Analyst believes Kirk Cousins to 49ers is more than speculation
By Adam Patrick
More thoughts about where the Minnesota Vikings quarterback will play in 2021 continue to flow in.
It’s starting to seem like Kirk Cousins starting under center for the Minnesota Vikings next year won’t be confirmed until their very first snap of the 2021 regular season.
With the Vikings expected to miss the playoffs for the second time since Cousins arrived three years ago, the idea of the team moving on from during the upcoming offseason continues to pick up steam.
The latest comes from NFL.com’s Gregg Rosenthal, who included the Minnesota signal-caller in his list of NFL quarterbacks that could be playing elsewhere in 2021.
Connection between the Minnesota Vikings quarterback and the San Francisco 49ers won’t go away
In his list, Rosenthal divided the passers he included into four tiers and Cousins landed in his second-tier which he titled “Slightly less realistic (but still spicy!) trade targets”. Along with the Vikings passer, Matt Ryan is the only other quarterback included in this second tier.
Rosenthal views Cousins and Ryan as players that could potentially be moved in 2021, but he also knows that it will be more difficult for either to be traded than it would be for other quarterbacks like Carson Wentz, Jimmy Garoppolo, Matthew Stafford, and Sam Darnold.
Fueling the NFL.com analyst’s thoughts about the Minnesota signal-caller is his connection to current San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan. This shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone as rumors of Cousins ending up with the 49ers have been floating around for a while now.
The interesting wrinkle that Rosenthal threw into all of this though is that he believes Shanahan’s admiration for Cousins makes him landing in San Francisco sooner than later more than just “idle speculation.”
This makes it seem like the NFL.com analyst might know a little more about what the 49ers are planning to do during the upcoming offseason and whether or not they will be targeting the Vikings quarterback.
Trade rumors involving Cousins and San Francisco certainly don’t seem to be going anywhere anytime soon and this will definitely be something to keep an eye on during the next few months.