Sticking With Kyler

The knot is tied between Gannon and Murray. - This tandem will be back together in 2025 (realistically there is no choice).

You hit nail on head however for 2026,  Kyler's contract is much easier to get out of without a severe cap hit.   Cards have plenty of cap space and KM1 needs to feel some pressure to his QB1 position on team.   

I am hoping Monti signs either Justin Fields or Daniel Jones for a backup QB position in 2025 with the opportunity to be the starting QB in 2026.   Kyler needs to feel pressure by bringing in a QB which has started many games for an NFL team.  I am still researching on college QB's and some of them have had their draft stock drop in the latter half of the college football season (e.g. QB Beck - Georgia and QB Nussmeier (LSU) - the latter had his team lose 3 games in a row where he underperformed)  On the other hand, a QB that IMO improved greatly over the 2024 college season and is far more athletic than observers would think and at 6'4" 220 lbs fits the stature of what NFL QB's should be -- his name is an intriguing one:  Riley Leonard of Notre Dame.   He fits one of Bill Parcells rules for drafting QB's - do they have over 25-30 starts ... Leonard when he plays IU will be starting his 40th college football game.

I  look forward to seeing how some of these QB's play in the College Football playoffs and bowl games.   One thing watching NFL games is it is VERY helpful if your QB is big enough to get a team first downs on key 3rd or 4th downs with the "tush-push."   I don't like this play and thought they would vote it out of football but going forward this does NOT appear to be happening so bigger, stronger QB's are very advantageous to winning NFL games.

P.S. I should add that I am VERY interested in watching IU vs. Notre Dame and Riley Leonard vs. my "sleeper" draftee third-day QB in Kurtis Rourke who is very adept at running a pro-style offense and now his busted thumb on throwing hand will be completely healed.   Rourke is 6'5" and 230 lbs. and please note the following:

Rourke is the highest-rated passer in the FBS per Pro Football Focus (92.3) and owns the second-best passing efficiency (182.7) in the nation. He ranks No. 2 in the Big Ten and No. 12 in FBS with 21 passing touchdowns (AI search with a date of 11/13/24)  My addition - he has thrown just 4 INT's in all of 2024 despite playing several games with a bad thumb on his  throwing hand.

I just found this article today from the33rd team and Rourke is mentioned in 2 categories of QB play amongst all college QB's (I wrote the above before seeing this article but see video where he is TB-like in subtle movements in pocket to avoid rush and allowing more time until his target breaks open):

QB 2025 potential draftees and their Skills

I would take Fields as back up all day long.  Will be a matter of if he thinks he can get a starting job elsewhere.

IMO we are automatically a better team if we replaced Kyler with maybe 5-7 different Qbs at most, and none are available. And rookies are a crap shoot. Sometimes even #1 picks aren’t Tom Brady.

😎

Depends on how you define better.  The wins above replacement score might not improve, but if someone else can put up the same performance, much cheaper, then net-net we are better even if the person isn't more talented.  It's all about how close the two comparisons are talent wise, and the cost differential.  If someone else can perform within 2% of Kyler's results, but it saves us 50%, then our overall record likely improves because of what the savings would buy us elsewhere.  That was always the issue with Kyler's monster contract.  It hamstrung us adding talent elsewhere and it took years to clean up cap to create more space.  Now that we have a lot of space, we could see vast improvements just by adding talent elsewhere and finding a game manager.  Let's face it, Kyler's been more of a game manager this year, even when he's not turning the ball over.

Monster contracts for QBs make no sense unless you know you've got a Mahomes type guy under center.  

To Do List for Monti after this season unless the Cards go 4-0 or 3-1 with the latter being a close loss to Rams but the offense scoring 28+ points

• Fire Petzing and think about bringing in Vikings QB coach and former Cardinal Josh McCown who has helped develop Sam Darnold this year
• Sign Justin Fields with the idea of pushing KM1 but also seeing how he picks up the offense to possibly be the QB1 in 2026 if Kyler repeats these 2nd half collapses in performance again.  At least we know Fields at 6'3" 227 lbs can get a yard with the "tush-push" to get 1 yd on critical 3rd and 4th downs.
• Fire WR coach and bring someone in who can get MHJ much closer to his ceiling as a player.  A coach who can light a fire with him as this is the NFL and he needs to be much more of an alpha or did growing up with $$ develop a "soft" side of the player.   Everything says he works hard so I just think it is a mentality between the ears which needs to be developed.  Of course, he possibly might hate the Drew Petzing offense but I don't understand the lack of separation.
• JV keeps hinting on his podcast that Monti inquired about Micah Parsons with Cowboys before the trade deadline.   He has intimated Monti would trade two (2) high draft picks for getting Parsons and the Cards have plenty of cap space to comfortably sign Parsons and Fields with the latter on a 1 yr deal.
• Draft DL, CB and OL with first 3 draft picks.