Tag: kirk cousins atlanta falcons

Fantasy response: Kirk Cousins agrees to huge deal with Atlanta Falcons

Captain Kirk heads to the Dirty South on a mega deal that reshapes the NFC quarterback landscape.

Will he or won’t he? That was the lingering question surrounding whether Kirk Cousins would return to the Minnesota Vikings. All doubts were erased once he agreed to a lucrative contract with the Atlanta Falcons on Monday.

There’s the obvious concern gamers will have about whether Cousins’ torn Achilles tendon is healthy, and one can safely believe there’s no way the Falcons would guarantee that kind of money without being confident in his recovery. He will officially sign as soon as Wednesday after passing a physical.

Cousins has one of the better offensive lines in his new confines, and the Falcons boast three of the most talented young players across the league in running back Bijan Robinson, wideout Drake London, and TE Kyle Pitts. Expect Atlanta to add more pieces at wide receiver, and it wouldn’t be a surprise if the brass brings in a veteran presence to pair with Pitts at tight end. Getting London to take the next step to becoming a true WR1 and seeing Pitts finally live up to his potential seems well within reach due to Cousins’ penchant to get the most out of his playmakers.

Fantasy football outlook

The Achilles injury will be fully healed in time for Cousins to build chemistry with his new teams and shouldn’t factor into his fantasy stock. Atlanta offensive coordinator Zac Robinson will implement a system that is awfully familiar to Cousins. Both Robinson and former Minnesota head coach Kevin O’Connell come from the Sean McVay tree.

The veteran has earned the right to be a low-end QB1 on draft day, and there will be weeks in which Cousins resides among the strongest performers at the position.

Kirk Cousins’ deal with the Falcons could upset the NFC’s balance of power

Kirk Cousins’ four-year deal with the Atlanta Falcons upsets the balance of power in the NFC South — and perhaps the entire NFC.

In the end, the Minnesota Vikings and the Atlanta Falcons were in a bidding war for the services of quarterback Kirk Cousins, and in the end, the Falcons won out. Per multiple reports, Cousins has agreed to terms on a four-year contract, and this puts the Falcons in an entirely new stratosphere.

The numbers are about what you’d expect.

Last season, under head coach Arthur Smith, the Falcons finished 7-10 with quarterbacks Desmond Ridder, Taylor Heinicke, and Logan Woodside. Those quarterbacks combined for 17 touchdowns and 17 interceptions, and the tape was just as average as the numbers would indicate. Last season, before suffering a torn Achilles tendon in Week 8 against the Green Bay Packers, Cousins completed 69.5% of his passes for 19 touchdowns and five interceptions. He had done some of his best work with Vikings head coach and offensive shot-caller Kevin O’Connell; he’ll now try to get on the same page with Falcons OC Zac Robinson, who has a strong background in Sean McVay’s offense. Cousins also has a strong background in that kind of offense throughout his career.

Cousins will also have some estimable targets to throw to — while the Falcons have been in quarterback purgatory since Matt Ryan’s decline, they’ve added a lot of first-round talent at the skill positions with Drake London, Kyle Pitts, and Bijan Robinson. That all of a sudden takes Atlanta’s offense from Extremely Mid to potentially top-tier, which is a very big deal.