Edge rusher Markus Golden had 35.5 sacks in two stints with the Arizona Cardinals, including 12.5 in 2016 and 11.0 in 2021. His nine NFL seasons produced 51.0 sacks, and the ride ended earlier this summer when he retired while a member of the Pittsburgh Steelers.
He was in State Farm Stadium for the coin toss Sunday, and judging by what the Cardinals defense did in a 41-10 beatdown of the Los Angeles Rams, maybe they should have him around more often.
Golden always talked about going “hunting” for quarterbacks and that’s what the much-maligned pass-rush group did Sunday. Dennis Gardeck had three, Zaven Collins and Krys Barnes one and four came on third down. The one by Collins and two of Gardeck’s came in the first half as the Cardinals built a 24-3 lead.
Gardeck had sack celebrations that were tributes to Golden, who Gardeck didn’t know was going to be in the house.
“(He) did not tell me he was going to be doing the coin toss, which is absolutely absurd,” Gardeck said afterward. “He kind of got me charged up seeing him out there. That is my dog. One of my favorite teammates I have ever played with. He used to always do the St. Louis Stomp— a little something like this. He said, ‘We’ve been doing this since high school Dennis.’ That was a little nod towards Markus.”
Head coach Jonathan Gannon said, “I thought the rush was lights out. I thought the plan was good. It was executed in practice all week and we had a bunch of guys win one-on-ones. I thought the back end did a really good job of taking some things that they wanted to do away. Guys (were) winning leverages, guys (were) winning one-on-ones and getting on the right people.
“The help was displaced. The zone distribution was displaced where it should be. When you make the quarterback hold it, we had guys winning, so I thought that was kind of a winning edge for us.”
All the Cardinals coaches have unique ways of communicating, and Gardeck pointed to one of defensive coordinator Nick Rallis’ points of emphasis.
He said, “We talk about the SERR model. It’s something Nick is always talking about. Situation, Emotion, Response, and the last R is the Result. The R that you can control is the response. It depends on the situation, but a lot of the time it’s stick to the game plan and continue to play your football. Sometimes feeding into it can get you hyped and get you ready, but sometimes it can be a distraction. You’ve got to understand (and have) enough…
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