Photo Credit: Arizona Cardinals
It’s official. After seven underwhelming seasons, the Arizona Cardinals have informed Kyler Murray that he will be released when the new league year opens on March 11, 2026. Murray, once the shiny Heisman Trophy winner, once the face of a franchise reborn, leaves the desert with a 38-48-1 record, one playoff appearance, zero playoff wins, and a parting message that said it all: “I am sorry I failed us.”
At least he’s self-aware.
The numbers tell the story without mercy. In seven years, Murray threw for 121 touchdowns against 60 interceptions. The Cardinals made the postseason exactly once: a 2021 wild-card appearance that ended in a 34-11 blowout loss to the Rams. The final chapter was even uglier: Murray played just five games in 2025 before a foot injury ended his season, and when backup Jacoby Brissett stepped in and promptly outplayed him, the writing was on the wall in neon. Arizona is now on the hook for a staggering $54.7 million in dead cap money for 2026 alone… the price of admitting a $230.5 million mistake.
But here is the question that should haunt Cardinals fans for years: what if they had never made the pick at all?
Arizona held the No. 1 overall pick in 2019. The NFL draft trade value chart makes that pick arguably the most valuable asset in the sport. The Cardinals could have traded back — stockpiled first-round picks, second-rounders, players — and still likely remained in position to address quarterback. More painfully, they could have looked ahead. Sitting in what was still a rebuild, trading down in 2019 would have positioned them beautifully for the 2020 draft class, which featured a generational talent: Joe Burrow.
Joe Burrow. Photo Credit: Wikipedia
Burrow – calm, surgical, clutch – has since taken Cincinnati to a Super Bowl, consistently ranked among the elite quarterbacks in the league, and done it all without the drama, the contract chaos, or the infamous “homework clause.” He is, by nearly every measure, the superior quarterback Kyler Murray was always supposed to become but never did.
Instead, the Cardinals swung big, missed bigger, and now head into 2026 holding the No. 3 pick, a backup quarterback, and a mountain of dead money. The Murray era wasn’t just a disappointment: it was an entirely preventable one. Sometimes the biggest error isn’t the player you pick. It’s not having the patience to wait for the right one.