{"id":647467,"date":"2026-01-02T06:46:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-02T06:46:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/647467\/"},"modified":"2026-01-02T06:46:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-02T06:46:11","slug":"arizona-cardinals-acquire-lb-austin-keys-with-waiver-claim","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/647467\/","title":{"rendered":"Arizona Cardinals acquire LB Austin Keys with waiver claim"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Cardinals added rookie linebacker Austin Keys on a waiver claim in a move looking toward next year.<\/p>\n<p>The <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/teams\/arizona-cardinals\/355\" data-autotag=\"c6331531-478d-4c7a-b93a-28f5b26af3f9\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Arizona Cardinals<\/a> added a linebacker on Thursday. They announced that they acquired former <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/teams\/minnesota-vikings\/347\" data-autotag=\"839728ed-97f0-4c7c-9ea6-299b7540514e\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Minnesota Vikings<\/a> rookie linebacker Austin Keys off waivers.<\/p>\n<p>He signed with the Vikings this year after going undrafted out of Auburn. He is 6-2 and 244 pounds and spent the entire season on their active roster, appearing in 11 games. He logged seven total tackles, a tackle for loss and a sack. Six of his tackles came on special teams.<\/p>\n<p>Because he was claimed off waivers, the Cardinals assume his contract. He is under contract through 2027 and will make $1.005 and $1.12 million in salary the next two seasons.<\/p>\n<p>To make room for Keys on the roster, they placed rookie safety Kitan Crawford, already ruled from the Cardinals&#8217; season finale against the <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/teams\/los-angeles-rams\/343\" data-autotag=\"f489e821-d3f9-4cff-bec5-7eaa0f4b51cb\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Los Angeles Rams<\/a>, on injured reserve.<\/p>\n<p>Because the Cardinals were already 91 players combined between the active roster, practice squad and reserve, they had to release somebody, choosing to release offensive lineman Tyler Cooper. Although he was cut by the Cardinals midweek, because he was on the practice squad on Tuesday, he will get paif for the week.<\/p>\n<p>Get more <a data-autotag=\"c6331531-478d-4c7a-b93a-28f5b26af3f9\" href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/teams\/arizona-cardinals\/355\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Cardinals<\/a> and NFL coverage from <a data-autotag=\"c6331531-478d-4c7a-b93a-28f5b26af3f9\" href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/teams\/arizona-cardinals\/355\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Cards<\/a> Wire&#8217;s Jess Root and others by listening to the latest on the Rise Up, See Red podcast. Subscribe on <a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/show\/27gxR7Oml5yVPywhOG8KHR?si=cGJ0FN6aRBquiLus5nj7rw&amp;nd=1&amp;dlsi=05e790ef05a641b8\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Spotify<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/music.youtube.com\/playlist?list=PL9sICHPD_aT9zxnG7dJj6izJWgMhLMh_U&amp;si=rpNldnLNN-_DdW8R\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">YouTube<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/itunes.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/the-rise-up-see-red-podcast\/id670822447?mt=2\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Apple podcasts<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Cardinals added rookie linebacker Austin Keys on a waiver claim in a move looking toward next year.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":647468,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2078],"tags":[247,265,240,375,390,2604,1327,7,20842,239,58,233,259,248,267,246,88,6,35196,245,264,424,1602,1982,9,266,1980,234],"class_list":{"0":"post-647467","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arizona-cardinals","8":"tag-american","9":"tag-american-football","10":"tag-angeles","11":"tag-arizona","12":"tag-arizona-cardinals","13":"tag-arizonacardinals","14":"tag-cardinals","15":"tag-football","16":"tag-hub","17":"tag-los","18":"tag-los-angeles-rams","19":"tag-minnesota","20":"tag-minnesota-vikings","21":"tag-national","22":"tag-national-sports","23":"tag-neutral","24":"tag-news","25":"tag-nfl","26":"tag-nfl-hub","27":"tag-overall","28":"tag-overall-neutral","29":"tag-rams","30":"tag-smg","31":"tag-smg-timely","32":"tag-sports","33":"tag-sports-news","34":"tag-timely","35":"tag-vikings"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115824164000888546","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647467","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=647467"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647467\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/647468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=647467"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=647467"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=647467"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}