When the Arizona Cardinals waived Trey Benson with an injury designation on Monday, Aug. 24, it earned them unwanted admission into a dubious club.
Twenty-eight months after they entered the NFL, 96 of the first 100 picks in the 2024 draft remain on active rosters. Benson, now, is among the four castaways — until and unless he gets scooped up elsewhere.
The three others: Ja’Lynn Polk, a second-round wide receiver who finished his rookie season with 12 catches and missed all of his second season with injuries before retiring; Jermaine Burton, a third-round wide receiver who developed a habit of missing practices and was involved in a domestic dispute; and Terrion Arnold, who currently faces the possibility of life in prison on kidnapping and robbery
charges.
That is the company Benson currently holds. But most concerningly, he’s not alone. For the Cardinals, this may just be the beginning of a week-long purge of former top draft picks.
Possible cut day casualties
In that same 2024 draft, the Cardinals selected cornerback Elijah Jones with the 90th pick. They seem to have five roster locks at cornerback, meaning Jones could be competing with Starling Thomas V for one roster spot. If that’s the case, Thomas would seem to have the inside edge, despite a poor preseason. He was a reliable contributor in 2024 — something Jones has never been — and may need more time to return to full strength after a torn ACL last July.
Jones, then, could join Benson as a squandered top-100 pick when the Cardinals trim their roster to 53 players on Sunday, Aug. 30.
Going back a year further, edge rusher B.J. Ojulari was the 41st pick in 2023. He, too, could be a cut day casualty.
In all three of the Cardinals’ preseason games, he has played into the fourth quarter — typically the realm of players destined for release. And when on the field, he hasn’t produced, generating just three pressures on 45 pass-rush snaps, per Pro Football Focus.
“You want to see them do it in practice, but then you really need to see him do it in the game, if he's got the opportunity,” assistant general manager Dave Sears said, speaking generally about players near the cut line.
And for Ojulari, those struggles are the continuation of a trend. In eight games last year, he produced a 9.7% pressure rate and recorded just one sack. By contrast, he produced a 12.4% pressure rate with four sacks as a rookie — before he tore three knee ligaments, including his ACL, in a practice during 2024 training camp.
“It's unfortunate, in terms of what that injury did to him and how much time he missed,” LaFleur said. “But that’s his story right now. … He’s made of the right stuff, and he’ll figure it out.”
If Ojulari is released, he would join similarly unwanted company to Benson and potentially Jones. Of the top 100 picks in his 2023 draft class, only three are not currently on an NFL roster. And of the top 50, every single player remains on a roster.
That doesn’t tell the complete story — three of those top 50 picks (Emmanuel Forbes, Isaiah Foskey and JuJu Brents) were waived by the team that drafted them, only to land elsewhere. And when rosters are trimmed to 53, others could join that group, like quarterback Will Levis. Ojulari would, in all likelihood, not be the only top 50 pick from his class without a job on Monday morning.
Complex decisions ahead
This is not the outcome that Monti Ossenfort would have envisioned from his first two draft classes as Cardinals general manager. In those two years, Ossenfort made 11 picks inside the top 100. Three could be out of a job by the end of the week — an unwanted record no matter how you slice it.
Those three picks also serve as something of a microcosm for Ossenfort’s resume as a whole. All three have dealt with significant injuries. Combined, they’ve been available for just 60 of 119 career games. But they’ve also largely struggled when on the field, failing to entrench themselves as reliable contributors.
The same story, to a lesser degree, goes for highly-drafted players like Darius Robinson and Tip Reiman. Similarly, notable free agent signings like Jonah Williams, Bilal Nichols and Justin Jones failed to get off the mark in Arizona as they dealt with persistent injuries.
Two things can be true here: Ossenfort has not gotten enough production out of his investments and the Cardinals have been uniquely battered by injuries in recent seasons. Whether those injuries excuse Ossenfort’s record is a question for owner Michael Bidwill to investigate, but they certainly help to explain why the Cardinals’ current roster is plagued by so many glaring holes.
And they create a complex series of questions for the Cardinals’ brass to analyze as they pare down the roster.
“What is this guy's ceiling?” assistant general manager Dave Sears questioned. “Is he gonna hit it? How long can we wait on him to actually start producing?”
This, LaFleur said, is often where coaching staffs and front offices find themselves debating on roster cuts. Coaches may prefer a player who is ready to contribute immediately, while the front office approaches decisions with a longer-term outlook.
“You go to Monti and that side, they're thinking big picture, too,” LaFleur said. “And that's the smart way of thinking.”
That wasn’t enough to keep Benson on the roster. Will it be enough to keep Jones or Ojulari? Those are the decisions for Arizona to make, as cut day looms.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Trey Benson is not the only top pick Arizona Cardinals may cut
