A Few Takeaways from Mike LaFleur’s Intro Press Conference

In French, “La Fleur” means “the flower.”

The Cardinals are hoping they smell like a rose after hiring new head coach Mike LaFleur. 

To do that, they’ll have to start climbing back into the ring in the vaunted NFC West. Like a garden, it will take more than one thing to cultivate this franchise to bloom. 

While there’s plenty of things ahead to learn, here’s what was revealed on day one of Mike LaFleur’s tenure:

He’s familiar with the Cardinals

LaFleur’s gone up against the Cardinals many times while with the Rams and 49ers, and he repeatedly mentioned how difficult it was to prepare for Arizona, no matter who was leading them at the time. But what also stood out to him was not only the competition but how the Cardinals had helped the teams he was a part of in the past…and how that gave him a vision of become head coach in Arizona.

Every season is a reset

While the Cardinals struggled last year, LaFleur said the effort and quality of play did not match the win/loss question for Arizona.

He looks back to a late season matchup between the Cardinals and Rams. Arizona was sitting at 3-9 at that time.

“I’ll never forget Matthew Stafford coming in my office and going, ‘These guys can play,'” LaFleur said. “I’ve seen it firsthand. I know what’s on this roster. There’s so many reasons why I was thrilled to be in this seat right here. It’s what Monti has built over these past few years. There are pieces.”

And he had a message for the current players on the roster as the a new era starts.

“It’s never special unless you finish it. You’ve got to restart it anyways. It’s a fresh start for these guys. There are great pieces to work with. We’ll continue to provide for these pieces.” 

Building the coaching staff

We learned LaFleur will be the offensive play-caller for the team.

He did not call plays with the Rams for the last three years but did call plays while with the New York Jets at his previous spot.

There are still plenty of questions regarding Kyler Murray’s future with the team and the quarterback room as a whole, but LaFleur is looking forward to connecting with whomever is under center for the Bird Gang. 

“There’s a tone at which you talk to that quarterback as well, I really believe that,” LaFleur said. “It’s so hard to play quarterback. He has the harder job as the quarterback compared to the play-caller, but you are in it with him. It’s an aspect of football that I missed.”

Now, LaFleur is looking to build his staff. Defensive coordinator Nick Rallis is still under contract and there are reports of coaches like Wink Martindale being in the mix. LaFleur did not tip his hand on the early steps of that process. 

“We are casting a wide net and there are conversations in this building that need to be had first with the coaches,” LaFleur said. “We’re going to be open to that. We owe it to the players to build the best staff that we can for these guys.”

The process

The Cardinals were last to make a hire in the 2026 hiring cycle. Some reported targets had taken other jobs, and the process was not a quick one. 

When asked if there was concern about perception of the Cardinals job, general manager Monti Ossenfort pushed back.

“We went through our process on our timeline,” Ossenfort said. “I believe we were at 14 different candidates, six of those who we met in-person with. Some of those people took other jobs. Doesn’t mean we wanted them to be at this job.

“We were able to go through our exhaustive process. We were able to go talk to everyone we wanted to talk to and in the end we had to come up with the decision that was best for us and thankfully that led us to Mike.”

Every situation is different certainly, but just a quick history lesson here…

The last time the Arizona Cardinals made the last hire of the cycle, it ended up being Bruce Arians. 

Seems like that worked out.