Vikings Urged to Consider 9-Time Pro Bowl Replacement for Kirk Cousins
The league announced an additional $30 million per team in cap space due to the repayment of COVID-era advancements made to the players that were deferred.
That doesn’t mean they should spend frivolously. They still have several holes to plug and potential upgrades to make on the defense. They also have to factor in a potential extension for Justin Jefferson.
All things considered, a more economical option than even Kirk Cousins could be in order.
NFL insider – and Vikings fan – Mike Florio of Professional Football Conversation proposed they ought to indeed take a see at Denver Broncos quarterback Russell Wilson, who may well be discharged before long.
“When the Broncos benched quarterback Russell Wilson and it rapidly got to be self-evident that they’ll cut him … a sense risen that Wilson will take the alliance least somewhere else ($1.21 million) and adhere the Broncos with the adjust of his $39 million fully-guaranteed recompense bundle for 2024,” Florio wrote on February 24.
“The plausibility of getting a beginning quarterback for one year at $1.21 million ought to entice any group with an unsettled quarterback circumstance. … The Vikings ought to compare what they seem get from Wilson for one year at $1.21 million to what it would taken a toll them to keep Kirk Cousins.”
More imperatively, Wilson isn’t recuperating from a arrangement harm just like the four-time Master Bowler, Cousins. Cousins is making his way back from a torn Achilles suffered in Week 8 final season.
Cousins and Wilson tossed touchdowns at the same rate this past season (5.8%), per Stathead. But Cousins beat out Wilson in each other metric on a per-game premise, counting interceptor and sacks.
Cousins is coming off a one-year, $35 million contract and will check $28.5 million against the cap following season in case he isn’t extended.
The Vikings cannot apply the establishment tag to Cousins since his current contract lapses after the due date to do so. Spotrac projects him to command a bargain worth $39.3 million every year.
The NFL’s bump to the compensation cap gives Minnesota $40.9 million in space, meaning they might fit Cousins in. Their issues would emerge in structure – Cousins seem look for a completely ensured bargain – and in tending to their other needs and issues.
There’s moreover the matter of group chemistry.
While Cousins has partners straightforwardly saying they need him back, there has been distant more noteworthy hush in Wilson’s case.
The biggest hurdle the Vikings and Wilson would ought to consider in a potential union this offseason is whether or not the quarterback fits what they need to do unpalatably beneath Head Coach Kevin O’Connell.
O’Connell may be a devotee of Los Angeles Rams head coach Sean McVay. His framework favors beat and timing over a quarterback’s capacity to make when the play breaks down.
Wilson is superior off-script, which is why he doesn’t fit with Broncos head coach Sean Payton.
“Look, I think Russell has a skill set, and I think Russell is still reaching to be able to go and have a extraordinary rest of his career elsewhere,” Drew Brees said on “Pro Football Talk” on February 8. “As I watched them play this year, it didn’t feel just like the timing, the cadence, the beat that I’m utilized to seeing in a Sean Payton offense.
“Those are the trademarks of the offense. That’s the standard that has been set.”
Cousins happens to flourish in this framework. He driven the NFL in passing yards per game last season some time recently the damage. There might not be an sum of savings that’s worth that.
