Is Kyler Murray-Kliff Kingsbury spat no big deal?

The Arizona Cardinals took down the New Orleans Saints on Thursday in a game that wasn't as close as the 42-34 score suggests. But the victory wasn't without drama.

Late in the first half, Kyler Murray had a heated encounter with Kliff Kingsbury. The quarterback appeared to twice tell his coach, "Calm the f--- down," with Kingsbury saying something back before DeAndre Hopkins intervened. The exchange happened after the Cardinals took a timeout in the red zone because the play clock was winding down as Arizona was looking to even up the game. 

Even though the Cardinals were able to score on the ensuing play and would go on to win in relatively convincing fashion, much of the postgame talk surrounded the exchange between their star quarterback and coach.

FOX Sports' Colin Cowherd doesn't see what the big deal is with their spat. 

"Folks, it's live sports," Cowherd said on Friday's "The Herd." "Actors get 20 takes. Columnists have copy editors. Sports is live. It's one take. It's intense, it's fast, and sometimes, it's uncomfortable. It's raw and authentic. You want fake? Go watch a scripted drama. That's not what this is.

"By the way, it's why the only thing anybody watches in America on linear TV is sports. That's all they watch because it's raw and uncomfortable. That's what it was."

While Cowherd appreciated the "raw and authentic" nature of what happened between Murray and Kingsbury, he also recognized the uncomfortable situation the Cardinals are in right now. Arizona was off to a 2-4 start entering Thursday's game, this after losing four of its final five regular-season games in 2021 and getting blown out by the Los Angeles Rams in the opening round of the playoffs.

"There's a lot of pressure in Arizona right now," Cowherd said. "There's pressure on Kyler. There's pressure on the coach. There's pressure on the GM. Here comes DeAndre Hopkins and you're at home and you better win this game or Kliff Kingsbury — the story yesterday was Sean Payton's taking his job — and this is what transpires down in the red zone? It's live, raw, unedited — it's sports."

Cowherd recognized that a player talking back to the coach isn't the best look, but also acknowledged that professional athletes have privilege that athletes at lower levels simply don't. 

"It's not ideal, you don't root for it," Cowherd said. "But if you love sports, and pro sports, sometimes the player fires back at the coach. I know … you never yell at Nick Saban. Kyler Murray's worth $250 million, he gets an opinion too. He's more valuable than the coach. Aaron [Rodgers] is more valuable than his coach. Tom [Brady] is more valuable than [Bill] Belichick. I love Andy Reid, [Patrick] Mahomes is more valuable. 

"This isn't high school sports. This isn't college sports. This is pro sports. It's real people. There's a lot of pressure to win now."

Both Murray and Kingsbury downplayed the moment following the game.

"He’s real animated over there on the sideline sometimes," Murray said. "It’s … 'Calm down, we’re good. We’re going to make it right.’ We ended up scoring, so that was good, but that’s all I was saying. Just chill out."

Kingsbury added: "Yeah, I mean, it’s good. I think we’re working through as an offense where we want to be and what we want to do, and you have competitors that have a level of intensity like that, I think it will keep pushing us forward."