The way they have handled him the past month leads me to believe that they will roughly sever ties in whichever manner is most financially beneficial to the franchise.

The Cousins situation is really interesting. He's in that Stafford+ range where he's not elite, but he's a top 12 talent that you can't let walk. I didn't watch the last few Skins games but it wouldn't surprise me if the coaches were ordered to tank in order to hurt his value.

Also the draft is actually fine to get a QB, though they'll take 2 white guys at the top of the draft who kinda suck on film over someone who isn't white but is good like nearly every year.

Yeah the potential FA QB crop is at least Tyrod/Kaep/Cousins/Cutler/Romo. Miami sounded not sure at all today what they're doing with Tannehill. Lots of teams looking at QB's this offseason.

A coach might try to prevent a guy from getting a bonus under orders but no coach is tanking ever, and also they had a playoff berth winning the last game of the season.

Overpaying Badford/Cousins/Stafford is the best way to never be relevant ever.

But an excellent way to finish between 6-10 & 10-6 & never get past 1st round.

Yeah no.

Per Schefter the LA Chargers will be announced as soon as tomorrow.

sizzling hot take there JM

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In order to compete for a SB you basically need an elite QB, who for some reason gets paid the same as this mediocre tier of guys, or you need a really cheap QB.

I'd franchise & trade Cousins, resign Stafford because he couldn't possibly require as big of a cap hit as he's taking up now, & trade Bradford, even if Teddy is confirmed dead.

Eli has two rings in the last decade. Flacco has one. They're in that same general range. Peyton was worse.

It's not like the old Hawks NBA paradox. The NFL season and playoffs have enough variance that having a decent QB is generally +EV.

Bill Musgrave should be a hot name but nobody's giving him any respect.

Eli was on his rookie contract (albeit in a higher rookie hit era) for SB1 & had a $14m hit in SB2. Flacco had an $8m hit in his SB year.

I'm not saying only ok QBs can't win a SB...they just can't if you're paying them elite QB $. You're just at such a huge disadvantage over the teams with elite QBs & the teams with good QBs on rookie contracts.

Excited for two horrible LA teams to fail

Agreed, but it's still probably better than the alternative--cutting/letting them walk and then gambling in the draft.

Yeah, I didn't recommend just letting any of them go for free:

I looked it up--Balt is stuck with Flacco till 2020. (2019 maybe but would be a hell of a cap hit) looooooooool @ that. The one league where it's really hard to bone yourself long term with any deal and the Ravens still found a way to do just that.

I think the argument is pretty simple--ie, tyrod should be undervalued, cousins will be WAY overvalued in the $/ability vs everyone else.

The biggest problem a GM has in these spots is simply letting that guy go and his new team does well/you are seriously risking a bad year and getting yourself fired and you're probably not gonna get another GM shot. Also you have to do whatever the owner wants even if you're against it (see cleveland's gilbert/manziel draft)

You don't have to franchise & trade cousins, just give him one of the other tags, like non exclusive or something like that.

You can also compete for a SB with a paid middling QB if you're elite at other spots (ie defense or OL or offense outside of that QB) and just run good for 4 games (ie every ravens title) or however the Giants got there twice. (likely requires drafting well though or evaluating your own team well)

The list of QB's that got to the Superbowl this decade isn't strong outside of the manning/godgers/roeth/brady group and nearly all of them were in close games when they got there vs a lesser guy.

kirk cousins has started 2 full seasons and just threw for 5000 yards with top 5 rate stats in the best division

good lord man

GMs are mostly professional fall guys anyway. The owner is the one who makes the decisions and then fires the GM when they fail to pan out.

The problem with trading mid-high tier QB is that it's impossible to get equivalent value. In the NFL you're drawing dead until you have at least Cousins/Stafford tier play. The reason that the mid and mid-high tier guys command so much is that their value over replacement is astronomical.

Cousins' and Stafford's situation is even more interesting because they're both 28. They are in the sweet spot of their prime $$$ and output years. Their main goal right now is to lock up a huge 6 year deal for FLACKS-level money. They'll be serviceable at 34+ but it's going to be at journeyman level, assuming they can avoid CTS.

Yeah, don't get the Cousins hate. I was skeptical, but he's had two really solid years and one of the tops in DYAR and DVOA for the last two years.


He's a top 10 and maybe better QB. Stafford could be if he plays like this year again. Badford will never be a top 20 QB.

Hot take: Cousins is the firmly one of the top 3 under-30 QBs.

Cousins haters last year reasoning was that the sample size was too small for a multi year deal. This season he performed at a similar or better level across the board compared to last year with a much tougher schedule and the reasoning is...what? That he performed too well that he now expects to get big money, which he doesn't deserve because as good as he was it wasn't up to Rodgers/Brees/Luck?

The counter seems to be let him go for picks and then go get somebody in the draft. Who? Watson? Wait for 2018? Hope to hit similar to a Rustle/Dak?

Cousins hate at this point mostly stems from his height, skin color, confidence (you like that clip), and having replaced a black quarterback. If Bradford was white and confident he'd probably be hated as much.

yeah, because everybody hates white guys at the QB position

I actually don't mind him at all and think the Skins should (and will) sign him long term. But the hate is because he misses key throws at key moments...which is the very opposite of what you want your QB to do

No, not everybody. Just ~everybody here.

If he had Russell's or Cam's defense those teams wouldn't even have many "key moments".

Russell and Cam's offense combined and play the best guys would still be definitively worse than what Cousins has.

Chargers moving to LA is so so bad. LA didn't show up for rams games this year (even bad teams who move first year usually get people for the first year) and now they get a second team, lol NFL.