Kirk Cousins is on absolute fire since the Vikings bye week
By Adam Patrick
The Minnesota Vikings quarterback has been playing great since the team’s bye week.
Following his team’s loss to the Dallas Cowboys last week, all anyone wanted to talk about was how Kirk Cousins wasn’t able to lead the Minnesota Vikings to a come-from-behind victory.
Despite the Vikings defense giving up 31 points to the Cowboys, including 15 in the fourth quarter, there were some who wanted to put the loss on Cousins’ shoulders despite him throwing for 314 yards, three touchdowns, and no interceptions.
During Sunday’s crazy win over the Carolina Panthers, the Minnesota quarterback went out and did what his doubters said he couldn’t as he put the offense on his back and led the Vikings to an improbable last-minute victory to save their season.
Kirk Cousins has been unstoppable since the Minnesota Vikings returned from their bye week
During Minnesota’s first six games of the 2020 campaign, Cousins really couldn’t have played much worse. He was completing less than 65 percent of his passes and averaging less than 250 passing yards per matchup while also throwing 11 touchdowns and 10 interceptions.
But since the Vikings returned from their bye in Week 7, Cousins has been on fire like he just made three shots in a row in “NBA JAM”. In his last five games, the Minnesota quarterback has completed 72.4 percent of his passes, averaged 258.6 passing yards per contest, tossed 12 touchdowns, and he’s only thrown one interception.
Sunday’s performance against the Panthers was the first time Cousins has finished with at least 300 passing yards in back-to-back games since Week 7 of last season.
During the win over Carolina, the Vikings signal-caller stepped up his performance and he didn’t really have any other choice since the team was missing Adam Thielen and Irv Smith Jr. while Dalvin Cook missed a bunch of time on the field after going down with an injury in the third quarter.
Cousins led Minnesota to 18 points in the fourth quarter on Sunday and his work on the field played a huge part in the team getting a much-needed win.
With his help, the Vikings are now still very much alive in the NFC playoff race and if they end up getting in, people are going to look back at Cousins’ performance against the Panthers as one of the big reasons why.