will have a very successful day against the defense of the Lions. Plus, the Cardinals will be giving Matthew Stafford a hard week, and will do a good job shutting him down. At the end of the day the Cardinals will move to nine and one.

Jacob Lintner’s Record: 5-2-1

Alex Connell’s Record: 2-5-1