{"id":860757,"date":"2026-04-08T11:18:21","date_gmt":"2026-04-08T11:18:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/860757\/"},"modified":"2026-04-08T11:18:21","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T11:18:21","slug":"kirk-cousins-latest-milestone-feels-impossible-to-explain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/860757\/","title":{"rendered":"Kirk Cousins\u2019 latest milestone feels impossible to explain"},"content":{"rendered":"

At this point in his career, former Minnesota Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins would probably have to be considered a borderline Hall of Famer at best, wouldn’t you say?<\/p>\n

To his credit, the four-time Pro Bowler has racked up some solid numbers over the course of his 14-year career, completing 66.7 percent of his passes, good for the seventh-best clip of all time, and throwing for 44,700 yards, the 19th-most all-time, and 298 touchdowns, ranking him 14th.<\/p>\n

The problem, however, is that Cousins simply hasn’t been known as a proven winner.<\/p>\n

In his 167 regular-season starts, he’s gone just 88-77-2. And in four postseason starts, he’s only won one of them, leading the Vikings to a 26-20 overtime win<\/a> against the New Orleans Saints in the Wild Card Round following the 2019 campaign before falling to the San Francisco 49ers in the Divisional Round.<\/p>\n

So, that’s certainly gonna hurt his HOF chances down the line. Eli Manning had solid stats and owns two Super Bowl rings, and still can’t get in, after all. <\/p>\n

All that said, however, Cousins’ longtime agent, Mike McCartney, might deserve a bust in Canton more than his client does, as he’s been able to make Kirko Chainz one of the highest-paid players in NFL history.<\/p>\n

Former Minnesota Vikings QB Kirk Cousins has already made more than $321 million in his NFL career… before his Las Vegas Raiders contract<\/p>\n

Cousins, of course, recently signed<\/a> a new five-year, $172 million deal to join the Las Vegas Raiders, but he’s not going to see anywhere close to that amount of money, which we’ll get back to in just a moment.<\/p>\n

At this point in time, according to Spotrac, Cousins has collected $321,692,254, and here’s what that looks like on a year-to-year basis since the team now known as the Washington Commanders took him in the fourth round of the 2012 draft with the 102nd overall pick.<\/p>\n

Season<\/p>\n

Team<\/p>\n

Total Cash<\/p>\n

Cumulative Cash<\/p>\n

2012<\/p>\n

Washington<\/p>\n

$862,688<\/p>\n

$862,688<\/p>\n

2013<\/p>\n

Washington<\/p>\n

$480,000<\/p>\n

$1,342,688<\/p>\n

2014<\/p>\n

Washington<\/p>\n

$570,000<\/p>\n

$1,912,688<\/p>\n

2015<\/p>\n

Washington<\/p>\n

$824,007<\/p>\n

$2,736,695<\/p>\n

2016<\/p>\n

Washington<\/p>\n

$19,953,000<\/p>\n

$22,689,695<\/p>\n

2017<\/p>\n

Washington<\/p>\n

$23,950,935<\/p>\n

$46,640,630<\/p>\n

2018<\/p>\n

Minnesota<\/p>\n

$26,000,000<\/p>\n

$72,640,630<\/p>\n

2019<\/p>\n

Minnesota<\/p>\n

$28,000,000<\/p>\n

$100,640,630<\/p>\n

2020<\/p>\n

Minnesota<\/p>\n

$40,028,856<\/p>\n

$140,669,486<\/p>\n

2021<\/p>\n

Minnesota<\/p>\n

$21,000,000<\/p>\n

$161,669,486<\/p>\n

2022<\/p>\n

Minnesota<\/p>\n

$40,000,000<\/p>\n

$201,669,486<\/p>\n

2023<\/p>\n

Minnesota<\/p>\n

$30,000,000<\/p>\n

$231,669,486<\/p>\n

2024<\/p>\n

Atlanta<\/p>\n

$62,522,768<\/p>\n

$294,192,254<\/p>\n

2025<\/p>\n

Atlanta<\/p>\n

$27,500,000<\/p>\n

$321,692,254<\/p>\n

Seriously, just those two years with the Falcons should get Cousins enshrined, don’t you think? That’s $90 million for 12 wins, 28 touchdowns, and 21 interceptions.<\/p>\n

A few years from now, given the ridiculous amount of money that’s being thrown around right now, especially to quarterbacks, Cousins’ career earnings will fall dramatically on the all-time list. For now, however, he ranks third, trailing only Matthew Stafford and his new boss with the Raiders, Tom Brady. Here’s a quick look at the top five, as listed by Spotrac<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Matthew Stafford: $408,315,802Tom Brady: $332,962,392Kirk Cousins: $321,692,254Russell Wilson: $316,871,920Aaron Rodgers: $315,919,122<\/p>\n

As we did with Cousins’ career total, the numbers you see there are only through the 2025 season.<\/p>\n

We at least know Stafford’s and Cousins’ will go up, but as of this writing, Wilson and Rodgers remain unsigned, as Russ is looking for a new team, while Rodgers (unbearable) is once again making the world wait to see if he’s going to play one more year. <\/p>\n

Nevertheless, let’s get back to the matter of Cousins’ new deal with Las Vegas.<\/p>\n

As mentioned, while the contract says five years for $172 million, that’s not happening, as this was basically built to be a one-year contract for him to serve as a bridge until Fernando Mendoza, who is undoubtedly going No. 1 overall to the Raiders in the draft in a few weeks, is ready to take over.<\/p>\n

Cousins is set to receive just $1.3 million from Las Vegas but is also getting another $8.7 million from the Falcons, so there’s $10 million, all of which is guaranteed.<\/p>\n

The Raiders also agreed to pay him another $10 million in guaranteed money as a roster bonus on the third day of the 2027 league year. And they’ll then probably just release him.<\/p>\n

So, with that $20 million, Cousins will surpass Brady on the all-time earnings list. Now, he just needs 34 more playoff victories, and those pesky seven Super Bowl rings to catch him in a couple of other areas.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At this point in his career, former Minnesota Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins would probably have to be considered…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":860758,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2073],"tags":[7,233,259,2529,6,234],"class_list":{"0":"post-860757","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-minnesota-vikings","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-minnesota","10":"tag-minnesota-vikings","11":"tag-minnesotavikings","12":"tag-nfl","13":"tag-vikings"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116368815724510195","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/860757","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=860757"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/860757\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/860758"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=860757"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=860757"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=860757"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}