| I love watching Kirk Cousins play quarterback.
I’ve never rooted for the Commanders. Never rooted for the Vikings. But I’ve always respected the way Kirk Cousins stands in the pocket, waiting for a play to develop, knowing the longer he waits, the more likely it is that he’s going to be pounded into paste.
And after he gets pounded into paste, he picks himself up and does it again.
That’s the kind of guy I want playing quarterback for my team.
Cousins is officially done for the season, sidelined not by a bone-crushing hit but by simply stepping wrong on his right foot.
It sucks, just as it sucked for the Jets when Aaron Rodgers went down four plays into the season.
With all due respect to Trevon Diggs and Nick Chubb and even Justin Jefferson, a quarterback going down with a season-ending injury just carries more weight. The Vikings managed to go 3-0 without Jefferson in the lineup and, in the process, reignited their playoff hopes. But there’s not much hope now in Minneapolis.
Injury to the wrong player at the wrong time is the NFL’s kryptonite. And while there won’t be an asterisk on this season’s Super Bowl winner because Cousins and Rodgers (we think) are out, the season would be a lot more fun with them in.
The Jets are 4-3 and a bad loss to the Patriots away from being 5-2 without Rodgers in the lineup. With him and one of the stingier defenses in the league, they’d be a Super Bowl favorite, clogging up the AFC playoff picture worse than the Lincoln Tunnel at rush hour.
Cousins has spent most of his time in Minnesota answering questions about why he can’t get the Vikings over the hump. That narrative had started to shift with him playing at an MVP level this season. Even through the dread of a 1-4 start, he had the Vikings' offense humming despite having the second-worst running attack in the league. If not for the injury, the talk today would be about the easy four-game stretch the Vikings now face, which could vault them to 8-4 and very much back into a shaky NFC playoff picture.
But injuries happen. And when they do, teams can implode, like Indianapolis did in 2011 when neck surgery cost Peyton Manning the season and the Colts a 2-14 record. Or they can explode, like the 1972 Dolphins or the 2017 Eagles, who both went on to win Super Bowls after their respective QBs went down.
The question is, is Earl Morrall or Nick Foles walking through the door for the Vikings? Is Jaren Hall the guy, or do the Vikings make a move before today’s trade deadline?
We’ll find out in short order.
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