Jordan Hicks Compares Current Cardinals Team to Pre-Super Bowl Eagles

At the conclusion of the 2019 season, the Arizona Cardinals looked like they were slowly but surely heading in the right direction. First overall pick Kyler Murray showed promise, as did new head coach Kliff Kingsbury's air raid offense.

Cardinals linebacker Jordan Hicks has hope in this duo, as well as the team as a whole. In fact, Hicks is already comparing the 2019 Cardinals to his Philadelphia Eagles team that went on to win a championship.

"It's eerily similar of a situation that we're going into," Hicks said, via the Cardinals official website. "The year before I won the Super Bowl in Philadelphia, we had a rookie head coach and a rookie quarterback in Carson (Wentz) and Doug Pederson. We had our highs and our lows, and as a defense we didn't know what our identity was. But we got better as the season went along -- very similar to what you saw with us this past season -- and then something hit."

The comparison is intriguing. Just like the Eagles, the Cardinals finished below .500 (5-10-1), and followed a similar path the following offseason. After their 2016 campaign, the Eagles opted to give Wentz a big-time receiver in Alshon Jeffery. And as we saw at the beginning of the 2020 league year, the Cardinals gave Murray the ultimate weapon in DeAndre Hopkins.

It truly is "eerily similar," Jordan.

Yet, the one thing deterring the Cardinals from following the Eagles' road to success is their division. The Eagles dominated an extremely winnable NFC East back in 2017; meanwhile, the Cardinals will have to do battle with the defending NFC champion San Francisco 49ers and the always-game Seattle Seahawks out in the West. That's not going to be a picnic even if this team does improve noticeably.

No matter the case, the Cardinals have the perfect chance to take a step forward in 2020. Would we put money on an Eagles-type run to the Super Bowl for the Cardinals? No. But at the very least, Jordan Hicks has the right mindset.