Stock Report: Cardinals Clutch When it Matters

The Arizona Cardinals arrived to the moment when they needed to.

Oct 6, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; Arizona Cardinals linebacker Kyzir White (center left) celebrates with teammates after intercepting a pass against the San Francisco 49ers during the fourth quarter at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images / Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images

The Arizona Cardinals shocked the world when they went to San Francisco and upset the 49ers. It was an outcome that very few saw coming; even the die-hard and/or delusional fans probably chalked this game up as a loss

Alas, that was not the case, and the Cardinals beat their division rivals and improved to a perfect 2-0 in NFC West divisional play... just like we all predicted!

After a win like this, there are several players who have improved their stock heading into week six of the year including some familiar faces. Some players "hurt their stock," but as you'll soon see, those are likely overreactions at best.

Let's break down the Cardinals who are on the way up and which are trending down.

Stock up

The offensive line

The 49ers entered this game with 14 sacks as a team captained by former Defensive Player of the Year Nick Bosa. On the flip side, the Cardinals offensive line had surrendered 10 sacks and a seemingly endless number of pressures. This was a mismatch for Arizona at best.

Instead, the Cardinals maintained the line of scrimmage and helped the offense run for 169 yards and 6.5 yards per carry between James Conner and Kyler Murray. They also only allowed one sack on Murray courtesy of Leonard Floyd, but the expectation was for Murray to be laying on the turf for most of the game.

Far from a great performance, it was a quality game for the offensive line that can hopefully be used as a stepping stone to build some momentum moving forward.

Michael Wilson

Wilson is on our stock up list for the second straight week. As far as I'm aware, that feels like a pretty good thing for any player, but seeing Wilson climb is extra exciting.

The second-year receiver led Arizona in receiving yards with 78 on five catches (six targets) including a 34 yard long. With Marvin Harrison Jr struggling to get going in this game (more on him later), it was a welcome performance against a top defense.

There were expectations that Wilson would step up as a complementary option opposite MHJ and he's been that more often than not this year. Shout to Wilson, who stepped up big for the offense.

The linebackers

We came into the year knowing that Kyzir White and Mack Wilson were going to be a formidable duo at linebacker and they have been that through five games as the number two and three tacklers respectively behind Budda Baker.

Yesterday was an advertisement for how good they can be, and it was scary good.

The duo combined for 10 tackles (five solo), one tackle for loss, and three turnovers. Wilson picked up a fumble from running back Jordan Mason as well as an interception. White had the game-sealing pick.

The two were dynamic and a force to be reckoned with. This feels like a game that they will build off of big time.

Nick Rallis

Three turnovers for the Cardinals defense plus a turnover-on-downs on the 49ers four second-half drives that resulted in a shutout. It doesn't get any better than that for creating halftime adjustments in a close game and Rallis deserves a game ball for his game plan.

While I wouldn't say the Niners dog-walked the Cards' defense in the first half, they had quite a bit of success on the unit, putting up 16 points on four of their five drives. Brandon AIyuk had his best game of the year with 147 receiving yards, and the run game grabbed 153 yards and 5.9 yards per clip.

The second-half was a completely different story, holding San Francisco to just 135 yards of offense plus the aforementioned shutout.

Rallis has had an up and down year calling the defense, but this was one of his better games.

Stock down

I want to make a note before we get into our two players listed under stock down -- It's about as minuscule as it comes and to some extent could be argued as an overreaction. That said, we can't just leave this space blank.

Not too much went wrong for the Cards in an impressive win over the 49ers, but a couple of guys did struggle. We'll talk about them below, but don't consider this as a "hit the panic button" segment of stock down.

Kyler Murray

Was this Murray's worst game of the season? I mean, you could argue it was, but he still scored two touchdowns including a 50-yard run. He also completed just over 63% of his passes and threw just his second interception of the season. His 79.2 passer rating was his second lowest of the season.

So yeah, maybe this was his "worst game of the year," but it was anything but a bad game. On the road against the reigning NFC champions, Murray was fine and did enough to helped the Cardinals win. That's all that matters.

Marvin Harrison Jr

Is MHJ the streakest receiver in the NFL? I have no idea because there are 32 other teams and I'm sure there are several "all-or-nothing" receivers. However, Harrison has certainly been just that.

Harrison grabbed just two catches for 36 yards on seven targets. It was his second worst game of the season after his NFL debut against the Bills.

However, Harrison pulled in a 22-yard catch on fourth down to keep a Cardinals 14 play second-half drive alive that ended with the go-ahead field goal that proved to be the winning score.

MHJ has had some snoozer games this year and this performance was one of them. But, a clutch fourth down conversion and his previous three-games don't have me worried one bit.

Maybe fantasy football owners are panicking, but I'm not and neither should Cardinals fans.

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