The Cardinals signed fourth-round pick Cody Simon on Monday, the team announced.
Arizona made the Ohio State linebacker the 115th overall pick.
The Cardinals have signed five of their seven selections, with only first-round pick Walter Nolen III and second-round pick Will Johnson unsigned.
Simon will compete for the starting job alongside Mack Wilson Sr. at inside linebacker. Free agent signees Akeem Davis-Gaither and Mykel Walker and holdover Owen Pappoe are other candidates for the job.
Simon earned defensive MVP honors at the CFP National Championship and the Rose Bowl last season. He had 112 tackles, 13 tackles for loss, seven sacks and seven passes defensed in 2024.
During his five seasons at Ohio State, Simon played 58 games with 30 starts and had 259 tackles, 23 tackles for loss, 10 sacks, 11 passes defensed, two forced fumbles, one fumble recovery and one interception. He was a four-time OSU Scholar-Athlete and four-time Academic All-Big Ten selection.
At the Cardinals’ rookie minicamp this weekend, head coach Jonathan Gannon will stress to his defensive rookies that they need to be ready for a step up in competition.
Gannon said today that he wants his defensive backs to understand that NFL wide receivers and NFL quarterbacks have the kind of talent they didn’t see every Saturday in college, and that means they have to be prefect on every play.
“Arguably the best athletes on the field, they’re covering them. A lot of times they don’t have a lot of help,” Gannon said of his rookie cornerbacks covering NFL receivers. “There’s good receivers in college and there’s good quarterbacks in college — what I’m about to say, I don’t want that to be misconstrued. But this is the best of the best. If you get beat the ball’s going to find you. Whereas in college I don’t see that all the time. The quarterbacks here can stand in the pocket and deliver the ball accurately, on time — that’s an adjustment for those guys. There’s not a lot of time to make up ground throughout the down to win that down up here.”
The Cardinals drafted two cornerbacks and a safety, and they went defense with six of their seven picks. They’re going to have some young contributors on defense this season, and Gannon wants them to be prepared for how much better the opposition is at the next level.
Will Johnson was not happy that he fell to the second round of the 2025 NFL draft. But he’s very happy with the team he fell to.
Johnson, a cornerback from Michigan, was viewed for much of his college football career as a potential Top 10 pick. Instead he went to the Cardinals with the 47th pick, and he says he ended up in the right spot, even if he waited too long to hear his name called.
“Super exciting. I mean, that scheme is amazing,” Johnson said. “It’s a cornerback’s dream. So I’m excited to play in it, I’m excited to get comfortable with it and just learn more about it. I’ve learned a good amount so far, so just continue to learn and get comfortable in it and make a lot of plays.”
Cardinals head coach Jonathan Gannon, defensive coordinator Nick Rallis and cornerbacks coach Ryan Smith think they’ve added a cornerback who’s the perfect fit. And got him at a point in the draft when few thought they could.
The Cardinals signed four draft picks on the eve of their rookie minicamp.
The team announced that outside linebacker Jordan Burch, cornerback Denzel Burke, offensive lineman Hayden Conner and safety Kitan Crawford all are under contract.
All signed the standard four years through the 2028 season.
Burch, the Cardinals’ third-rounder, transferred to Oregon in 2023 from South Carolina. He recorded 18.5 tackles for loss and 11.5 sacks.
Burke, an Arizona native, was a fifth-round selection. He spent four seasons at Ohio State, staring 51 games.
Conner, a sixth-round pick from Texas, was a semifinalist for the Joe Moore Award as the nation’s top offensive lineman in back-to-back seasons. He did not allow a sack on 617 pass blocking snaps in 2024.
Crawford, a seventh-rounder, was a core special teams player at Texas for four seasons and at Nevada last season. He played 1,010 special teams snaps.
Walter Nolen III, Will Johnson and Cody Simon are the unsigned Cardinals’ draft picks yet to sign.
If Will Johnson’s knee is OK, the Cardinals got a steal with the 47th overall pick.
No one expected the Michigan cornerback still to be in the green room after the first round ended.
Johnson reportedly had a medical red flag on his knee, which is the reason he fell. That left him frustrated initially, and now he is even more motivated.
Johnson released behind the scenes of his reaction after the Cardinals selected him in the second round.
“Finna go kill, bruh. They going to have to pay for this shit. I promise you. Arizona finna get a dawg,” Johnson said in the video clip, via Bo Brack of PHNX Cardinals.
Johnson said he has not had any knee issues in two years and doesn’t understand the concerns. In 2024, he missed one game with a shoulder injury and the final six with turf toe.
The Cardinals announced an addition to their 90-man roster on Monday.
They have signed tight end Josiah Deguara. The team did not announce any terms of the deal.
Deguara spent the 2024 season with the Jaguars and had three catches for 14 yards in 15 appearances. The Packers picked Deguara in the third round of the 2020 draft and he played in 50 games for the team. He had 47 catches for 436 yards and three touchdowns in that action.
Trey McBride is the top tight end in Arizona. Deguara will join Tip Reiman, Elijah Higgins, Travis Vokolek, and Oscar Cardenas in the mix for playing time behind him.
The Nikefication of the NFL will continue.
One of the overlooked items that emerged during the draft is this: Starting in 2025, the NFL will introduce “Rivalries” jerseys inspired by the communities of the teams.
The first wave, debuting in 2025, will cover the teams of the AFC East and NFC West. The league will add two new divisions every year.
Via Jonathan Jones of CBSSports.com, the jerseys will be worn only by the home team in a division rivalry. Every team will be required to wear the “Rivalries” jersey at least once every three years. It can be used more frequently than that, against any of its three division rivals.
The AFC East and NFC West “Rivalries” jerseys will debut later this year, before the start of the season, for the Patriots, Bills, Dolphins, Jets, 49ers, Seahawks, Rams, and Cardinals.
While teams are limited to four games with throwback or alternate jerseys, this is just another jersey that fans can buy. Which is the obvious motivation here. The most zealous fans will want to have another jersey. And another. And another.
Of course, if the economy goes sideways, maybe the fans will have two jerseys instead of thirty.
The Cardinals selected Marvin Harrison Jr. with the No. 4 overall pick in last year’s draft.
It was seen as a strong pick at the time, and even though his numbers weren’t off the charts, Harrison delivered a solid rookie season.
But entering 2025, head coach Jonathan Gannon says Harrison is primed to make significant improvements.
“When the staff’s in place, the jump from Year 1 to Year 2, I think that’s where guys make a huge jump,” Gannon said in a recent interview with Adam Schein on Mad Dog Sports Radio. “And this guy played unbelievable ball for us. But if you talk to him, he’d be the first to tell you, I need to get better at these couple of things. And man, he has went to work on them. He’s went to work on them.
“He looks awesome out there right now.”
Gannon noted that in his exit meeting with Harrison to end 2024, the receiver had an improvement plan laid out for himself.
“[H]e came up to me and he handed me a piece of paper — it wasn’t me handing him a piece of paper,” Gannon said. “But we knew that, you know what I mean? The guy is a readymade pro. He does all the right things. He was here the whole offseason — he skipped out one week, he went and trained with a bunch of different receivers. But he was here the whole offseason. And I think he added a little bit of muscle mass, he looks a little bit bigger. All his numbers, his metrics, are all better than when we got him.
“I’m not going to speak truth into the universe, but just wait until this guy plays this year.”
Harrison finished his rookie season with 62 receptions for 885 yards with eight touchdowns.
Cardinals head coach Jonathan Gannon did not expect to land cornerback Will Johnson in the second round of the draft.
During an appearance with Adam Schein of Mad Dog Sports Radio, Gannon said that the team had Johnson “graded very high” going into the second night and that the team’s analytics people thought the percent chance he’d be available at No. 47 was “like 0.02" as a result. Johnson did slip that far, however, and Gannon said that the unexpected slide didn’t give the team any hesitation about making him the choice.
“So when he was sitting there, I’m like; ‘Dude am I missing something? Like, this is the best corner in the draft. Like what are we talking about?’ And there was a group of players we liked, right when we were picking, and that was kind of a no-brainer, too,” Gannon said. “We’re like: ‘We think this guy’s a starting corner, and just the person is phenomenal.’ The intangibles. He’s very intelligent. And it really is a scheme fit for us, too, so it was like; ‘Dude, let’s take that guy.’ So when we picked him it was like; ‘Holy cow, man.’ I did not think he was going to be there.”
A report indicated teams were concerned with Johnson’s knee, but the cornerback said he has not had issues with it for two years and Gannon said that the Cardinals were “really comfortable” with everything they saw regarding his medicals. He also said eight other defensive coordinators reached out to say they thought Johnson was the best corner in the draft and their teams may be kicking themselves if Johnson proves to be as good as Gannon and others believe he is.
Calais Campbell is back with the Cardinals and he’s back in his familiar No. 93.
The Cardinals announced on Wednesday that the defensive lineman will be wearing the same number that he wore in Arizona for the first nine years of his career. Campbell also wore the number with the Falcons, Ravens, Jaguars, and Dolphins.
Defensive lineman Justin Jones wore No. 93 in 2024, but he will now be No. 98. The Cardinals also announced that linebacker Baron Browning will wear No. 5, quarterback Jacoby Brissett will wear No. 7, edge rusher Josh Sweat will wear No. 10, and defensive tackle Dalvin Tomlinson will wear No. 94.
The team’s rookies have also unveiled their numbers. First-round defensive tackle Walter Nolen will be No. 97, second-round corner Will Johnson will be No. 0, third-round edge rusher Jordan Burch is now No. 52, fourth-round linebacker Cody Simon is No. 50, fifth-round corner Denzel Burke is No. 29), sixth-round guard Hayden Conner will wear No. 58, and seventh-round safety Kitan Crawford drew No. 36.
