After spending six seasons with the Minnesota Vikings, Kirk Cousins and his used car salesman-smile decided to take his talents to the NFC South and sign a lucrative contract with the Atlanta Falcons.
Well, year one with the Falcons couldn’t have really gone any worse for the former Vikings quarterback. Cousins put together his worst season since becoming a full-time starter in the NFL in 2015 and it resulted in Atlanta benching him for rookie Michael Penix Jr. before the team’s Week 16 game.
Some have wondered how the former Minnesota signal-caller would respond to his benching, and judging by his actions in the last few days, he’s doing everything he can to make the Falcons regret their decision to sign him last year.
Former Minnesota Vikings QB Kirk Cousins expected to be released by Atlanta Falcons this offseason
Earlier this week, Cousins started off his “I hate Atlanta” tour by going on NFL Network’s “Good Morning Football” and sharing that an injured shoulder and elbow played a role in his late-season struggles with the Falcons.
These weren’t injuries that Atlanta really expressed any significant concern over during the 2024 campaign, so for Cousins to bring them up now seems like he’s pointing his finger at the team for letting him play injured.
Then, on Wednesday, during an appearance in New Orleans at one of the Super Bowl-related promotional events, the veteran quarterback declined to answer any questions or speak to any members of the media, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s D. Orlando Ledbetter.
Ledbetter also pointed out that midway through the event (which was a ping pong tournament), Cousins changed out of his shirt with a Falcons logo on it and switched into a plain black shirt. Could be nothing, but when it comes to the former Vikings quarterback, it probably wasn’t done unintentionally.
All of this is just the latest example of Cousins deflecting blame elsewhere in an attempt to make himself look like the victim in his current scenario. He did it countless times in Minnesota and now Atlanta is getting a taste of it because of course it was the Falcons’ fault for letting him play injured and have arguably the worst season of his entire NFL career.
It certainly had nothing to do with Cousins likely rushing back too soon from a torn Achilles and attempting to play through the pain of other injuries to avoid getting benched for Penix even sooner.
But, as it is usually the case, the former Vikings passer is likely going to get a chance to dupe another team into signing him this offseason, as ESPN’s Adam Schefter shared on Wednesday that multiple people around the NFL expect the quarterback to be released by Atlanta this year in a similar fashion to what the Denver Broncos did with Russell Wilson last offseason.
If the Falcons release Cousins before June 1st, they will not only lose $25 million in cap space, but they will also be left with a dead-cap hit of $65 million.
It’s possible that Atlanta could designate his departure as a post-June 1st release, which would spread out the dead-cap hit over this year and 2026, but it wouldn’t cost them $25 million in cap space this offseason.
Either way, Cousins is likely going to get what he wants, and within a few weeks, he’ll have an opportunity to sign with a new team that is in need of a starting quarterback with the hope that it will somehow lead to him landing another lucrative contract one final time before his NFL career comes to a close.
