The talk of the offseason for the Minnesota Vikings so far has been about what the new regime will do with quarterback Kirk Cousins. The Vikings are well above the cap, and Cousins is on the last year of his contract and due $45 million this upcoming season. While there has been talk recently about the Carolina Panthers inquiring about a potential trade for Cousins, Voice of the Vikings Paul Allen suggests that discussion about a Cousins trade is “fruitless.”
This past Friday, Allen discussed how Cousins had a major role in getting his former offensive coordinator Kevin O’Connell the Vikings head coaching job. Allen Stated:
“Kirk put a lot of time into getting Kevin O’Connell hired and put in a lot of time behind the scenes with those who hire. Ok, so now there’s that. And O’Connell is glowing, to a certain extent, along with the new offensive coordinator [Wes Phillips], of Kirk. So, you lay those things out, right there. It would be a metaphorical 2X4 up your butt if they were to just trade him out of nowhere. ‘What’d you say here, what’d you mean here? What about that 25-minute conversation with the team president to get the guy hired?’ I mean, all of that plays into this and that’s why I think [the Kirk Cousins trade conversations] are fruitless.”
The news of Cousins’ involvement in the coaching process isn’t too far-fetched. Adam Thielen went on Ben Leber’s podcast, Unrestricted, and said that ownership and the front office met with the team and had a meeting asking leaders on the team what they would like to see in terms of the qualities the new head coach and general managers would possess. What is most interesting is that Cousins, whose future in the long term is uncertain, may have been the driving force of getting O’Connell the job over some of the other candidates.
If what Allen said is true, we should expect Cousins to be the quarterback next year and potentially for him to sign an extension this offseason.
