When asked if he would have signed with the Falcons if he’d known they were going to use the No. 8 overall pick on a quarterback, quarterback Kirk Cousins said, “Yes, I would have.I don’t deal much with hypotheticals..”
It was a gentle way of saying “absolutely not.”
According to a recent article by Kevin Seifert of ESPN.com: It chronicled a two-year Viking journey. The move from Cousins to JJ McCarthy suggests the Vikings wanted to do exactly what the Falcons did with Cousins.
The important part is: “[Coach Kevin] O’Connell was honest with Cousins after the season: “The Vikings’ 3-6 record after the injury exposed the danger of not looking beyond the 36-year-old quarterback. The team decided to use their highest draft pick in the past decade (11th overall) to deepen their 2024 quarterback roster and search for the next starter. However, the ownership and [G.M. Kwesi] Coach Adofo-Mensah, not O’Connell, wanted to play his rookie right away. Cousins is likely to be a starter in 2024 and beyond.”
Even if the Vikings had offered Cousins the same contract as the Falcons ($90 million fully guaranteed at signing, plus $10 million more next year), Cousins would have chosen a place where retirement was a strong option, which is what he and everyone else assumed he would get when he went to Atlanta.
Now he’s in the same position he would have been if he’d stayed in Minnesota: The team is preparing to use a rookie at some vague point in the future. When will that be? It will depend on how Cousins plays in his first year after tearing his Achilles. It will depend on how quickly the rookie develops. It will depend on how the team performs. It will depend on how popular the backup becomes with fans.
I’m projecting the over-under odds that Kirk Cousins will sign with the Falcons for two years. He could be traded after just one year, which would give the Falcons a cap charge of $37.5 million in 2024 and a total one-year cash investment of $62.5 million. A new team would acquire him for a base salary of $27.5 million in 2025.
Sure, Cousins has a no-trade clause, but what would he do if he had the choice between staying and not playing or accepting a trade and taking the field?
At the end of every season, teams have big decisions to make at the most important position, and some will be looking for a short-term solution at quarterback, and $27.5 million in 2025 and $35 million in 2026 makes Cousins a bargain in the short term.
