Tag: Mike Zimmer

Former Vikings LB says vaccination status the breaking point for Mike Zimmer and Kirk Cousins

What was the breaking point for Mike Zimmer and Kirk Cousins?

There’s more to the statement that former Minnesota Vikings coach Mike Zimmer “didn’t like” Kirk Cousins. And the problems might have run deeper than the quarterback’s performance on the football field.

During an appearance on The Colin Cowherd Podcast, former Vikings linebacker Ben Leber went a bit deeper when discussing the former duo’s unraveling relationship.

The personalities between the two never gelled from the start, but according to Leber, things really took a turn when Cousins refused to take the COVID vaccination.

“It didn’t seem like it was ever the way I thought a head coach and a quarterback should interact,” said Leber. “And it wasn’t new news. We’ve been talking about that locally now for really probably the last two seasons.

“I think it really came to a head during training camp when Kirk and others—and that’s the thing, there were others on the team that decided not to get vaccinated. But it was like Kirk was being singled out. You could see the disdain that Zimmer had towards the situation.”

Leber clarified that he isn’t blaming Zimmer for everything that went wrong in Minnesota, either. Quite the contrary, he believes Zimmer was a big reason for the defense not being even worse last season.

But there were clear issues between the former coach and quarterback that led to an unhealthy situation for the team as a whole.

Ultimately, it ended with Zimmer being fired and the Vikings bringing in an offensive-minded coach with a more player-friendly approach in Kevin O’Connell.

Leber even brought up the fact that Cousins approached Zimmer and tried to set up a weekly football meeting as a means of forming some sort of a player-coach connection.

“You start putting the pieces together after a couple of years and a couple of seasons, and it just didn’t seem like [Zimmer] liked the guy, at all,” said Leber.

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Rick Spielman can’t escape culpability for messy end with Vikings

Mike Zimmer isn’t the only one to blame for the previous regime’s failures.

Mike Zimmer spent the better part of the offseason in secrecy, while being raked through the coals for a disastrous ending to his eight-year tenure as head coach for the Minnesota Vikings.

But it took two to tango in a crash landing that was every bit the fault of former general manager Rick Spielman as much as it was Zimmer’s.

Spielman’s questionable personnel decisions coupled with a lack of communication with Zimmer contributed to things nosediving and the Vikings missing the playoffs in back-to-back years.

And no amount of jiggling and wiggling can absolve him from culpability in the disaster.

 

NFL Hall of Famer Deion Sanders, Zimmer’s friend, alluded to the communication issues back in January, when he revealed Zimmer and Spielman hadn’t spoken in months. Not long after those comments, Zimmer’s girlfriend, Katarina Elizabeth Miketin, echoed Sanders’ statements of clear dysfunction within the Vikings’ organization.

“What about the GM having a relationship with the organization? Not talking to your coach for three months? Rick, Back-peddling and “spin” have always been your “game,” Miketin said in a now deleted Twitter post.

And these aren’t just a couple of Zimmer allies spouting off, either.

You don’t have to look far to see the cracks at the top of the organization, especially when it pertained to the draft.

Look no further than the third round of the 2021 NFL draft. Spielman took a chance on quarterback Kellen Mond, who Zimmer never connected with from the start.

The former head coach seemed completely disinterested in the rookie, and it was obvious he was never a fan of the draft pick. It all culminated into Zimmer outright telling the media he wasn’t interested in seeing Mond in action.

And then there was offensive guard Wyatt Davis, who was allegedly a rogue draft pick by Spielman.

“Do you want to know what I heard at the combine? That was a Rick Spielman special, where he didn’t listen to anyone else in the room on Wyatt Davis,” ESPN’s Courtney Cronin said, during an appearance on the Purple Insider podcast. “He went after his guy. Two scouts I talked to in the Minnesota Vikings organization said that this guy wasn’t even a backup grade for them. Okay? That’s what the reality of the situation was.”

Communication is key for any successful NFL team, and the Vikings dropped the ball under the guidance of Spielman.

There were obvious first-round bombs as well with players like receiver Laquon Treadwell and even center Garrett Bradbury, who hopes to turn things around in 2022.

But to be fair, there will always be misses for anyone that sits in the general manager seat for 10 years, regardless of the situation. It comes with the territory.

Sometimes, it really is just a roll of the dice.

And it wasn’t all bad in Minnesota, either. The team did come away with gems like Justin Jefferson, Adam Thielen (undrafted), Dalvin Cook, Eric Kendricks, Danielle Hunter and even a possible future Hall of Famer in Harrison Smith.

There’s enough jiggling and wiggling room for that success, at the very least.

But it was a failed regime from the top to bottom considering the inability to capitalize more consistently on the football talent. Things got increasingly stale for fans and players long before ownership felt the need to drop the guillotine.

After spending nearly a decade together with only one NFC championship appearance to show for it, perhaps Zimmer and Spielman both felt the same.

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Mike Zimmer lived long enough to see himself become the villain

It’s been a rough offseason for Coach Zimmer.

Mike Zimmer has remained the subject of criticism for all-comers hell-bent on taking their parting shot at a coaching tenure that spanned eight seasons with the Minnesota Vikings.

Whether it’s deserved or not is up for interpretation. But what it means to the organization as a whole, particularly one that’s in a win-now mode, runs much deeper.

The Vikings are a team testing the very definition of insanity, which is doing the same thing and expecting different results. Most of their roster remains intact from a season ago, outside of a couple of major additions, like outside linebacker Za’Darius Smith and rookie safety first-round draft pick Lewis Cine.

But for the most part, they are running it back with the thinking that former Los Angeles Rams offensive coordinator Kevin O’Connell replacing Zimmer as the head coach will give them the desired results of Super Bowl contention.

Zimmer being dubbed the villain of the story sure beats the alternative of the Vikings looking in the mirror and coming to grips with the possibility that the roster doesn’t work. Granted, they might have to do that anyways if O’Connell fails to get the team back into the playoffs.

For now, however, they’ll just stick with Plan A: Building on what’s already there instead of calling in the wrecking crew and starting anew.

But that’s only possible if Zimmer is the villain. It only works if his hard-nosed coaching style is to blame for all of the problems in Minnesota.

Star linebacker Eric Kendricks called the Vikings a fear-based culture under the former head coach’s watch. Cornerback Kris Boyd called out Zimmer’s coaching staff for being too strict and acting like the “world ended” whenever a mistake was made. And former Vikings linebacker Ben Leber reaffirmed the belief that the former coach never liked quarterback Kirk Cousins.

So much has come out in the aftermath of Zimmer’s run with the Vikings, and he has yet to address any of it. His silence has been deafening.

But there’s also the possibility that he’s made peace with being perceived as the villain.

What good could really come from arguing otherwise? It would be his word against multiple Vikings players that have already opened up about a looser, more player-friendly atmosphere under O’Connell. Besides, it’s no secret that Zimmer ruled with an iron fist.

This is the same coach that opted to kneel down at the end of the Vikings’ Week 18 finale against the Chicago Bears, completely aware of the fact that wideout Justin Jefferson just needed 16 more receiving yards to surpass Randy Moss’ single-season record.

It’s also the same coach that said he wasn’t interested in seeing backup quarterback Kellen Mond get playing time on the field.

Loose and player-friendly have never been words used to describe Zimmer as a coach. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing, and there have been plenty of coaches with the same mentality that have gone on to lead teams to Super Bowls.

Maybe, just maybe, silence is Zimmer’s answer after all.

If the Vikings fail to get over the hump with him gone, he could come out looking like a winner in all of this. That would then lead to an argument that the struggles were more due to him being tethered to a roster that lacked the personnel to get the job done on the field.

Once a hero and now the villain, Zimmer is intently listening somewhere out there with hope that the team’s failure could ultimately lead to his exoneration.

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Former Vikings LB claims Mike Zimmer never liked Kirk Cousins

A former Viking raises questions regarding the relationship between Zimmer and Cousins.

Kirk Cousins will finally have an opportunity to thrive at quarterback for the Minnesota Vikings after the split with former head coach Mike Zimmer, according to NFL commentator Ben Leber.

During an appearance on CBS Sports Radio, the former Vikings linebacker claimed Zimmer never liked Cousins enough to give him a real opportunity to lead the team.

“I think he’s going to finally thrive, really thrive, in a system and a coach that actually respects him,” said Leber. “I mean, it’s not like I’m breaking news here that Mike Zimmer did not like Kirk Cousins. And I think that showed in the way that Kirk behaved and the way that he carried himself. The team was never given to him, or he was never allowed to earn the trust of the team, because the head coach I think just didn’t like him.”

There have been obvious clues to a disconnect between many of the personnel decisions made by former Vikings general manager Rick Spielman and Zimmer.

If Leber is right in his assessment, perhaps some of that plays into the equation as well. Of course, it would be great to hear Zimmer’s side of the story, but the former coach has gone radio silent since being fired by the team back in January.

Newly-hired head coach Kevin O’Connell has arrived with a more player-friendly coaching style, along with having actual experience working alongside Cousins during their time with the former Washington Redskins.

A higher altitude for the Vikings quarterback, who threw for 4,221 yards, 33 touchdowns and only seven interceptions in 2021, could potentially carry the team to the Promised Land in 2022.

Anything less could bring into question an offseason of Zimmer being painted as the bad guy in Minnesota.

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Kris Boyd says it felt like ‘world ended’ if mistake was made under Mike Zimmer

Boyd is already loving the Kevin O’Connell era

Now that the Mike Zimmer era is completely in the rearview, more players for the Minnesota Vikings are speaking out about the differences between the previous coaching staff and the current one under Kevin O’Connell.

Cornerback Kris Boyd was the latest to give his take on what things were really like when Zimmer was at the helm, and his comments mirrored remarks made by standout linebacker Eric Kendricks, who claimed the team was being ran like a “fear-based organization.”

When appearing on All Things Covered, Boyd spoke about fear seemingly being at the center of everything football-related under the previous regime.

“With the last staff, they were like, whatever they were dealing with or were scared of, I don’t know,” said Boyd. “… They would walk around with their [butts] like tight. [They] would always be strict about everything. Like any time you messed up, it’s like the world ended.

“[O’Connell] and them, they way more chill, way more relaxed. Whatever we got to get fixed, we’re going to fix it. We’re going to keep rolling. We’re going to bounce back and figure it out. [They’ve changed] the whole vibe. Everybody’s way more relaxed.”

There’s obviously a distinct difference in coaching approaches from O’Connell and Zimmer.

O’Connell, 37, is a younger coach with a better ability to relate to the players on his team. He’s more of a player-friendly coach that runs his team with a bit more freedom. That approach might not work for everyone, but it did lead to O’Connell winning a Super Bowl under Sean McVay with the Los Angeles Rams.

Quite the contrary, Zimmer is more of an old school coach that ruled with an iron fist. That approach is fine as long as the team is winning football games. But an unpleasant atmosphere combined with failing to make the playoffs in back-to-back seasons is always going to be a recipe for disaster.

The team imploded—and Zimmer along with it.

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Kellen Mond and father Kevin Mond sound off on Mike Zimmer

Kellen Mond and his father, Kevin Mond, speak in-depth on the Mike Zimmer situation

Kellen Mond didn’t exactly get off on the wrong foot with former coach Mike Zimmer. Quite the contrary, he never knew where he stood with his former head coach since they barely spoke to one another.

It makes sense considering Zimmer didn’t have much to say about his young quarterback when asked if he was interested in starting him ahead of the Vikings’ Week 18 matchup with the Chicago Bears.

“Not particularly,” Zimmer coldly responded, when asked if he wanted to see Mond in an NFL game.

When speaking with the Pioneer Press’ Chris Tomasson, Mond claimed he wasn’t particularly bothered by Zimmer’s comments because the two never had a relationship.

“He’s never really talked to me personally, so I didn’t really take too much offense to it,” said Mond. “He kind of backtracked on his word a little bit after. But it’s all fun and games, whatever. It’s a new year, new coaches, new team. I’m a year older, second year in the NFL.”

Kellen’s father, Kevin Mond, doesn’t believe Zimmer’s issue with his son was personal, but he does think it was a byproduct of the ongoing problems between the coach and former general manager Rick Spielman. He thinks Zimmer wanted to go defense with the No. 66 overall pick instead of adding another quarterback.

It also didn’t help that Kellen was unvaccinated, which Kevin saw as another potential problem working against his son. Zimmer had been adamant about getting players vaccinated to lower the odds of them missing games.

At the end of the day, it ended up being an uphill battle that Kellen had no hope of ever climbing as long as Zimmer was at the helm.

“Zimmer wasn’t mad at the person, he was mad at the selection of the quarterback,” said Kevin. “So whoever was going to get his venom thrown at him, it just happened to be Kellen.

“Kellen was in the doghouse from the start because of the draft and then, number two, the COVID. So he was in Zimmer’s doghouse and wasn’t getting out. They weren’t going to give him the time and Zimmer not playing him at the end of the year was, personally to me, Zimmer just sticking his thumb at Spielman.”

It all feeds into the overarching narrative that the Vikings were operating with serious dysfunction within the previous regime.

Hall of Fame cornerback and current college football coach Deion Sanders, a friend of Zimmer’s, claimed Spielman and Zimmer weren’t even on speaking terms for multiple months into his final season, ahead of the eventual firings.

It’s hard for veteran players to succeed in that kind of environment, much less a rookie third-round draft pick. Kellen Mond never stood a chance with Zimmer.

So it’s no surprise why it’s like night and day under coach Kevin O’Connell and offensive coordinator Wes Phillips. The two have taken a legitimate interest in Mond’s development, and it’s already showing on the practice field.

O’Connell admitted he was impressed by what he’s seen so far from the 22-year-old quarterback, and Phillips echoed that belief in a recent media conference.

“Kellen is very sharp. He has really picked up the offense very well,” Phillips said.

In many ways, this is a do-over rookie season for Mond, who hopes to put the Zimmer drama in the past and finally get a fair crack at realizing his full potential as a Viking.

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Eric Kendricks spoke to Vikings owners about culture change after Mike Zimmer’s firing

Veteran concerns like those harbored by Eric Kendricks played a role in ownership’s GM and head coaching hires.

Eric Kendricks turned heads when speaking about a “fear-based culture” in the aftermath of the Minnesota Vikings firing coach Mike Zimmer in January.

Now, the former First-Team All-Pro linebacker is saying he spoke with co-owners Mark and Zygi Wilf directly, when the team was in the early stages of hiring a new general manager and head coach.

“We had a great conversation at the end of the season and throughout the offseason a little bit,” Kendricks told reporters on Wednesday, “I’ve talked to the Wilfs as well. They are very involved in the community as well. Just having that bridge of communication with them and the management as well, I feel like it’s not really common. I talk to players around the league, and they don’t really have that communication with their ownership.”

The Vikings eventually settled on former Cleveland Browns vice president of football operations Kwesi Adofo-Mensah as their new general manager and former Los Angeles Rams offensive coordinator Kevin O’Connell as the new head coach.

Adofo-Mensah has spoken about collaboration and making decisions as a collective since arriving in Minnesota. And O’Connell is more of a player’s coach with an ability to relate better with all of the different personalities on the roster.

That isn’t an attempt to pile on a more old school-minded coach like Zimmer. Former Vikings star linebacker Chad Greenway recently called him an elite coach, but he also claimed his “aggressive” coaching style “wasn’t for everybody.”

Kendricks has never elaborated on his feelings towards Zimmer, but to be fair, it really doesn’t even matter at this point. The Vikings are moving on with O’Connell at the helm of the ship, while Zimmer has moved on with his life as well.

If another coaching opportunity presents itself, perhaps the two paths will cross again someday.

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Chad Greenway says players couldn’t adapt to ‘elite’ coach Mike Zimmer

Was Mike Zimmer an elite coach?

Former Minnesota Vikings star linebacker Chad Greenway believes ex-coach Mike Zimmer came with the sort of style that needed adjusting. A player’s ability to adapt and adjust to a more aggressive coaching style likely told the story on how they experienced Zimmer.

While Greenway admitted that kind of coaching isn’t for everyone, he still thinks the source of the information was an elite football mind, once you get beyond the new-school preferences.

“[Zimmer] wasn’t for everybody and I think his approach was very aggressive,” Greenway told Fox News Digital. “…It’s a little more pressure and a little more serious and that’s fine. I could adapt because I had been in the league for nine years already. I could adapt and adjust, but a lot of other guys couldn’t, and it was hard for them and I could understand that.

“I think he’s a very good football coach — an elite football coach, an elite football mind — and at the end of the day is a great guy that I loved playing for.”

Zimmer spent eight years with the Vikings before he was finally fired by the team.

Star linebacker Eric Kendricks alluded to a fear-based culture with the defensive-minded guru in charge. Those comments raised eyebrows considering Kendricks is one of the more outspoken leaders in the locker room.

And then the news trickled out regarding the ongoing dysfunction in the relationship between Zimmer and then-general manager Rick Spielman.

From strictly a football perspective, however, Greenway makes some great points. You’d be hard-pressed to find anyone that would label Zimmer a bad football coach. The fact that he managed to stick around for nearly a decade in a league that churns out coaches quicker than parts on an assembly line is an amazing feat in itself.

But it’s also the responsibility of the coach to adapt to the ever-changing times and find new ways to connect with players. Zimmer wasn’t able to do it enough to keep a surprisingly talented roster from underachieving.

And so the axe fell.

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HBO missed the boat on Mike Zimmer, Vikings ‘Hard Knocks’

Keep those cameras and distractions far away this season! But last season? The Vikings would have been perfect for “Hard Knocks.”

An inevitable train wreck like the Detroit Lions is always fit for television, which makes sense why they’d be the team chosen to be featured on HBO’s “Hard Knocks” in 2022. But make no mistake, there was enough choo chooing and billowing smoke clouds from the Minnesota Vikings last season to kick viewership for “Hard Knocks” into overdrive.

It was a hard miss by HBO, who spent the season following around the Indianapolis Colts instead.

The Vikings hadn’t quite dipped to the Lions’ levels of struggles yet—no playoff berth in the last six years and a last place NFC North finish in four consecutive seasons. But the struggle-bus was still rolling in the not-so-hunky-dory Minnesota land with general manager Rick Spielman and coach Mike Zimmer overseeing things.

Losing, in-fighting and a likely lame duck coaching situation would have had football fans lapping it all up.

Vikings linebacker Eric Kendricks hinted on a “fear-based culture” when giving a little insight into what things looked like behind the scenes under the previous regime. Everyone thought the same thing when he made those remarks—boy, oh boy, if those walls could talk in Minnesota, they’d have some good stories to tell.

Legendary cornerback Deion Sanders, who is friends with Zimmer, claimed there was no communication between Spielman and Zimmer in the months leading up to both men being fired by the team. To add to the lack of communication, there was also an accusation of Spielman going rogue in the 2021 NFL Draft in selecting offensive guard Wyatt Davis in the third round.

Granted, I wouldn’t expect Spielman to be on the field or in the locker rooms enough to be on camera for the shows, unfortunately. But the trickle-down effect from some of his incendiary decisions has been a lingering problem for the Vikings.

Zimmer looked almost as disinterested in playing Davis last season as he looked at Spielman’s earlier third-round draft pick, quarterback Kellen Mond. He actually admitted he didn’t want to get a look at Mond on the field when pressed by reporters ahead of the team’s season finale against the Chicago Bears.

Along with all of the Spielman and Zimmer drama, there was the Kirk Cousins contract situation bubbling at the surface. It was the year where Cousins was expected to prove he was worth the massive salary cap hell his contract would inflict upon the team before his eventual extension by the new regime.

An opportunity to see how he led behind the scenes and how the rest of the team reacted to him would have been worth the price of admission. Throw a mega personality like All-Pro wideout Justin Jefferson and future Hall of Fame cornerback Patrick Peterson into the mix and you’d need snacks and soda as well.

It was all popcorn entertainment at its finest, and the good folks at HBO should be kicking themselves for missing it.

Vikings re-signing Kirk Cousins a commitment to mediocrity

Just more of the same from the Vikings

Over the last few weeks, there has been a ton of speculation about the Vikings free agency. They sat approximately $15 million over the cap with multiple players primed for trades and restructures. Within those discussions, there were a lot of different ways this offseason could go.

Just minutes after Tom Brady tweeted out to the world that he was coming out of retirement and back to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Tom Pelissero broke the news that the Vikings had agreed in principle to an extension with quarterback Kirk Cousins.

With all of the discussions of possible change, the Vikings have extended Cousins by giving him a fully guaranteed short-term extension.

The details of the extension does make sense given the teams cap constraints. Here is how it breaks down.

According to Over The Cap, the Vikings are $750,000 away from being compliant with the salary cap. When you look at this from a salary cap compliance perspective, this move makes some sense.

However, from the perspective of building a championship contender, this move is baffling.

Just two years ago this week, the Vikings did the same exact thing. They gave Cousins an extension over two seasons worth $66 million. That shrunk his 2020 cap hit from $31 million to $20 million. It also set up a $45 million cap hit for 2022. This extension essentially does the same thing, dropping it down to $31 million. It also adds on two void years to push $12.5 million down the road.

The biggest frustration with this move is that it not only accepts mediocrity, but embraces it.

Let’s face it, the Vikings were a Super Bowl contender when they brought in Cousins. They were coming off an appearance in the NFC Championship Game and had the No. 1 defense. Cousins was signed to be a mercenary to climb to heights Case Keenum couldn’t reach. Over the last four years, he went 33-29-1 with the Vikings.

Over those years, Cousins has put up some impressive stats. He’s thrown 124 touchdowns to only 36 interceptions. He throws a really nice, accurate football and can run an offense with command.

But the difficulty with Cousins is that it’s not enough.

Throughout his tenure, there are numerous instances where he plays like a top-tier quarterback. The issue is there are too many games where he plays incredibly poorly. The 2019 games against Chicago and San Francisco are prime examples of him playing at a disastrous level.

It’s never been about what Cousins can do but rather what he doesn’t or can’t. Too often Cousins refuses to be aggressive and will take the check down when a receiver is about to come open down the field. Jay Gruden spoke several years back about Cousins’ need for everything to be perfect on a given play. That mentality hasn’t escaped him. In fact, it has creeped in even more.

The Vikings over the last four seasons went from having the fifth-ranked defense to having one of the bottom-five defenses each of the last two seasons. The main reason is the opportunity cost of his contract.

After the 2019 season, the team lost Xavier Rhodes, Linval Joseph, Trae Waynes and Mackensie Alexander due to cap constraints that his contract provided. While Cousins is objectively really good, he isn’t good enough to elevate the talent around him and overcome the deficiencies that the team has. The offensive line, poor defense, struggles with play-calling and missing weapons have all been issues for the Vikings during his tenure. That’s the biggest issue with his contract. It’s what he doesn’t provide on the football field.

We have seen multiple times over the last decade teams understanding they didn’t have that game-changing quarterback to take them to the next level.

The Kansas City Chiefs traded up 17 spots to select Patrick Mahomes while still having Alex Smith, who led them to a 13-3 record. The Buffalo Bills had Tyrod Taylor lead them to their first playoff appearance in 18 seasons and drafted Josh Allen. The Rams just traded away Jared Goff for Matthew Stafford, incurring a dead cap charge of over $20 million and losing two first-round draft picks, because they knew Goff wasn’t the answer.

Kirk Cousins is in that same mold. One playoff spot in four seasons isn’t exactly a ringing endorsement. In fact, he is one game under .500 for his career when he has consistently had a myriad of weapons and elite play-callers at his disposal.

The Vikings were set up to be able to make the change most had hypothesized they would do: move on from Cousins and potentially select a quarterback with the 12th overall pick of the 2022 NFL Draft. New general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah, a brilliant mind that came from Wall Street, seemed primed to make that move. He and new head coach Kevin O’Connell had a clean slate to make whatever moves they wanted to shape the team. With this extension, it raises major questions about their vision of the future in Minnesota.

No team has ever won a Super Bowl with their quarterback taking up 15 percent or more of the salary cap. This year, Cousins cap charge is exactly 15%, while 2023 has a charge of 16.1%.

Over his career, analysts and fans alike have moved the goalposts for Cousins. It’s excuse after excuse for why he wasn’t successful in a certain situation.

“The coaching was bad.”

“The offensive line can’t protect him.”

“The defense can’t stop anyone.”

At a certain point, when the quarterback is below .500, he deserves to shoulder that blame.

At first glance, the Vikings have decided that they’d rather stay relevant by remaining competitive and selling out U.S. Bank Stadium than winning a Super Bowl.

The idea of running it back with how the roster projects out and the track record of poor results isn’t exactly a great idea. In fact, letting go of Rick Spielman and Mike Zimmer just to do the same exact thing under a different banner doesn’t exactly exude confidence from the fanbase and analysts alike.

Adofo-Mensah deserves more time to show what his vision for the team truly is, but this is a poor start.

For an executive of his intelligence to look at the data in front of him in regards to paying above-average quarterbacks top-end money, to make this move—it really is quite shocking. If he is successful, this would be the first team to win a Super Bowl with these constraints, and it would open the eyes of the entire football world as to how to build a franchise. Starting off your first time running a team focusing on making the outlier work is not a great strategy.

Overall, I think Cousins is a good football player. In fact, I believe he is a fringe top-10 quarterback. The fact of the matter is that his flaws are too much to overcome for me to feel comfortable with this extension. The next few days are going to speak volumes as to whether we should have the glowing confidence that we had when Adofo-Mensah was hired.

Until proven otherwise, this extension is a commitment to mediocrity.

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