sadly, I would bet money that we vastly overpay Kirk, the desperation is only made worse by the fact that Rg3 teased us with one great year and a decent one, and now Kirk has played pretty solid mostly with flashes of bad.
I would prefer we kept building a stellar Oline, revamped the defense entirely and then went looking for a qb, but i doubt most of us have the patience required for that and I know Gruden doesn't.
Jay's future with the Redskins is going to be pretty much determined by this years results. Teams rarely will give a HC more than 4 years to produce and so far Gruden's first three years equals 21-26-1. Blame it on whatever you want, it's just the way it goes. He probably doesn't want his future riding on anyone but Cousins and the Skins are looking at giving him a contract or a tag.
Obviously teams that will push his contract value this year would be SF, Chicago and quite possibly the Jags. New regime in JAX, they'll test the market for a trade for Bortles. All three teams have plenty of cap space. If Roethlisberger actually retires the Steelers are probably be a serious contender. It actually may wind up that Cousins would be cheaper to keep under a tag for this year. There's more competition for FA QBs next year so maybe that dings his market a bit but probably not a lot unless he Kaps it.
If other teams consider him a vastly superior QB they should be taking a shot at him this year.
DET - Stafford a FA next year and he'll get about the same average salary than a contract with Kirk this year. Stafford is a $18M cap savings this year so the actual cap hit would be negligible. If Kirk is a major upgrade then they should jump on it because there won't be a significant difference in $$$.
MIN - Bradford a FA next year and he will probably get a little less average salary than a contract with Kirk this year but still $20M+. $18M cap savings this year so the actual cap hit would be negligible. If Kirk is a major upgrade then they should jump on it because there won't be a significant difference in $$$. Bridgewater may have started his last game as a Viking.
MIA - Tannehill not a FA until 2021 and only a $10M cap savings this year but if Kirk is a major upgrade then it's a small price to pay.
OAK - Carr a FA next year and he'll get more than Kirk does this year. No way the Raiders consider Cousins an upgrade over Carr. They'll pay or tag him next year and a tag will probably be cheaper.
All these guys outside of Carr are the same age so that's not an issue. Kirk just isn't a significant upgrade to those 4 teams but he has far more value to the Redskins so yeah it'll cost to keep him around and without some obnoxious deal (like the one Washington did with the Rams) they will pay him $22M+ this year to keep him - tag or contract.
Overpaid by performance metrics, probably. Overpaid by market value, probably not. He's the 'safe' bet right now. Might the FO go with a much cheaper QB option and spread that money around for upgrades at other positions of need, then take a shot at a future/FA QB? Certainly an option but this team just isn't good enough to start mortgaging off their future for a shot at today. Tag him this year and wait till next year to work something out with Kirk or someone else (FA or draft pick) - I really don't have a problem with that. He'll probably wind up at around the #4 paid QB this year - is his price really gonna jump up way past that next year?