Momentum is an idea and word used -- overused, likely -- in sports, although it is, during the emotion of a sporting event, easy to see if one wants. The word has definitely been connected to the Cardinals, after the team finished fairly strong in 2023 (including upset road wins in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia) and built a top-five running game.

But do the Cardinals have momentum? Really?

Coach Jonathan Gannon was asked about it Wednesday as training camp opened and he revealed that he had Kenny Bell, the team's director of football strategy do a deep dive into momentum. And when he says deep he means it -- Gannon said it included historical data of warfare in the 1800s, as well as Olympics and both team and individual sports like tennis and golf.

"Why does Xander (Schauffele) go bogey-par-bogey and then birdie-birdie-birdie-birdie-birdie?" Gannon said. "Is that momentum? I don't know. Maybe he just hit some good wedge shots and made some putts."

Gannon did get into his motivation, oft hearing media types talk about how a game had shifted on a certain play or certain series.

"I always thought to myself, 'Is that real?'" Gannon said. "Maybe you can feel it, or it's an instinct, 'Oh man you're on your heels,' or 'Oh man, you're on the attack.' What do you have to do to gain momentum, stop momentum, all those things.

"We just wanted to make sure we were versed on what that actually is, or what that means. It's funny, you talk to anybody in our building, (ask) is momentum real, you're going to get a lot of different answers."

Gannon never really said on which side he landed. Some of it is perspective, he said, depending on how much a person is revisiting the past or not. The coach's own definition was a team doing what it's supposed to do consistently and "typically good things happen."

"Does momentum exist?" Gannon said. "The answer is ... perhaps."