Going into the 2026 season, the Arizona Cardinals decided to hit the reset button. That means bringing in a new head coach in Mike LaFleur, as well as moving on from former first overall pick Kyler Murray at quarterback.
Murray is with the Minnesota Vikings now. Meanwhile, the Cardinals have plenty of questions to answer at the quarterback position.
Brad Gagnon of Bleacher Report took notice of the quarterback situation in Arizona. In a ranking of the 10 worst quarterback situations in the entire NFL, the Cardinals ended up with the second-worst situation. The only team with a worse situation at this point is the New York Jets. Worse, no other NFC West team makes an appearance in the rankings, as the Cardinals begin a rebuild.
Diving into the Current Arizona Cardinals Quarterback Situation
GettyArizona Cardinals quarterback Jacoby Brissett
The Arizona Cardinals currently have three quarterbacks on their roster. That includes two veteran backups in Jacoby Brissett and Gardner Minshew. Along with those two, Kedon Slovis is also on the roster.
Brissett is going to be in his second season with the Cardinals. He ended up being the team’s primary starter, playing in 14 games and starting 12 of them. In that time, he completed 64.9% of his passes for 3,366 yards and 23 touchdowns. That’s part of the silver lining that Bleacher Report also noted in its rankings. Gagnon wrote, “Brissett was actually a higher-rated passer than Stroud, Trevor Lawrence, Baker Mayfield, Caleb Williams, Patrick Mahomes and Bo Nix in 2025.”
For his part, Minshew was a backup with the Kansas City Chiefs a season ago. It was his fifth NFL stop, and in 2023, he made it to the Pro Bowl. Meanwhile, Slovis has thrown two passes in his NFL career.
Questions about the quarterback situation in Arizona aren’t anything new. Despite that, Mike LaFleur recently insisted that the Cardinals are happy with where their team is at right now.
“We like where we’re at right now,” LaFleur said.
There may be a good reason why LaFleur feels that way. Gagnon added to that, but admitted there are some major concerns too. The reality is that the long-term solution at quarterback isn’t on the roster yet.
“That success in a small sample for Brissett is dwarfed by his career 86.4 rating,” Gagnon wrote. “He is 33, while Minshew (who is on his sixth roster in seven years) will be 30 in May. They may swing at Simpson or one of those middle-round quarterback candidates, but this is realistically about 2027 at this point.”
ESPN Insider Predicts the Arizona Cardinals Make a First-Round Trade for a QB
GettyAlabama Crimson Tide quarterback Ty Simpson
The Arizona Cardinals have the third overall pick in the NFL Draft this year. Normally, that’s a good spot to draft a quarterback from, but this year, there is only one quarterback expected to go early in the first round, Fernando Mendoza, and he’ll likely be off the board by then.
So, if Arizona wants to draft a quarterback, it’ll need to get creative. ESPN reporter Ben Solak had a good idea of what the Cardinals could do in a recent mock draft.
The solution could be to trade back into the first round and select Ty Simpson. One spot that makes sense to do that is at No. 31, when the New England Patriots are set to select. That way, they could select Simpson with a pick more in line with where he’s valued, have him take some time to transition to the NFL behind a veteran, before eventually becoming the quarterback of the future in Arizona.
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