An hour after Thursday night’s loss, Kyler Murray was still at a loss to explain what happened on a throw that will be a talking point in Arizona all weekend.
Murray threw a back-breaking interception in the end zone on the Cardinals’ final offensive play, on a sequence where it appeared nobody was on the same page. While wide receiver A.J. Green took the brunt of the backlash, Murray didn’t shed much light on what happened — and even admitted he hadn’t spoken with the wideout after the game.
“No, I know he’s hot — emotions running high,” Murray told reporters, according to NFL.com. “Obviously … we weren’t on the same page and it cost us. We will be better because of it.”
Cardinals coach Kliff Kingsbury was a bit more illuminating on the play that sealed the Green Bay Packers’ 24-21 win — although a little reading between the lines was necessary.
Without calling out Green explicitly, Kingsbury did imply the veteran receiver ran the wrong route.
“We feel like it’s a safe throw, if he knew what route to run,” Kingsbury said, per NFL.com. “No question. They brought zero. It was the right place to go with the ball. Just didn’t communicate, on the same level, and the guy made a good play.”
Regardless of whether the route or throw was incorrect might be secondary to the latter piece of Kingsbury’s explanation: poor communication.
On the replay, it appeared the three receivers to Murray’s left operated as though the ball was coming to their side. They all appeared to turn to find the ball after making hard cuts in their routes. Green, by contrast, never seemed to expect the ball to come his way, at least not in the timing with which it was delivered.
One cog can make the whole machine appear malfunctioned, but in the end that’s part of the quarterback’s job, and Murray played an up-and-down game Thursday with two interceptions and no touchdowns.
Whoever ultimately was most at fault for the breakdown, the Cardinals suffered their first loss of the season and lost a potentially crucial end-of-season tiebreaker with the Packers, who now have an identical 7-1 record.
