Interpreting the Kirk Cousins report: Vikings’ last chance
What can one interpret from Sunday’s report by Dianna Russini and Alec Lewis of The Athletic that Kirk Cousins will let the Vikings know Sunday night if he plans to explore free agency or not?
In the mind of Purple Insider’s Matthew Coller, it’s a clear signal from Cousins’ camp that the Vikings have until Sunday night to meet his contract desires. In other words, a last chance to up the ante.
“We have gotten the sense over the last year that the Vikings have a price tag for Cousins that they are not willing to move off from. We have reached the witching hour of this saga so the big question is whether the team will move off their number? Otherwise it appears that a team like Atlanta is going to be willing to go all in. We all just have to wait and see what happens,” Coller told Bring Me The Sports on Sunday afternoon.
Russini says the Vikings expect to hear from Cousins regarding his decision to explore free agency.
The Vikings are expecting to hear from Kirk Cousins tonight on his decision to explore free agency, sources tell me and @alec_lewis Of note: His contract does not void until Wednesday so the team will have until then to extend him before his dead cap hit officially hits the books… pic.twitter.com/A4QJlQKJqg
— Dianna Russini (@DMRussini) March 10, 2024
The unknown is what Cousins’ terms are. Is it about annual compensation? It is about guaranteed money? Is it about fully guaranteed years?
It’s also unknown how far apart the sides are.
Earlier Sunday, ESPN insiders Dan Graziano and Jeremy Fowler reported that Minnesota is still in the fight to sign Cousins. But the fact that the situation is going to the free agency wire is not surprising. In fact, this is exactly what Minnesota general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah expected.
"I think it probably will go right down to the deadline. I hope it doesn't. I don't like hoping but as I've learned in this league deadlines do just kind of get people to, you know, tighten up, I guess, and come to that final agreement," Adofo-Mensah said Feb. 28.
The clock is ticking. Will the Vikings meet Cousins’ price point or will Cousins lower his terms? Maybe they meet in the middle?
The wait to know isn’t much longer…
Title: Bring Me The Sports co-owner, editor Email: joe@bringmethenews.com Twitter: @JoeBMTN Education: Southwest Minnesota State University Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota Expertise: All things Minnesota sports Nelson has covered Minnesota sports for two decades, starting his media career in sports radio. He worked at small market Minnesota stations in Marshall and St. Cloud before joining one of the nation's highest-rated sports stations, KFAN-FM 100.3 in the Twin Cities. There, he was the producer of the top-rated mid-morning sports show with Minnesota Vikings announcer Paul Allen. His radio experience helped blossom a career as a sports writer, joining Minneapolis-based Bring Me The News in 2011. Nelson and Adam Uren became co-owners of Bring Me The News in 2018 and have since more than tripled the site's traffic and launched Bring Me The Sports in cooperation with the Sports Illustrated/FanNation umbrella. Nelson has covered the Super Bowl and numerous training camps, NFL combines, the MLB All-Star Game and Minnesota playoff games, in addition to the day-to-day happenings on and off the field of play. Nelson also has extensive knowledge of non-sports subjects, including news and weather. He works closely with Bring Me The News meteorologist Sven Sundgaard to produce a bevy of weather and climate information for Minnesota readers. Nelson helped launch and manage the Bring Me The News Radio Network, which provided more than 50 radio stations around Minnesota with daily news, sports and weather reports from 2011-17.