ARIZONA CARDINALS

John Skelton will start at QB for Cardinals at Seattle

Dec 5, 2012, 8:32 PM | Updated: 9:31 pm

Well surprise, surprise.

Just a week after Ken Whisenhunt stayed with rookie quarterback Ryan Lindley in a rough performance against the New York Jets, the Arizona Cardinals head coach is swapping signal callers once again. Third-year pro John Skelton will start Sunday against the Seattle Seahawks at Century Link Field.

Arizona Sports’ Kyndra de St. Aubin tweeted out the news:

Skelton hasn’t played since being replaced by Lindley in the first half of a loss at Atlanta November 18. The Fordham product, who won the starting job in training camp, has started five games this season, completing 98-of-179 passes for 1,058 yards with two touchdown passes and five interceptions.

“There’s a number of reasons that go into it, but John is going to start for us this week up in Seattle, and we’ll go from there,” Whisenhunt said.

The head coach was vague about the reasons why he’s switching back to Skelton.

“Some of it has to do with Seattle — playing up there, having played against them once already this year,” he said. “There are a lot of factors, but I’m not going into each one of them.”

Skelton suffered an ankle injury in the season opener against Seattle at University of Phoenix Stadium and didn’t see the field again until Week 6 against Buffalo when Kevin Kolb suffered a rib injury.

Skelton started the next four games before being replaced by Lindley.

“It’s another opportunity, you can’t take any opportunity for granted if it comes at the beginning of the season, the end of the season, whether you’re losing or when you’re winning, you just have to take advantage of every opportunity you get,” Skelton said after practice Wednesday.

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John Skelton will start at QB for Cardinals at Seattle