Carson Palmer authored the finest season of his career at age 35 for one of the best offensive minds in football. As far as skill-position talent coming back, there aren’t five collections that you’d take over what the now-36-year-old quarterback has at his disposal a year later.
From slightly under-selling the former Heisman Trophy winner’s talents and situation to sheer outrageous thinking, Palmer’s average draft position doesn’t seem to be based around the notion his 2015 slate is replicable.
But what, exactly, is supposed to happen to last year’s QB5? Will the six-turnover NFC championship game tailspin induce full Delhomme action from a player who up until that game had a strong case to be named first-team All-Pro — as he was at Pro Football Focus? I’m willing to bet on the likes of Palmer, Bruce Arians, Larry Fitzgerald, John Brown and Co. keeping the aerial-driven Cardinals as one of the Super Bowl frontrunners.
He’s still a high-floor QB1 who warrants strong consideration to be drafted among the top five at his position, and possibly ahead of some future Hall of Famers.
His 35-touchdown pass, 4,671-yard passing season does not look fluky based on his circumstances. He’s back in Arians’ system, one that’s been quite friendly to quarterbacks, with a lethal and diverse array of targets and ball-carriers. He completed nearly 64 percent of his passes in the league’s most extreme deep-passing offense and now what looks like a dual-threat running back (David Johnson) looks ready to play a much bigger role than he did as a rookie.
The twice-traded Palmer is also an additional year removed from the torn ACL that harpooned Arizona’s season in 2014, and not set to turn 37 until late December, there’s no reason to bet age will play a big factor yet. If you’re going to dock Palmer for his torn ACLs that occurred nine seasons apart, why even consider Ben Roethlisberger?
More red flags come up regarding the bulk of the other elite fantasy passers than are attached to Palmer.
If there’s an end-of-season hangover to be worried about, Cam Newton meets that criteria more than Palmer. He doesn’t have the same set of receivers, plays in a gimmick offense that the Broncos’ pass rush hijacked and despite the ridiculously frequent end zone cameos has still never shown to be a terribly accurate passer.
The 39-year-old Tom Brady will likely miss four games. He should be able to deliver the typical Brady season — or at least an upper-middle class version of it — but he’s closer to the end than Palmer. Roethlisberger has a higher ceiling thanks to the Steelers’ employing Antonio Brown and an up-tempo attack, but his injury troubles pop up more consistently than Palmer’s.
Russell Wilson looked like the goods down the stretch, but again, he’d never shown anything close to that before. Same goes for Blake Bortles. And it shouldn’t be treated as automatic that Andrew Luck will reclaim his place among the elites. His raw ability shouldn’t be questioned, but he’s had one fantastic fantasy season, two meh showings and last year’s horror show.
Even the league’s most talented QB, Aaron Rodgers, took a step back as the Packers continue their bizarre resistance against helping one of the most talented players of all-time with free agents. I’d still roll with him, but he’s suddenly not a lock.
Palmer shouldn’t be drafted as the overall QB1 or anything crazy; he hasn’t put together a Rodgers-, Brady- or Drew Brees-like season and obviously doesn’t have Wilson or Newton’s play-making ability. But there doesn’t seem to be anything that is clearly worse about the Cardinals’ passing game. It could even be better.
An injury-restricted Michael Floyd struggled through the season’s first half, and Palmer still lit up box scores for 300-plus-yard days — the ex-USC star posted nine of those overall last year. Fitzgerald may not hit the 1,200-plus-yard threshold again at age 33, but there isn’t much reason to suggest the enduring dynamo will regress too far. Brown is one of the league’s most explosive players, and JJ Nelson — he of a 27.2 yards-per-reception figure on 11 grabs — will be a more relied-upon auxiliary option in 2016.
I suppose Palmer can be penalized for a lack of tight end help (Jermaine Gresham, stand up), but those who do are overthinking this.
If you can grab Palmer at anything below the top five at his position come August, it needs to be done. Despite Jake Delhomme’s implosion occurring in the same stadium with the same teams involved, Palmer is a far better quarterback and has way too much around him to go full Delhomme.
He’s going to provide value at this rate despite coming off an incredibly visible and productive season. That’s kind of unique.
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