HEADLINES

Cardinals DC Vance Joseph Favored To Replace Kliff Kingsbury?

January 8th, 2023 at 8:26am CST by Adam La Rose

January 8: Owner Michael Bidwill has not told Kingsbury about his plans one way or another, as Ian Rapoport and Tom Pelissero of NFL.com report. While Bidwill is doing his homework on coaching candidates, he no longer has Keim as a trusted sounding board, and the NFL.com duo suggest that a Kingsbury firing is not a sure thing. After all, Bidwill will already have to replace Keim, and an accompanying coaching change could be too much turnover, unless he can be sure he is getting an upgrade.

That is to say nothing of the fact that he would have to pay Kingsbury and Keim through at least 2026 while also paying his new coach and GM (previous reports indicated that the recent extensions that Bidwill greenlighted for Kingsbury and Keim ran through 2027, but Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk reports that Kingsbury’s deal is guaranteed through 2026, with 2027 being an option year).

Rapoport and Pelissero name Sean Payton as a possible candidate to replace Kingsbury, and Florio notes that the Saints are expecting to hear from Arizona about the possibility of acquiring Payton’s rights. New Orleans has already granted the Broncos permission to interview Payton, and those two clubs appear to have trade compensation — which features a first-round draft choice — largely in place.

January 7: With the NFL’s regular season set to come to a close, ‘Black Monday’ has nearly arrived. One move which would, given recent reporting, come as little surprise would be the Cardinals parting ways with head coach Kliff Kingsbury.

The 43-year-old signed an extension this past offseason, one in which general manager Steve Keim and quarterback Kyler Murray each inked long-term deals of their own to remain in Arizona. Things have not gone according to plan on the field or in the front office this season, however, to the point where it is something of an “open secret” that Kingsbury will be fired this Monday. Such a decision would reflect the team’s regression in 2022, but also invite questions with respect to his replacement.

On that point, Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer reports (via Johnny Venerable of the PHNX Cardinals Podcast, on Twitter) that Cardinals defensive coordinator Vance Joseph is expected to be “a lead candidate, if not the lead candidate” to succeed Kingsbury. Promoting the former would represent a level of internal maneuvering which would run counter to what many feel the organization should be aiming for.

Keim – who is currently away from the team – is also thought to be on his way out of Arizona, a departure which (if coupled with the firing of Kingsbury) would clear the way for a total re-tooling on the sidelines and in the front office, should ownership be inclined to move in that direction. Joseph, on the other hand, would be a familiar face to take on the HC role, as he has served in his current capacity since 2019. The Cardinals’ defense has seen two years of above-average ranks during that span, but the unit has taken a step back this year.

Heading into the final week of games in 2022, Arizona sits 29th in the league in terms of points allowed per game (25.7). The team has struggled in particular against the pass, and has been unable to establish a consistent pass rush during the campaign. In spite of that, Joseph, 50, has reportedly boosted his stock heading into the 2023 coaching cycle. His time in Arizona came after a two-year stretch as the Broncos’ head coach in which the team went 11-21.

That period, in turn, was preceded by one year spent in Miami as a DC in 2016. The Dolphins interviewed Joseph for their head coaching vacancy last offseason, before ultimately hiring Mike McDaniel. It will be worth monitoring how much outside interest he generates for HC (or at least coordinator) openings in the coming days and weeks should he hit the open market at all.

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