Film review: Dolphins-Cardinals was the coaching matchup of the season ... and proved Kyler Murray is a star

Kliff Kingsbury and Brian Flores painted a masterpiece.

Brian Flores was coming off one of the most important wins of his young coaching career, but you wouldn’t have known that based on his post-game press conference following a 34-31 triumph over the Cardinals in Arizona.

The 39-year-old coach, who has put the league on notice this season with a string of dominant defensive performances against the NFL’s top offensive minds, was almost exasperated when asked about the challenges the Cardinals offense and Kyler Murray had presented his defense on Sunday afternoon.

“I’m just telling you guys that’s a good football team. Calling the game — kudos to Josh Boyer, I thought he called a great game against somebody … that’s a very — that’s a damn good play-caller over there in Kingsbury. A lot of credit to them. Um … … that was good… that was a hard-fought battle, really, across the board…

I mean, you play against good players, good coaches … I mean … it’s hard. It’s not easy. It’s not easy to call that game … um … feel free to call it if you feel like you can call a better game against that group then go ahead.”

Flores sounded like a guy who was mentally worn out, and I can’t blame him. This matchup of young coaches — Kliff Kingsbury on one side and Flores on the other — didn’t just live up to pregame hype. It exceeded it. In part 1 of this post we’ll look at the schematic adjustments that made this game so exhilarating. Part 2 explains why even though the Cardinals ended up losing the game, it proved that they’re in good hands with Kliff and Kyler.