I'm writing this after seeing the scores of Sunday's games in week 12. The Seahawks have lost and the Rams have won. No matter what the result of Monday Night's game against the 49ers will be, a team with a losing record will be in the lead of the NFC West, which is possibly the worst division in all of football right now.

However, this situation presents a unique opportunity for the Arizona Cardinals in that they have a chance to go 4-7 and be exactly one game back of the Rams and Seahawks for the division title. This, of course, is dependent on the fact that the Cardinals actually win the game. But considering how abysmal this team has been during the course of its losing streak, it's amazing to me that we could see them "In the Hunt" before long when most people (including myself) had written their entire season off.

I'm going to make a bold prediction for Monday night's game: if Arizona wants to win, they need to leave Derek Anderson on the bench. If he starts, they're going to lose.

What do you all think?

At home against Seattle, Arizona's season hung by a thread. It was a must-win game and Arizona lost. Last week on the road against Kansas City, the game couldn't have mattered less. Players take pride in what they do on the field and no one wants to lose, but the fact of the matter is that the NFC West crown will be contested between the Seahawks and the Rams. As a Cardinals fan, I am pulling for the Rams because they haven't been in the been in the Super Bowl since (drumroll please) Kurt Warner played for them. In this post, I will attempt to break down Arizona as a team and describe what led to them having a 3-7 record after week 11, and likely to finish with a losing record on the year. Since the season is effectively over anyway, I thought a team analysis would be in order.

Coaching:

Ken Whisenhunt is the man for the job at head coach. Don't let one down year fool you. Todd Haley went 1-15 last year, but now he's on the winning track. While Whisenhunt hasn't always made the best decisions, a lot of the blame deserves to go to the assistant coaches and players. A coach can do everything he can possibly do, but if the players don't want to show up on Sunday, the team is going to lose.

A lack of offensive coordinator hurt the team early on in the year. The offense appears to be competent enough in garbage time (a point I'll get to later), so it's not as though Whisenhunt is a bad play-caller. But a guy like Todd Haley on the sidelines getting fired up and demanding more effort out of his team would go a long way. When you get right down to it, more effort is what the offense as a whole needs to give.

The defensive coordinator, Billy Davis, has been terrible. Let me just say this to be perfectly clear: the secondary isn't the problem for Arizona. There have been guys getting burned and such, but the main problem is the lack of a pass rush and the inability to blitz. When you give the quarterback tons of time, he's going to connect with somebody out there, and it doesn't matter how much talent you have in your secondary. Guys look bad on film covering receivers but the truth of it is that without being able to shorten the time limit that the QB has to release it, this sort of thing is going to continue- number one draft picks in the secondary or not.

Based on the performance of his offensive line, Russ Grimm has not done the best job this year. I think everyone knew coming in that Deuce Lutui, despite having a lot of experience in the system, remains a penalty machine and is good for at least one false start every week. Alan Faneca has been capable, but not outstanding. The running game has slowly improved, but it hasn't been nearly as successful as it has in years previous. This goes beyond the passing game: if you think an explosive passing game is all that's needed to get the running game going, go back and take a look at some footage of Edgerrin James running the ball under a Kurt Warner-led offense.

Quarterback:

The quarterback has been the biggest issue of the year. Derek Anderson remains the anti-clutch guy. He can deliver when there's no pressure, but in a situation in which he absolutely has to get it done, he fails. If Arizona came into the game up by 21-0 at kickoff, Anderson would probably play better. However, in a close game he doesn't deliver. His passes are generally inaccurate, but I think that has more to do with the mentality he brings to the game rather than any other factor. "Clutch" quarterbacks are described as guys who can get into the end zone often, and how often has Anderson led his team to touchdown-scoring drives?

Max Hall seems like the best option at QB right now (at least  to me). I'm willing to let the Tampa Bay game (in which Hall threw 14 points to the defense) as an aberration considering that Tampa Bay shut out San Francisco at home recently. I'd like to see Hall get another chance because while he isn't setting the world on fire with his play, he also is a lot more consistent and reliable. Had Derek Anderson started the game against the Saints earlier in the year, Arizona would have likely lost.

Running Back:

Not much to say here other than LaRod Stevens-Howling appears to be the better of the three RB's right now. Injuries have limited the season of Beanie Wells, and it's hard to know whether Hightower has lost a step or whether he's being underutilized as a result of Arizona always falling behind and needing to pass (this is a situation that dooms the team to failure because they are meant to play with a lead). The lack of a fullback has hurt the team. I'm wondering if it wouldn't have been better to have kept Dan Kreider for another season.

Wide Receivers:

Injuries have also limited this group. The rookie receivers for Arizona- Andre Roberts among them- haven't done a lot to inspire confidence in the coaches. Fumbles on punt returns and a lack of production on the offense have kept them on the bench now that the group of Larry Fitzgerald, Steve Breaston and Early Doucet are healthy. I truly believe is a group that can get 1400, 1000 and 700 yards respectively, but that would only happen with a quarterback whose play is the same irregardless of the score on the board.

Tight Ends:

The lack of a receiving tight end has hurt Arizona this year. Ben Patrick, Steven Spach and Jim Dray have been the guys doing the dirty work here, but none of them are catching a lot of balls. A guy like Jason Witten would make a huge difference in the offense because it would force someone of the opposing linebackers into coverage rather than ignoring a tight end while staying home to protect  against the run and/or blitz the quarterback. In the draft, I would look for a talented TE in the second round.

Defensive Line:

They can't stop the run and they aren't getting pressure on the quarterback. Darnell Dockett is now injured, so that leaves a lot of guys most people haven't heard of before to try and shut down the opposing team's drives. The unfortunate truth is that if they were good, they would have edged out the starters, but that hasn't happened. I don't want to use the term "manhandled" but the statistics would seem to point in that direction.

Linebackers:

Joey Porter leads the team in sacks. Does anyone miss Karlos Dansby? I certainly do. He was a playmaker and got all around the field and made tackles everyplace. Porter is more of a guy who rushes the quarterback. In trying to look for new linebackers, Arizona needs to find that guy who goes sideline to sideline and there is on every play. Don't worry about how many sacks or interceptions he gets- just get a guy who tackles everything.

Secondary:

The secondary has been much-maligned, but I'm willing to bet they're also been exhausted quite a bit. Teams are running up the score on Arizona, constantly getting deep passes and first downs. This has to be wearing down the defenders. I don't care how much stamina you have, if the other team puts up 51 points on you, you're not going to be the same ball-hawking guy that everyone expects. I wouldn't change too much on the secondary, because this is a group that with the right coaching can be very tough.

Special Teams:

Jay Feely has been invisible thanks to the ineptitude of Derek Anderson. He seems like a good kicker, but he hasn't got a lot of opportunities.

Sadly, LaRod Stevens-Howling appears to be the team's MVP this year. He's always a threat to return it deep and he ought to be getting more time on the offense.

The punt returners have been messy. Arizona still has yet to find that guy like DeSean Jackson who's really dangerous...but then, guys like that don't come along often anyway.

With all that said, the matchup on Monday night against the 49ers looks to be one of the more pathetic games I've ever seen. Both teams are 3-7, neither team is making the playoffs and the only thing left to play for is pride. I know that these two combined for some good games before, but I have a feeling this one will either be one-sided or a shining example of what you don't do in the NFL. As an Arizona Cardinals fan, I'm already looking forward to the draft.

After the disappointing loss to Minnesota in week 9, Arizona has fallen to 3-5. Realistically, it could be a lot worse. The team could be 1-7.

In week 1 against the Rams, a blocked field goal proved the difference in the game. In week 3 against the Raiders, the Cardinals won because Sebastian Janikowski couldn't get it done. The Cardinals have been blown out twice and the only team they really beat all the way through was a confuzzled Saints team that had lost its step for a moment.

The good news is that things are getting better. The team is committing less penalties, the quarterback play has improved and there is more of a commitment to the running game, even if it isn't working that well so far. The bad news is that Arizona's defense is just as bad as everyone remembers it. We're talking Clancy Pendergast bad. We're talking go up against a quarterback with injuries to his arm, ankle and chin who is also over 40 and let him get 400+ yards on you bad. As was the case in last year's playoffs, Arizona's D couldn't stop anybody and remains a group that relies on turnovers rather than stopping people.

With that in mind, I'm going to look at Arizona's week 10 matchup against the Seahawks. The Cardinals need to win the game but it's not guaranteed that they will. Here are three potential scenarios for what will happen in the division next week (excluding ties):

-Cardinals win, Rams lose. Everyone in the division is stuck at 4-5. I'm not sure who would lead the division then, but at least everyone would be even. This is the best case scenario.

-Cardinals win, Rams win. The Rams improve to 5-4 while the Cardinals improve to 4-5. The Seahawks are also 4-5.

-Cardinals lose, Rams win. The Rams are 5-4 as are the Seahawks. Arizona goes to 3-6 and is effectively eliminated from playoff contention (though not stastically).

It's safe to say that Arizona's entire season rides on its week 10 matchup at home against Seattle. Matt Hasselbeck will likely start this game given the ineffectiveness of Charlie Whitehurst against the Giants. Here are some of the things that I think the Cardinals need to do in order to win their week 10 matchup:

-Pressure Matt Hasselbeck early and often. Whoever gets the most sacks has a big advantage here. Don't forget that Hasselbeck is injury-prone. I don't often advocate taking a guy out, but his absence really hurts Seattle's chances.

-Arizona's offense line must play better. They can't give up sacks and they have to run block more. Arizona really doesn't have a noticeable fullback that much which can be a problem because they run it up the middle quite a bit. Arizona needs to try running it on the edge now and then to spread out the defense. One of the reasons the running game doesn't work is that all the running plays are called up the middle and so the box becomes stacked.

-Throw the ball to Early Doucet and Steve Breaston. These guys need to deliver at home. Larry Fitzgerald is such an obvious choice as a playmaker, but if the other guys can get involved as well, it will just be that much better. Anderson does have his flaws, but ideally you want the opposing defense to start thinking that they can't just use three guys to cover Fitzgerald every play.

-Convert on third down. But this really means getting gains on first and second down. Arizona usually has a bad third down conversion percentage, and as long as that remains the case, the opposing offense will get their chances. It's actually sound defensive strategy to convert often on third down when you have the ball.

-The defense has to make their stops. Interceptions and fumble recoveries are nice, but receivers can't be completely open. There is talent on the Seattle side of the ball, and these guys aren't pushovers anymore. The running duo of Marshawn Lynch and Justin Forsett isn't all that scary, but there are playmakers for Seattle. Mike Williams is one of them. If receivers run free, it won't be good for anyone.

-Good play from the quarterback. Derek Anderson needs to play well and be consistent. His first half against the Vikings contained a really good two-minute drill. Hopefully he can build off that success and continue to go. Arizona's offense only scored one touchdown last week, and that's not going to get it done. Anderson needs to put it in the end zone three to four times.

-Win the turnover margin. Arizona did this in week 9, but still lost. That's not usual at all. Most teams that win the turnover battle win the game.

It sounds like a lot, right? But these are the fundamental kind of things that most winning teams do week in and week out. The phrase "defenses win championships" might be true, but the I believe in the phrase that goes "quarterbacks win division titles." The Cardinals have a chance to climb back into the hunt, and a lot of it will rest on Derek Anderson. Sustaining drives might be the most important thing that can happen in week 10.