It was a crestfallen Marvin Harrison Jr. who talked to the media after the Arizona Cardinals‘ 16-15 loss to the San Francisco 49ers in Week 3.
During the game, Harrison was wide open downfield, but dropped the pass. There was another drop in the end zone on a tougher throw, along with a miscommunication with quarterback Kyler Murray.
In the previous game against the Carolina Panthers, there was a drop and an end-zone pass on which he failed to compete on a back-shoulder throw.
He later said, “Easy to say now, I wish I could’ve gone back up for it. I wish I just had tracked it a little earlier, turned my head around, be able to give myself a better chance. But it was a great ball by Kyler.”
The words after the 49ers game came haltingly. “A lot of emotion. Just disappointed, really. I know what I put into the game,” the emotional Harrison said. “Everybody’s got a job to do. I’m not doing my job at a high enough level at the moment. I know what I’m capable of. To go out there and not play to nowhere near the best of my abilities. It’s frustrating. It hurts your team. I’ve got to get better.”
Thus, it was no surprise that on the first play of the game against the Seahawks, quarterback Kyler Murray tossed a quick pass to the left that resulted in an eight-yard gain.
Unfortunately, that was his only catch of the first half. The two quarters included a route that he broke off and stopped running, apparently believing that Murray was scrambling. The result was an interception. There was another drop on third-and-11 near the Seahawks’ 22-yard line in which the ball popped into the air for another interception.
There were also two more plays where he and Murray weren’t on the same page.
When the second half began, Harrison’s numbers for the first 14 quarters this season were 11 receptions on 22 targets for 150 yards. It was difficult to believe things would improve in the second half. But they did.
There were no targets on the Cardinals’ first possession of the second half, but in the next possession, Harrison had a 16-yard catch on a back-shoulder throw in which he expertly got both feet down in bounds.
In the first possession of the fourth quarter, he caught a short pass for three yards and then after Murray was sacked for a loss of seven yards on first-and-goal from the 9-yard line, Harrison lived up to his first-round selection when he high-pointed the pass with Seahawks cornerback Devon Witherspoon in his face and controlled the ball to the ground for a 16-yard touchdown that got the Cardinals within 20-13 after the extra point.
Harrison went to his knee after the score and remained there briefly as if a load had been lifted from his shoulders.
Then, in the game-tying touchdown drive, there was another short pass for five yards on first-and-10 and later on third-and-5, an 18-yard play to the 7-yard line.
His second-half numbers were five receptions on five targets for 58 yards and the touchdown.
Head coach Jonathan Gannon said, “The response was fantastic. I thought he came and lit it up in the second half. He got involved, made some big-time plays. The touchdown catch, a big-time play and a couple of catches in those drives. He is winning one-on-one. I’m not worried about Marv at all. He’s going to be just fine. I thought he played faster today too. That’s what I told him. That’s what I wanted to see.
“On a short week, there’s not a lot you can work on because you’re not practicing. I said just let it rip and play fast, and I thought he did that.”
Asked what led to his bounce-back second half, Gannon said, “Control the controllables. Being psychologically trained, which he is, he wants to help the team win. He gets down on himself. He’s got to let that go and control the controllables, which for him is just play fast. Control your effort, your mode to play and play fast. I thought that’s what he did, so that was good to see. I really liked his response. I said keep playing fast. Let me see your effort. He said, ‘I got you.’ And he did.”
Murray said of the drop, “I’ve seen Marv catch that ball a hundred times. I told y’all throughout the week I wasn’t worried about it. Continued to go to him, and he came up clutch in the stretch. That’s part of football. I have the utmost confidence in Marv. I’ll continue to have confidence in Marv. We just have to go back to the drawing board and be better. We have to be better. He knows that, I know that, (the) whole offense understands that.”
As for keeping the faith with Harrison, Murray said, “I need him and he needs me. This is a team sport, four-quarter game. And I understand he’s not coming out of the game. I don’t want him to come out of the game, so we have to get this going. That’s really just what it is. It’s just conversations on the sideline, keeping his confidence up. The other receivers and everybody around him, we were all in it together.”
Coincidentally (or maybe not?), Harrison didn’t play in 24 of the team’s 187 snaps in the first three games, but was on the field for all 67 against Seattle.
Speaking of teammates, wide receiver Michael Wilson was asked about Harrison continuing to fight and to not let it get in his head, which appeared to be the case in the first half.
“It’s just the ultimate football character and even if you’re not a football player you can appreciate what he’s been able to do,” Wilson said. He had a tough game last week, a tough game against Carolina, a bad play against San Francisco, another sort of a nightmare play tonight.
“To then come back from that is the ultimate respect and credit because if he wasn’t made of the right stuff, there’s a lot of guys that would just crumble and completely just fall apart. And for him to be able to bounce back from that, I’m just really happy for him.”
Left tackle Paris Johnson Jr., a teammate of Harrison at Ohio State, wasn’t surprised at how things turned around in the fourth quarter.
Johnson said, “I tell Marvin all the time, he’s one of the best receivers I’ve ever seen. You may say one thing about him, but I know the real Marvin. I’ve seen him time and time again. Just told him how happy I was that he took advantage of those opportunities and made the Marvin-like plays to put us back in position to have that chance. Marvin, he’s always been a winner. I feel like it’s not in him to be down about what’s going on.
“I think he takes those moments that he’s not pleased with and he takes and uses energy to keep fighting. He’s not going to sit in his thoughts and sit in and start to as like we talk in the O line room, we joke (about) the spider pose, dead spider, like they crawl and eat themselves. That’s not Marvin. So, it doesn’t surprise me to see him come out here, step on the field, and be the 18 that we all know and love.”
Now, we’ll see if Harrison can continue to move forward and put those first 14 quarters of the season behind him.
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This article originally appeared on Cards Wire: Cardinals hope Marvin Harrison Jr.’s bounce back continues
