Surprising Kirk Cousins comments create new questions about Vikings exit

The Minnesota Vikings painted a friendly picture when Kirk Cousins signed with the Atlanta Falcons in free agency earlier this year. To the public eye, the Vikings weren’t willing to meet Cousins’s demands but the two had an amicable split as he got his last big contract.

But while Cousins seems happy with his new team, his departure from Minnesota keeps popping up. Speaking with Dianna Russini and Chase Daniel on The Athletic’s "Scoop City" podcast, Cousins was asked about his previous desire for one-year deals, which painted a harsher picture of his decision to sign with the Falcons.

“I think the reality is just that they wanted to give themselves that flexibility. I remember [Vikings head coach Kevin O’Connell’s] words that which – I’m not going to hold them to them – were, 'Hey if we sign you back, I think it’s very unlikely that we would draft somebody.' It was something to that effect.

But I also know in the league things change, so even if he says that, it’s not like I’m going to, you know, hold them to that. But his approach was, ‘I just don’t see us doing that if you’re back. If you’re not back, then we have to [draft a quarterback.]'”

Comments from Atlanta Falcons QB Kirk Cousins create puzzling uncertainty about his departure from the Minnesota Vikings

Cousins’s recollection of the conversation with O’Connell makes some sense. If the Vikings brought Cousins back, they probably wouldn’t have traded for the No. 23 overall pick for the draft and made an aggressive move to trade for Drake Maye or J.J. McCarthy. The Vikings also would have tried to bolster their defense and possibly selected Dallas Turner with the 11th overall pick.

Cousins also reiterated this side of the story – although he admitted that a lot of the conversations took place through his agent Mike McCartney – when he was a guest on "The Dan Patrick Show" last May.

“It was very grey. It was very ‘We don’t know what we’re going to do.’ And speaking with Kevin O’Connell, it was always very communicative with me. It was ‘We’re not sure.’

He said if we bring you back, we’d love to use the draft picks on defense. Um, but you understand that nobody really knows in March what they’re going to do in late April.”

But Cousins’ story doesn’t connect when considering other reports around the league. ESPN’s Kevin Seifert recently reported that O’Connell “leveled with Cousins” at the end of the 2024 season and informed him that they would be taking a quarterback due to the depth of the draft class and Cousins’s status as a 36-year-old quarterback coming off a torn Achilles.

“The Vikings’ 3-6 record after his injury had exposed the dangers of not looking beyond a 36-year-old quarterback. With their best draft position in a decade, the team had decided to tap into a deep 2024 quarterback class and find its next starter.

But no one – not ownership, not [Vikings general manager] Adofo-Mensah and not O’Connell – wanted the rookie to play right away. Cousins would be their starter in 2024 and possibly longer.”

Seifert also wrote that the Vikings had reached out to the Los Angeles Chargers about the availability of Chargers quarterback Justin Herbert in early March, which indicates the team had a full plan in place to move on from Cousins last spring.

Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer also hinted that McCartney had a feeling the Vikings would draft a quarterback all the way back to the spring of 2023 and that they would want to get rid of Cousins in 2025 to make way for the new starter.

“As the negotiations resumed, the first purpose, clearly was for Minnesota to show it genuinely wanted Cousins back – a sentiment the agent felt strongly from O’Connell, who’d been in touch with his team captain since the season ended.

McCartney didn’t doubt the Vikings' intentions on that. Conversely, he couldn’t shake his feeling that the team was going to draft a quarterback two months later and that Cousins was being offered a bridge contract that would guide the Vikings through the transition.”

With all of the information, it seems like two different stories are circulating regarding Cousins’s departure and whether the Vikings informed Cousins that they were going to draft a quarterback. Cousins went on to sign a four-year, $180 million contract, but the Falcons drafted Michael Penix Jr. with the eighth overall pick one month later – a plan that Cousins reportedly didn’t find out about until they were on the clock.

Maybe Cousins has selective hearing, or his agent didn’t see both scenarios coming. Either way, Cousins has his money, and his long-term future isn’t an issue for the Vikings anymore.

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