{"id":10638,"date":"2025-04-29T20:31:10","date_gmt":"2025-04-29T20:31:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/10638\/"},"modified":"2025-04-29T20:31:10","modified_gmt":"2025-04-29T20:31:10","slug":"falcons-made-the-right-choice-to-keep-kirk-cousins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/10638\/","title":{"rendered":"Falcons made the right choice to keep Kirk Cousins"},"content":{"rendered":"

Owner Arthur Blank didn\u2019t budge when Cousins spoke with him on the phone and presumably made a case to be released.<\/p>\n

The Falcons have been willing to listen to trade overtures from quarterback-needy teams, which would at least bring back some value in the form of draft picks and lessened the cap hit. But they evidently did not get the offer they wanted and held the line.<\/p>\n

ExploreRead more about the Braves<\/a><\/p>\n

At the end of the draft Saturday, general manager Terry Fontenot was asked whether the team had received calls about trading Cousins during the selection process. Fontenot said he wouldn\u2019t share private communications but added that nothing about the team\u2019s stance had changed.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust like on any player, if we get a call, we\u2019ll discuss it,\u201d he said. \u201cIf it makes sense, it\u2019s going to help this team, we\u2019ll do it. If not, we won\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

And now more than ever, it would appear that coach Raheem Morris will take Cousins to training camp as a backup to Penix. The draft came and went. Every likely trade partner added a quarterback in the draft. The most likely remaining possibility, the Pittsburgh Steelers, are expected to sign Aaron Rodgers.<\/p>\n

ExploreFalcons moving full bore with Michael Penix Jr. as their starting quarterback<\/a><\/p>\n

If Cousins wants to go only to a team where he would be the starter, with no rookie waiting in the wings, it would seem he\u2019s out of luck.<\/p>\n

For the Falcons, this seems like as practical an outcome as there is. They\u2019ve paid for him. They might as well keep him and get some return from the investment they\u2019ve made.<\/p>\n

The Falcons don\u2019t get every decision right. Often, it feels like they don\u2019t even get most of them right.<\/p>\n

But keeping Cousins, at least at this point, will be of the greatest benefit to the team, which Fontenot has said all along would be the parameter for managing the situation. What sounded like posturing actually has turned out to be the case.<\/p>\n

Keeping the quarterback who was signed to be the franchise savior as the backup has the potential to be high on the awkward scale. But it makes sense from the following standpoint.<\/p>\n

Statistically speaking, it\u2019s likely Penix will not start all 17 games this season, or even 16 games. It\u2019s also probable that if the Falcons were to end their seven-year postseason drought and make the playoffs, they wouldn\u2019t do so with much margin. They are counting on a second-year quarterback with three starts to his credit, after all, and as many as four rookies could be heavily depended upon.<\/p>\n

A healthy Cousins would give the Falcons a far better chance to win a game or games without Penix than anyone else that they could sign.<\/p>\n

Beyond that, the salary-cap repercussions make it favorable for the Falcons to keep him rather than cut him. And while they have been willing to listen to trade offers, they\u2019ve obviously not been desperate to unload Cousins. They\u2019ve recognized that having Cousins on the roster has value.<\/p>\n

ExploreFalcons GM Fontenot says he was not surprised QB Kirk Cousins reported for offseason program<\/a><\/p>\n

The expected path was for the Falcons to cut ties to Cousins before a $10 million roster bonus was due to him in March. No less an authority than ESPN\u2019s Adam Schefter in December that the split was \u201cinevitable at this point,\u201d citing multiple unnamed sources.<\/p>\n

But Cousins was present last week for the first day of the team\u2019s voluntary offseason program, an indication that he\u2019ll be willing to cooperate and be the sort of teammate that someone making $27.5 million this season should be.<\/p>\n

Morris was not expecting him to be there.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think he\u2019s done a great job of coming in, being with his team, being a part of us, and that\u2019s what he\u2019s got to do right now until we figure out whatever else could happen,\u201d Morris said. \u201cObviously, we\u2019re open to all the ideas and things that we talk about and … listening to people and communicating to see what happens best for our team, but it\u2019s always going to make sense for the Falcons.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Falcons have a history of straying from the NFL norm, which helps explain why they\u2019re still waiting for their first Super Bowl title. The signing of Cousins to a contract with $90 million guaranteed and then the drafting of Penix with the No. 8 pick a month later will stand perpetually as a prime example.<\/p>\n

But trying to gain value from Cousins, this one looks like it makes sense.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Owner Arthur Blank didn\u2019t budge when Cousins spoke with him on the phone and presumably made a case…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":10639,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2074],"tags":[2566,223,254,2554,224,7,262,6337,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-10638","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-atlanta-falcons","8":"tag-ajc-freelancer","9":"tag-atlanta","10":"tag-atlanta-falcons","11":"tag-atlantafalcons","12":"tag-falcons","13":"tag-football","14":"tag-los-angeles-chargers","15":"tag-mercedes-benz-stadium","16":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114423155078476345","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10638","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10638"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10638\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10639"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10638"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10638"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10638"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}