Kirk Cousins- quarterback, businessman, and one helluva gambler
Cousins bets on himself again, and he'll probably come up a winner
Those of you who know me or who’ve hung around this corner of da Interwebz for any length of time know I’m a huge Minnesota Vikings fan. I’ve written about the years of frustrations and close calls as the Vikings have come to share a dubious record with the Buffalo Bills as the only teams ever to lose four Super Bowls.
Ah, well, at least the Vikings didn’t lose four consecutively as the Bill did.
Though I’ve managed to forgive Gary Andersen (One kick…all he had to do was make ONE fucking kick….), the Vikings’ history in the playoffs has been one of swings and misses.
(When I lived in Houston, I went to a Rice-Colorado State football game at Rice Stadium. All I could think of during the game was that I was sitting in one of the stadiums where the Vikings lost a Super Bowl- January 13, 1974, when they lost Super Bowl VII 24-7 to the Miami Dolphins. Minnesota actually led 7-0 early in the game. No, I’m still not over it. Thanks for asking.)
I went to my first Vikings game in December 1968 at Metropolitan Stadium in Bloomington, on the site of what’s now the Mall of America. The Los Angeles Rams thumped the Vikings 31-3 that afternoon on a day when I was probably the coldest I can ever remember feeling. At eight years old, I did not suffer discomfort well.
Over the years, I’ve seen the Vikings play in Houston and twice in Seattle. I attended the Vikings’ first game at their new US Bank Stadium in 2016 when they beat Green Bay. Two years later, I saw them mail in a pitifully sad performance there against Buffalo.
When QB Kirk Cousins signed with the Vikings in 2018, no one knew what to expect. There were more questions than answers, and the first couple of years were inconclusive, to say the least. When new Head Coach Kevin O’Connell came on board in 2022, it seemed like things were about to change. Then they went belly-up against the New York Giants in the first round of the playoffs…and they were the same old Vikings all over again.
The 2023 season went into the toilet early when Cousins tore one of his Achilles tendons (during a Week 8 24-10 victory in Green Bay) and was ruled out for the season. Everyone- fans, media, sportswriters- assumed the season was over, and they weren’t far wrong. After rotating through three quarterbacks, the Vikings missed the playoffs and limped into an offseason with one big question:
Who would be their quarterback in 2024?
Kirk Cousins would be a free agent at the end of the NFL’s business year in March. At 35 and recovering from a torn Achilles, his future was a gamble…for everyone but Cousins, who was willing to bet on himself once again.
Say what you will about Cousins, but he’s the real deal. Sure, his overt religiosity can be a bit much, but that’s who he is, and it’s not phony. Beyond that, no one works harder or is more dedicated to his craft. No one believes in Kirk Cousins more than Kirk Cousins, so when it came time to negotiate with the Vikings, he was clear with his demands. He wanted a large chunk of his next contract to be guaranteed money. That raised more than a few eyebrows in Minnesota.
In the NFL, few contracts are guaranteed. It’s not unusual for teams to release players before the significant money years in their contracts come around. Generally, only high-performing star players are able to sign contracts with substantial amounts of guaranteed money. Given the brutality of football, it can be a blessing for a player’s future, especially if their career ends unexpectedly.
Cousins possesses one of the brightest business minds in the NFL, so he was going to ensure that whatever came next in terms of a contract, he’d get paid. After going back and forth with Vikings management, it became clear the team wasn’t comfortable committing a lot of guaranteed money to a player in his mid-30s coming off an Achilles tear.
It’s difficult to blame the Vikings for their caution. If they’d agreed to Cousin’s contract demands and he came back unable to perform as he had previously, the team would be in difficult straits. Of course, if he was able to perform as he had before, the Vikings would be in good shape. But how could they be certain?
They couldn’t, of course, and in the end, didn’t feel comfortable committing to spending a lot of guaranteed money on Cousins.
So, when the free agency period began, Kirk Cousins signed with the Atlanta Falcons, who agreed to do what the Vikings felt they couldn’t.
After six seasons with the Minnesota Vikings, Kirk Cousins is ready for his next chapter with the Atlanta Falcons.
Cousins agreed to a four-year, $180 million contract with the Falcons earlier this week, according to NFL Network's Tom Pelissero, and he's set to put pen-to-paper on the deal on Wednesday with the official start of free agency.
Prior to inking his new deal, Cousins took the time on Wednesday to thank the Vikings and their fans for his time in Minnesota, describing his departure and subsequent deal with the Falcons as "bittersweet" in a video posted to X[.]
Whatever one might think about Cousins as a quarterback—he was never as flashy and attention-grabbing as he was business-like and efficient—he’d consistently recognized his place in the community and understood how people see him. His video was as classy as everything he’s done off the field in Minnesota. The Twin Cities won’t just be missing a good starting quarterback; they’ll also be short a first-class human being.
It’s easy to wonder what might have happened if….
does an excellent job of breaking down Cousins’ time in Minnesota:So much of Minnesota Vikings history is defined by two words and a question mark: “What if?” But as Kirk Cousins leaves, agreeing to a four-year contract with the Atlanta Falcons on Monday, we can look back at the last six years of Cousins in Minnesota with a different pair of words on our minds: “If only…”
The first stanza of Cousins’ Viking tenure was the Super Bowl or Bust years of 2018 and 2019. With just one playoff win between the two seasons coming off an NFC Championship appearance we were left wondering what would have happened if only the Vikings had hired a different offensive coordinator in 2018. If only general manager Rick Spielman had given Cousins competent interior offensive line play. If only they landed a different matchup in the 2019 playoffs rather than going to San Francisco in the divisional round. If only Stefon Diggs had been a touch happier or Mike Zimmer a shade less cantankerous and obsessed with the running game.
The 2020 and 2021 seasons were a separate beast. A crumbling roster and delusional franchise thinking it could still compete for a title as it slid down the NFL’s slippery mountain. In 2020 the Vikings extended Cousins despite the fact that a significant portion of their roster was crumbling. If only they had moved on then and looked to the draft (which featured five QBs who ultimately became quality starters).
The Vikings scrambled to remain in win-now mode in order to justify the Cousins contract but their attempts to reconstruct the depleted defense with draft picks like Cam Dantzler and Jeff Gladney and signings like Michael Pierce, Bashaud Breeland and Sheldon Richardson (the second time) were unsuccessful. If only they had found the next Xavier Rhodes, Danielle Hunter and Everson Griffen.
If only COVID never existed then it wouldn’t have driven a wedge between Cousins and his head coach. It wouldn’t have caused him to miss a key game in Green Bay that held Zimmer’s fate in its hands either.
The final section of Cousins’ tenure, 2022 and 2023, left us to wonder how it would have gone if only Kevin O’Connell had been his coach the whole time. If only O’Connell had fired Ed Donatell midway through 2022 as the defense was giving up 400 yard games every week. If only O’Connell called for a better play on fourth-and-8 against the Giants and if only Cousins threw it deep to Justin Jefferson rather than underneath to TJ Hockenson.
If only Cousins didn’t pop his Achilles just as he was playing the best football of the season in 2023.
Fleeting moments of hope and bursts of excitement were abound over the last six years but they were always followed by crushing disappointment. An amazing performance by Cousins in Week 2 of 2018 against Green Bay would have made you believe he was on his way to an MVP and then he got strip-sacked en route to a stunning blowout loss against Buffalo the following week.
In 2019, he tossed a brilliant pass to Kyle Rudolph to beat the New Orleans Saints in the Superdome and then followed that up with 172 yards passing vs. the 49ers.
In 2022, an all-timer against the Bills came right before a total meltdown versus Dallas. The largest comeback in history vs. Indy quickly turned into a disaster in Green Bay.
The difficult thing to reckon with as Cousins heads to different pastures is that he outperformed expectations on an individual level. He played better in Minnesota than he did in Washington and it’s not particularly close. Cousins went 50-37-1 as a Viking after only winning 26 of 57 games in Washington. His career QB rating was eight points higher in purple than burgundy, his touchdown percentage is higher, his interception percentage is lower, his PFF grades were largely higher and he made the Pro Bowl more often.
Yeah…”If only….”
Given the cutthroat nature of business in the NFL, it’s hard not to be happy for Kirk Cousins. He believes in his ability and that he’ll come back strong from his injury. His willingness to bet on himself brought him to Minnesota in 2018, which worked well for everyone. Now he’s rolling the dice again.
OK, no Super Bowl, but while the guy’s a good quarterback, he’s not Superman.
Now he’s going to Atlanta on a contract with, depending on who you believe, either $90 million or $100 million in guaranteed money. Either way, neither he nor his family will ever have to worry about where their next Big Mac comes from. He’ll get to play a game he loves for a few more years, and his family will be set for life.
And he can buy his son a Porsche when he turns 16.
It’s hard not to be happy for a guy who’s done things the right way and is reaping the rewards. Kirk Cousins has bet on himself his entire career, and the cards keep coming up in his favor. And he’s only 35. When he finally retires from football, he’ll have his whole life in front of him…and hopefully, his body will still be reasonably intact enough to enjoy it.
I wish him well…except, of course, when Atlanta plays Minnesota. And the Falcons are on the Vikings’ schedule this season.
Stay tuned….
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