Kirk Cousins Development Tracker

I'm not saying Kirk is top 5 now. But he's been consistently knocking on the door of that group ratings wise.

We've seen growth from him over the last couple of years. Ok tonight was a bad game, all QBs have them. But...

Year 1 the knock on him was that he wallowed in mistakes and was a turnover machine.

He fixed that.

Then the knock was that he couldn't beat winning teams and his pocket presence was bad.

This year he's looked much more composed in the pocket, stepped up, extended plays... and beaten winning teams.

So now the knock is that he doesn't step up in big pressure games.

Anyone want to bet what he does next year?

Anyone want to bet against him?

My point being when we let RGIII go we knew he wasn't the answer and there was little to fear that he would suddenly become the second coming in Cleveland. We wished him well but expectations were low.

Kirk on the other hand has studied, learnt, improved and grown Year on Year. He's knocking on the door of elite status. I could absolutely see him going to somewhere that has a decent team but needs a QB and developing into a consistently very good QB, while we keep fruitlessly searching.

I don't think we've seen the peak of his potential yet, whereas we saw RGIII's in 2012.


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Boone said:
I think that's a knee-jerk fan post. Cousins absolutely needs to take it up about 5 notches in big games. He is far too erratic in high pressure moments. But he's the best QB we've had under center in 20 years. He will be back, and if the Redskins have any sense, they'll recognize that QB is not on the list of top 5 problems this team has. Far too many games this season where had we made reasonable playcalls and played to our strengths offensively, we'd have won going away. I'm with Bulldog - if anyone needs to go, it's wunderkind Sean McVay. Cousins is the last guy we need to cut.
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This is where I am, Cousins will be back...if they don't agree we tag him again. Even with Kirk's pedestrian play, the play calling is what pissed me off most in this game. Kirk played poorly in another mus win situation, but play-calling was bad, simply bad.

With so many to choose from, I think this was the worst coaching sequence of the night.

On 1st and 10 inside their territory with 1:36 left in the game, we take a time out? Why? Their defense was winded, we were driving at will...burn some clock off, take your time, get set and run a quick draw to see what you can get off it it, then call a time-out. The draw McVay loves to call with Kelly on the field, when it's best run with Thompson on the field, would have been a perfect play call their because the middle of the field was wide open, there were no substitutes on defense and they were rushing only 4. Easy 5-8 yard gain on 1st down there and your set up with 2nd and short even closer. Wide open array of calls you can make after that.

Instead? They call time out, they give the Gnats time to rest, sub a couple of players and come with a blitz that got some pressure on Kirk so he could make the mistake, and big mistake he made.

That was a very poor decision by Kirk, but a terrible series of coaching. Absolutely no need for a time out! NONE!

Sign Kirk, go into the next 4-6 years knowing he's your QB and that he will get over these pressure games. I am convinced that he will be better when he isn't asked to carry the load all by himself. He's not that QB...hopefully, yet.
 
Is Cousins being paid better than the average QB in the NFL? Indeed he is.
Is Cousins playing better than or worse than the average QB in the NFL? Overall, not really.

Basically until he raises his level he's an average QB. And maybe you can work with that but $20M @ year for 4 or 5 years I think is excessive. What if this is where Kirk has pretty much peaked out at? He'll probably will give you more good games than bad. Might be Andy Dalton 2 - can't find the finish line. Anyway, if this is his plateau then he's still a keeper (today) but more in the $12M @ year for 3 or 4 years. Can always renegotiate later if it works out.

How much better did he play this year versus last year? Certainly some improved metrics a few dropped off but how much? Better O-Line this year. Better receivers but never really got in sync with dJax, drop off at RB which hurts. Some horrendous play calling by the bench was a big hurt. The team dropped from 11th in Red Zone TDs last year to a bottom 5 team this year. dJax falling off a step didn't help but he's really not a Red Zone target either.

I don't think Scot wants to see Kirk go but this is the same guy that kicked Matt Flynn to the street after paying him a $10M signing bonus in favor of an under the radar draft pick, Russell Wilson. He probably won't fight real hard to negotiate a contract and I wouldn't be surprised to see another tag but one way or the other Kirk is most likely to be back.
 
Elephant said:
With so many to choose from, I think this was the worst coaching sequence of the night.

On 1st and 10 inside their territory with 1:36 left in the game, we take a time out? Why? Their defense was winded, we were driving at will...burn some clock off, take your time, get set and run a quick draw to see what you can get off it it, then call a time-out. The draw McVay loves to call with Kelly on the field, when it's best run with Thompson on the field, would have been a perfect play call their because the middle of the field was wide open, there were no substitutes on defense and they were rushing only 4. Easy 5-8 yard gain on 1st down there and your set up with 2nd and short even closer. Wide open array of calls you can make after that.

Instead? They call time out, they give the Gnats time to rest, sub a couple of players and come with a blitz that got some pressure on Kirk so he could make the mistake, and big mistake he made.

That was a very poor decision by Kirk, but a terrible series of coaching. Absolutely no need for a time out! NONE!
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This play. Oh I was so mad about this one. Aikman said it as well during the broadcast during the timeout. He said that the Redskins did the Giants a favor by letting them get fresh pass rushers into the game. Again, this was before the play was run. I didn't understand it either because there was still 1:30 left. So much time in a FG game in plus territory. Just a terrible job by the coaches of understanding the time of game and the situation. There is no clock situation. You have the Giants on the run. You keep them on the run. Instead, the coach panics and calls a timeout giving the Giants a chance to sub and regroup. Then Kirk makes a bad decision against a fresh defense. Awful, awful in game coaching decision there followed up by a bad decision by Cousins.
 
Perhaps because they didn't use any TO's when NY just had the ball the Skins didn't want to leave any time outs on the board before halftime. They should've had that possession start with more time on the clock. Poor time management has been an issue all season long.
 
We've had bad clock management all season. That needs to change.

But on the other hand if our Defense was competent we would be avoiding those situations completely.

As for Kirk... he's a second year starter. He simply doesn't have the experience of Brady, Rodgers, Brees, Ryan, Stafford, etc etc. Yet in two years as a starter he's putting up numbers this club hasn't seen for almost 30years!?! We almost had three 1000 yard receivers this year for the first time since the Posse did it. When this Offense is humming he's driving it. Does he throw interceptions and have bad games? Yes. But not that often anymore. All QBs have bad games from time to time.

We're magnifying a lot of bad cause we're bummed out. But as long as we put the right pieces around him he'll continue to learn and grow and gain the experience to play better in key games. Don't confuse lack of ability with lack of experience.

He's gonna get paid because of that. It's not his fault that the market got expensive because the demand for QBs is greater than the supply, or that certain teams screwed the pooch giving big money to untested QBs. (Looking at you Houston... you know what you did!!)

Look at what this kid has done since he got here. He bides his time, learnt the system. Beat out RGIII to the starters job, then systematically started fixing his flaws. He's not the finished article yet by a long stretch.

I for one want him to achieve that ceiling playing in the Burgundy and Gold.


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Numbers.

What did those numbers produce? Another year of no post season. What are we, 1-6-1 in games he throws for 300+ yds. Wins and losses, those are the only numbers that matter.
Paired with a coaching staff that would ban running if they could, there is no good reason to overpay this average QB.

Oh, and clock mismanagement has been a Gruden staple for 3 years. It's no better now than it was in his rookie year.
 
This was a perfect "How you like me now" game.

This is why people inside Redskins Park are hesitant to pay KC1 big money long-term.

Nick
 
I honestly don't know why people think he's simply average?!

2 years as a starter and two winning seasons.

He's ranked number 5 for the season.

And from Boone's stats

• Cousins finished the year with single-season team records in attempts (606), completions (406) and passing yards (4,917) and matched his team record for 300-yard passing games (seven). Cousins’ also posted the third-highest completion percentage (67.0) and tied for the sixth-most passing touchdowns in a season in team history (25).
• Cousins’ 4,917 passing yards ranked third in the NFL in 2016 and are the 15th-most in a season in NFL history.
• Cousins (307.3) became the first quarterback in team history to average 300 passing yards per game in a season, surpassing the previous mark of 269.1, set by Mark Rypien in 1989.
• With the start, Cousins started 16 regular season games for a second straight season to join Jason Campbell (2008-09), Mark Rypien (1991-92) and Joe Theismann (1983-84) as the only quarterbacks in team history to start 16 games in back-to-back seasons.
• On a one-yard touchdown pass in the fourth quarter, Cousins registered the seventh 25-touchdown passing season in team history, joining Sonny Jurgensen (31 in 1967), himself (29 in 2015), Joe Theismann (29 in 1983), Jurgensen (28 in 1966), Mark Rypien (28 in 1991) and Sammy Baugh (25 in 1947).

Honestly lost me the 20 other QBs in the league you'd rather have? I could name maybe 6 or 7 possibly. And a couple of those would be debatable.

(For the record: Brady, Rodgers, Brees, Wilson... possibly Stafford or Ryan and Luck... that's about it!)

Put a decent defense on the other side of the ball and we're not having this discussion. If we had even an average defense we'd have probably won in London, beaten the Lions and split with the Cowboys. We played 7 games against playoff teams and had the 3rd toughest schedule in the NFL. You can't look at Win/Loss totals in a vacuum. It's never that simple.

We get a defense that wins us just three of those close games and then we're talking about an 11-5 team.

This team has issues, but it's not at the QB position. He's not Brady or Rodgers, but that's rarified air. Are we really going to criticise him for the fact that our Defense can't put games away and we don't have a consistent run threat?

If this offence even stays roughly this good next year and the Defense steps up, plus an easier schedule (including none of those stupid short weeks!) then we COULD see something good next year. There are never guarantees but I feel good about next year (draft dependent!).


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Knight I honestly don't know why you don't get it. He is not clutch, comes up small in big games, did not put this team on his back, if he did we win the Cows game, the Lions game, and possibly the Bengals game. We would have clinched along time ago. I'll say it again, his stats and ranking are meaningless. He's a nice QB, a journeyman type QB. You don't judge a QB by "who would you replace him with." That is not the standard. He simply doesn't meet the standard for a playoff winning QB. Way better than RGIII, but so what? He'll improve a losing team but we've seen his peak imho. Don't tell me we needed a running game to make him good. The Giants and Packers and Seahawks have no running games.

Add this.....our defense had no room for improvement, they are what they are. The offense had more to give and sometimes came out flat and underperformed, underachieve. I could tell you what to do with those lofty stats, but won't. I'll pencil them in on the TP roll in me bathroom.

Nevertheless, I love how you love this team and commend you.
 
When playoff hopes were on the line,down the stretch, Kirk Cousins came up small.

That's a fact that you just can't get around.

You want to pay a guy like that on the Brees,Rodgers and Brady scale(which is being reported what Kirk and his agent want)?

I hope they can come to a reasonable deal that still allows McCloughan to rebuild the defense and address the holes in the OL.
 
Ax said:
Numbers.

What did those numbers produce? Another year of no post season. What are we, 1-6-1 in games he throws for 300+ yds. Wins and losses, those are the only numbers that matter.
Paired with a coaching staff that would ban running if they could, there is no good reason to overpay this average QB.

Oh, and clock mismanagement has been a Gruden staple for 3 years. It's no better now than it was in his rookie year.
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Good Stat AX. I've always said......and its true for all teams......If your TE leads your team in receiving, you lose. If your team is a passing team exclusively, you lose. Those two stats are what you look for when analyzing team stats.

Also, you don't analyze a team based on which side of the ball is worse and blame them. Our D does not play our O. Our defense plays against scheduled opponents offenses. And our offense plays against opponents defenses. You look at the variance between the two. Our defense overachieved with what they had to work with, while our offense underachieved with their talent. We lost 4 of last 6, you look at Kirk first and foremost. (keeping the coaches out of it. and yes, Houston, we have a coaching problem.)
 
Calling a guy who throws for 5000 yards a 'journeyman' is pretty ridiculous. He's had 2 pretty impressive back to back seasons guys. The criticism about getting it done in the big games is 100% valid but it's also a team sport. Lots of things have to go right for a QB to be successful, and that includes getting lots of help from the offensive coordinator. For example - of our run game is effective in a game like yesterday's, perhaps Kirk doesn't press and throw those picks?

I think it's quite possible that if the team doesn't want to franchise Kirk again that he gets a better offer.

Kirk deserves some of the criticism he's getting. I think even he would own that. But describing him as 'average' or as a 'journeyman' I think is reactionary. Overall he's been a helluva good QB for the past 2 years.


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I can get around it because it's a hugely unfair comparison.

What I'm saying Micks and DP is that we're benchmarking him against players like Rodgers and Brady. They come up big in big games because they have 10+ years of experience to draw from.

You simply can't compare 32 games as a regular starter to over 200.

Those elite QBs pull these games off because they've been there and done it before in the past. They took their hard knocks and their lumps and learnt from it. There's probably very little you can throw at them that they haven't seen before.

But we're jumping all over Kirk for not having that level of experience yet?

He's not elite yet, not by a long shot. Yes he sometimes comes up short in big games, but so does Brady and Rodgers. Super Bowl XLII anyone?

Fact is Kirk has tools that we can build on. He is already putting together big numbers and was a pro bowl alternate this year.

He doesn't set the market price for QBs, stupid teams like Houston do when they overpay for trash. And fact is that Kirk has put up numbers that have him in the top 5 QB rankings.

He's gonna get paid. And after two years of consistent play for the most part the chances are he continues trending up.

We all saw RGIII crash and burn in Year 2. Kirk has already shown he's not crashing and burning. Not yet.

And give the man a defense to play with. And a decent run game. The game has two sides of the ball to play.

He's a two year starter who often has to outscore the opposing team without the aid of a decent run game and we're jumping all over him coming up short in a few games?

Time and experience.


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I'm thinking Kirk on another team doesn't get those stats. I'll give it to Gruden on that and his playbook. Our offense was totally designed to get the max passing yards, be it McCoy Sudfield or Cousins.

By the way, journeyman doesn't mean bad to me. Fitzpatrick is one who I think is a decent QB, but still a journeyman and average. You have to be good to stick in the league that long. Kirk improved our team, no doubt about it. Now we need to move to the next level.

Boone, you and I know that moving to the next level generally means that its another player for any position. Except in the NFL, the QB position will always get that contract no matter what. I won't be surprised if we break the bank for him.
 
Let McVay walk, promote Callahan to OC and watch us get serious on balance as rush attempts per game go up.
 
micks113 said:
Good Stat AX. I've always said......and its true for all teams......If your TE leads your team in receiving, you lose. If your team is a passing team exclusively, you lose. Those two stats are what you look for when analyzing team stats.

Also, you don't analyze a team based on which side of the ball is worse and blame them. Our D does not play our O. Our defense plays against scheduled opponents offenses. And our offense plays against opponents defenses. You look at the variance between the two. Our defense overachieved with what they had to work with, while our offense underachieved with their talent. We lost 4 of last 6, you look at Kirk first and foremost. (keeping the coaches out of it. and yes, Houston, we have a coaching problem.)
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Again simply not true Micks.

Our Defense has a DIRECT effect on our Offense. If they can't hold an opponent to a low score then our Offense has to keep performing to outscore the opponent. That forces us out of game plan and to a reliance on passing etc. We've witnessed that time and again!

By the same token the Offence is directly responsible to the defence too. Which is when games like last night happen. Our D was under a lot of pressure last night to keep the Giants from scoring and did a solid if unspectacular job.

But to be fair they were helped by a Giants Offense ranked 25th in the league and a QB ranked 27th. I'm not sure how much credit I give our D for that.

Too many times this year we've been forced into shootouts with opponents because our Defense couldn't stop them scoring. Those are the games where Kirk HAS to throw to get us back in the game and when precious little help is coming from the run game.

With no defense and an inconsistent run game we're FORCED to rely on Kirk to outperform the defense every single game. To be perfect. And we shoot him down when he's not.

I reiterate. He's a second year starter who doesn't yet have the decades of experience that the Elite QBs have. But he's put up two pretty good years of play and would be the first to admit he's still learning.


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Knightingale said:
I can get around it because it's a hugely unfair comparison.

What I'm saying Micks and DP is that we're benchmarking him against players like Rodgers and Brady. They come up big in big games because they have 10+ years of experience to draw from.

You simply can't compare 32 games as a regular starter to over 200.

Those elite QBs pull these games off because they've been there and done it before in the past. They took their hard knocks and their lumps and learnt from it. There's probably very little you can throw at them that they haven't seen before.
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I think that may still miss a key point - you're talking about 2 of the greatest QBs in NFL history. Forget the experience factor. While I think it's possible that Kirk will learn and get better with more experience in high pressure games, it's also possible he'll never be a Tom Brady or Aaron Rodgers. My point is, so what? That's not a reason not to retain the guy, or to grade him an 'average QB' in comparison - every other NFL QB in this league is 'average' if that's the standard :)

I will continue to proclaim Kirk Cousins the best QB we've had in over a decade, maybe longer than that. That doesn't mean he's perfect, or that the criticism he is taking in regards to stepping up under the spotlight is not valid. If we don't retain him, it's going to set us back for a long time to come.
 
micks113 said:
I'm thinking Kirk on another team doesn't get those stats. I'll give it to Gruden on that and his playbook. Our offense was totally designed to get the max passing yards, be it McCoy Sudfield or Cousins.

By the way, journeyman doesn't mean bad to me. Fitzpatrick is one who I think is a decent QB, but still a journeyman and average. You have to be good to stick in the league that long. Kirk improved our team, no doubt about it. Now we need to move to the next level.

Boone, you and I know that moving to the next level generally means that its another player for any position. Except in the NFL, the QB position will always get that contract no matter what. I won't be surprised if we break the bank for him.
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Guys, I have been consistently saying that Kirk Cousins is a "good" QB. That doesn't mean average, or above average - for me, the "good" qualifier is one step above that level.

BUT: with anything, even with the best QB in the world, it's not like you can throw a mythical guy who can single-handedly GUARANTEE 3-TDs per game 100-million per year. Everything is about what your front office can put together AROUND him given the contract in place. It seems like the Colts GM had an "I am an idiot" moment when he seemed to blame Luck's contract this year for some of their issues. I mean, that was just idiotic, because as far as I can tell, HE set up the contract that Luck signed. As an FO, it is incumbent upon YOU to figure out a plan to put a team together around the player. As an intelligent and discerning player who wants money AND to win, it is incumbent upon YOU to find a place that HAS a good plan that you buy into, AND enough $$$ to make you happy. That is how I see success formed on BOTH sides.

I could say that Kirk is the greatest QB in the world.

Eli has a 24 million dollar cap hit this year. In the next 3 years his cap hit hovers around 20 million. It sounds like many think Kirk is better than Eli. Guys, you may hate Eli for his inconsistency and a tendency to throw picks... but the guy did win 2 SBs for that team. He also hit some beautiful timely deep balls in that game yesterday - and did NOT throw the game away (of course, I think there was minimal pressure.. but again, this is a TEAM sport). The QBs success OR failure does not exist in a vacuum. For those lambasting his ability in the redzone or some of his bad decisions, I would point that to playcalling. Gruden was quoted to say that he would throw the fade three times in a row AGAIN after Sonny kind of angrily (or annoyed at least) asked him why he threw the fade three times in a row in that one game. He was stubborn, and that is usually a HUGE mistake in a head coach. Adaptability goes a LONG way in the sport.

So for me, Kirk did well this year. I think that he does not even approach a Rodgers or Roethlisberger in ability to operate without an OL (or under significant pressure), REGARDLESS of scheme. I do think he has a killer instinct, which is great, but his deep ball accuracy seems inconsistent, and that is a problem for this offense. Perhaps he is more afraid of TOs and that is why he leads a bit too far so many times though (unclear).

By the way - the reason I quoted the above post was to say... Gruden's playbook has been a blessing and a curse. I think it has helped him rack up yards, and the pointed passing helped that too... which gives some impressive stats. But POINTS are what you win with. And the redzone playcalling was atrocious this year. That wasn't on Kirk, that was Gru-gru.
 
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