You heard it here first: Warner makes Cards a threat

It's almost too unreal to write, but here goes: Watch out for the Arizona Cardinals in 2005.

There are good things happening in the Valley of the Sun. The Cardinals are building a new stadium. There will be a Super Bowl there in three years. The team even has a new logo, a fiercer looking bird on their helmet.

But the best thing about this offseason so far is Kurt Warner.

Despite demoting him in New York, Tom Coughlin praised Kurt Warner's leadership. (Getty Images)

Arizona now has a legit quarterback.

No more hearing coach Dennis Green pump up Josh McCown as if he was the next coming of Tom Brady, while letting Philip Rivers and Ben Roethlisberger go by on draft day in some of the worst moves made by a franchise that has made many terrible ones.

Green spent all of the early part of 2004 -- his first months on the job -- telling anyone and everyone, including doubters inside his own building, that McCown would be fine as his quarterback, even though he was greener than the Incredible Hulk.

Green then benched McCown last season for Shaun King, who has journeyman stamped across his helmet.

Give Green and vice president of football operations Rod Graves credit for realizing after the season that McCown would not take this offense where it needed to go.

Warner can. No, he will.

The Cardinals signed Warner to a one-year deal Sunday that will pay him $4 million, including a $2 million signing bonus. Warner tuned down offers from both the Bears and Lions -- reportedly for more years and more money -- to take a chance in Arizona. He wants to start, which he'll do for the Cardinals, although Green says the competition is open (wink, wink).

In Detroit, Warner would have competed with Joey Harrington and in Chicago the Bears have Rex Grossman, but while the Cardinals are giving lip service to the competition talk in Arizona, it's Warner's job to lose.

The skeptics will say Warner is done, that his two-time NFL MVP skills have eroded. They will say he holds the ball too long, that he takes too many shots that have made him flinch at the sign of pressure.

They'll say he failed with the New York Giants last year -- even though he was 5-4 as a starter playing behind a line that was awful -- and that Eli Manning had to take his job, not because it was a move for the future but a move for the now. They'll point out he hasn't started a full season, either because of injuries or coaching decisions, since 2001.