Kirk Cousins’ contract deal: The Falcons agreed to do what the Vikings wouldn’t

Less than an hour after the NFL’s free agent negotiating window opened on Monday, the Vikings agreed to a four-year, $72 million deal with Texans linebacker Jonathan Greenard. By early Monday afternoon, they had a two-year, $20 million deal with Dolphins linebacker Andrew Van Ginkel and a three-year deal with former Gophers linebacker Blake Cashman, recently of the Texans, worth up to $25.5 million over three years.

They pursued defenders with a purposefulness that reflected their plan to supply Brian Flores with upgrades. At the same time, Kirk Cousins was completing a move from Minnesota to Atlanta the Vikings already knew they weren’t going to stop.

Their final set of negotiations with Cousins, their fifth in six years and their third since Kwesi Adofo-Mensah replaced Rick Spielman as general manager, was by all accounts professional, amicable and direct. The talks ended, for the third consecutive offseason, without the Vikings giving Cousins the multi-year commitment he sought. This time, Cousins was free to talk with other teams and see if someone else would make him an offer beyond the limits that seemed to bound the Vikings’ interest. By Monday, it was clear the Falcons were that team.

How Atlanta approached Cousins in 2024, in some ways, mirrored how the Vikings (and Spielman especially) courted him in 2018. The 2017 Vikings had reached the NFC Championship game with Case Keenum at quarterback; Cousins, who reached free agency at the same time as Keenum, Sam Bradford and Teddy Bridgewater, was seen as the quarterbacking upgrade that could put them over the top and end years of changes at the position. After two bungled attempts to replace Matt Ryan, the Falcons seemed to view Cousins as the catalyst that could help a young roster surge to the top of a winnable division, with owner Arthur Blank willing to provide the financial backing to get him there.

Cousins can officially sign his four-year, $180 million deal, with $100 million guaranteed, and is expected to hold a news conference on Wednesday.

In some ways, the Falcons’ contract with Cousins reads like an anthology of his deals with the Vikings. He got a no-trade clause, as he did in his 2018 and 2022 deals in Minnesota. When the Vikings signed Cousins to an extension in March 2020, the deal included a $35 million base salary for 2022 that became fully guaranteed if Cousins was still on the roster in 2021; his deal with Atlanta includes a $10 million roster bonus in 2026 that also becomes fully guaranteed a year early. Each of Cousins’ deals with the Vikings included up to $2 million in annual incentives, based on the quarterback’s playing time, the team’s offensive success and its playoff progress; his Falcons deal also has $2 million annual incentives, based on the same criteria.

Though the Vikings’ publicly-stated interest in keeping Cousins seemed genuine, it also came with obvious constraints: The Vikings were looking toward the future at the position, with an eye toward drafting a quarterback that coach Kevin O’Connell could mold through the rest of his tenure in Minnesota. During the Vikings’ 2023 negotiations with Cousins, they were only willing to guarantee his salary through 2024, not through 2025 as the quarterback wanted. It’s believed they took a similar approach to guarantees this year.

Last year’s negotiations ended without a deal in March, and the Vikings explored a move to the top of the first round to draft a quarterback last April. They’d kept the door open to a deal with Cousins following the 2023 season, and the quarterback’s strong start before his torn Achilles seemed to only pique their interest in a reunion. Cousins reiterated he wanted to finish his career in Minnesota; both O’Connell and Adofo-Mensah said they wanted Cousins back, and the team seemed hopeful it could find a deal with Cousins even as it pursued the passers in a deep 2024 draft class. But the Vikings’ interest in a rookie always seemed likely to serve as a check on how far they’d go in a deal with Cousins.

“After significant and positive dialogue with Kirk and his representatives, we were unable to reach agreement on a contract that fits the short and long-term visions for both Kirk and the Minnesota Vikings,” Adofo-Mensah said in a statement the team released Monday. “Our approach heading into free agency always included layers of contingencies regarding the quarterback position. We are moving forward with plans that allow us to continue building a roster that can compete for a championship.”

The Falcons pick three spots ahead of the Vikings this year, but they seem to be taking a different tack. Their deal could commit them to Cousins through 2027, with Atlanta taking on at least $35 million in dead money if it cuts him any year before then. By that point, the Falcons would be three years into a rookie QB’s deal, with a steep financial hit if they cut Cousins and a no-trade clause constraining their ability to deal him.

In other words, even with Cousins set to turn 36 in August and coming off an Achilles injury, he got a commitment from the Falcons in 2024 that hewed closer to what the Vikings did in 2018 than what they were willing to do now. The Vikings will plan for a future without Cousins; the quarterback will return to U.S. Bank Stadium in 2024 as a visiting quarterback, entrusted with taking another team to the next level.