Why did Kirk Cousins not play like Tom Brady?

[The negotiator]

Who have we signed that can be justified. Hendricks. We got worse after we signed him. Diggs same thing. All the guys we signed didn't justify it. The Redskins what a jump they made. There's only one QB in the NFL that can lift a team from door mate to contender and that's Rodgers. And it looks like he might be losing his spark. And he took a joke of a deal and will never hit the market. Jimmy G gets a boat load and was it worth it. Cousins is an upgrade over the bum Case and 90 percent of the board wanted that bum back at 16 million +. We lack a contender roster. And if somehow we sneak in next year it will be a drilling again and Cousins will get all the blame. I still don't think our D is a shutdown D. Although we are ranked at the top. IMO we aren't close to the Bears D but we might be ranked higher. I seen them beat us the last game and that D just collapsed our entire offense. Not one guy. Nobody could get open deep. Why not? That 13-3 season everything broke right including a miracle to win a home playoff game. We should have spanked that team. But our D laid down and tried to hand it to them. Then the Eagles basically said why are you here. Bring that bum QB and number 1 ranked D on. Your playing a team now. Bottom line you can win with Cousins but he is not a QB that will take a below average roster and make them contend. That's Rodgers. We need to fix the roster for us to be a SB contender. All areas need improvement. But a QB upgrade won't become available. There isn't one out there. Maybe the 49ers will cut Jimmy G but I don't see that as an upgrade at all. The guy can't stay healthy.

Not sure who this Hendricks guy is, but Kendricks had a great season, Diggs had his best season, and Hunter became a top 3 DE in the NFL this season. Those three guys got huge raises and played better. They all justified their contracts. It is apples to oranges though, because paying a guy 14 million per year is not nearly the same as paying one guy 28 million. 28 million for a position that according to you, can't really carry a team.

The argument that bad teams making bad decisions at QB justifies our bad decision at QB is getting old. It doesn't.

As I said, the only thing that can justify the contract is Cousins winning us football games. So far he hasn't done that, and Hunter and Diggs at 14 million made a bigger impact on the team than Cousins did at twice that last year. Until that changes, he was a bad signing, regardless of other team's mistakes at QB.

Sorry, Im confused. I thought Cousins was the one throwing to Diggs and Thielan and responsible for the numbers they put up this year. Second, he was the most pressured QB in the league this year.
Third, he’s never had a complimentary running game in his career. FIX the OL and give him a running game of 125 yds per game and he will maul a defense.
Fourth, he needs a TE who can get separation or an optional third wide receiver who can take the pressure off Diggs and Thieland being double covered. Right now opposing defenses have us figured out. IMO, as much as I love Thieland and Diggs, neither are a deep threat who can create separation.
Fifth, I hope Stefanski has some creative juice in him, or else hand the reins to Kubiak. We are just getting out coached on offense and we remain predictable.
Sixth, there is no one who wants to win more than Cousins. He loves it in Minny. And don’t think he doesn’t feel the weight of the contract.

A lot of things have to go right to get to and win a SB. We have a tight window which underscores the urgency of making all the right off season moves. I underscore the OL as priority #1. Without that, we are not going to be a factor regardless of who plays QB. As a side note, I think Cousins was the first QB in history to have a combined 30 td’s 10 int, 4000 plus yds and a completion % of over 70%. Stats are just that, doesn’t translate to wins, but if you said before the year started that if Cousins could get you those numbers, you would have jumped on it. My point is, many things have to fall in place to get to the promised land. As far as the IT factor, get him a competent OL and I’d he fails, I’ll be his biggest critic

[StumpHunter]

I never stated our defense was below average as you pointed out. They have played some tremendous football. We held the Lions below 10 points twice this year. What I'm getting at is all offensive woes are thrown at Cousins. We couldn't do anything offensively against the Pats and there D wasn't even ranked that high. We were tied 10-10 and then our D gave up a 75 yard drive in 4 plays. And then 50 yards in 6 plays. 10 plays 125 yards. Almost like they were toying with us. They probably could have scored whenever it was needed. Brady had 311 yards on 32 attempts. That's close to 10 yards an attempt. That's getting abused anyway you look at it. Not sure how that loses you. Cousins averaged less than 5 yards an attempt which really means he shouldn't be an NFL QB. The Ram guy did the same in the SB. He shouldn't be an NFL QB either. And yet the Pats D was rated as being basically crap. Maybe I'm getting confused to easily. But our D was roasted IMO in that game. Although the rating may say otherwise.

I'm saying saying you stated that but that's how you are putting it across as. I have gone to bat for Cousins because you are right, any offensive issue lands on Cousins shoulders. Which is far from accurate. Yeah, he played bad in a few games. There were other games he played well and other factors on offense were terrible. But every loss, every bad play, any offensive struggle, is all on Cousins which just isnt realistic.

I don't believe I have ever seen someone argue all of the issues on offense were Cousins' fault. Or that every bad play was his fault.

What you are doing here is changing the argument from a reasonable, "Cousins was responsible for a lot of the issues on offense" to a very unreasonable "Cousins is 100% to blame for everything that went wrong on this team". It isn't a good way to win an argument and I suggest switching tactics.

[StumpHunter]

Not sure who this Hendricks guy is, but Kendricks had a great season, Diggs had his best season, and Hunter became a top 3 DE in the NFL this season. Those three guys got huge raises and played better. They all justified their contracts. It is apples to oranges though, because paying a guy 14 million per year is not nearly the same as paying one guy 28 million. 28 million for a position that according to you, can't really carry a team.

The argument that bad teams making bad decisions at QB justifies our bad decision at QB is getting old. It doesn't.

As I said, the only thing that can justify the contract is Cousins winning us football games. So far he hasn't done that, and Hunter and Diggs at 14 million made a bigger impact on the team than Cousins did at twice that last year. Until that changes, he was a bad signing, regardless of other team's mistakes at QB.

Sorry, Im confused. I thought Cousins was the one throwing to Diggs and Thielan and responsible for the numbers they put up this year. Second, he was the most pressured QB in the league this year.
Third, he’s never had a complimentary running game in his career. FIX the OL and give him a running game of 125 yds per game and he will maul a defense.
Fourth, he needs a TE who can get separation or an optional third wide receiver who can take the pressure off Diggs and Thieland being double covered. Right now opposing defenses have us figured out. IMO, as much as I love Thieland and Diggs, neither are a deep threat who can create separation.
Fifth, I hope Stefanski has some creative juice in him, or else hand the reins to Kubiak. We are just getting out coached on offense and we remain predictable.
Sixth, there is no one who wants to win more than Cousins. He loves it in Minny. And don’t think he doesn’t feel the weight of the contract.

A lot of things have to go right to get to and win a SB. We have a tight window which underscores the urgency of making all the right off season moves. I underscore the OL as priority #1. Without that, we are not going to be a factor regardless of who plays QB. As a side note, I think Cousins was the first QB in history to have a combined 30 td’s 10 int, 4000 plus yds and a completion % of over 70%. Stats are just that, doesn’t translate to wins, but if you said before the year started that if Cousins could get you those numbers, you would have jumped on it. My point is, many things have to fall in place to get to the promised land. As far as the IT factor, get him a competent OL and I’d he fails, I’ll be his biggest critic

Great that he put up those stats on an offense that was 22nd in scoring efficiency. Has his best season of his career and the team drops 14 spots in scoring. What an impact those stats made.

I do actually agree that for this team to have success, we need to run more, and take the ball out of Cousins hands. Bad things will happen if Cousins is asked to carry an offense, and I couldn't agree more with you on that.

We fix the line, which was a part of the issue in 2018, and improve the run game, and I think this offense can be top 10 again. I just don't know how that solves the issue with our QB playing his worse football in the biggest games.

[Pondering Her Percy]

I'm saying saying you stated that but that's how you are putting it across as. I have gone to bat for Cousins because you are right, any offensive issue lands on Cousins shoulders. Which is far from accurate. Yeah, he played bad in a few games. There were other games he played well and other factors on offense were terrible. But every loss, every bad play, any offensive struggle, is all on Cousins which just isnt realistic.

I don't believe I have ever seen someone argue all of the issues on offense were Cousins' fault. Or that every bad play was his fault.

What you are doing here is changing the argument from a reasonable, "Cousins was responsible for a lot of the issues on offense" to a very unreasonable "Cousins is 100% to blame for everything that went wrong on this team". It isn't a good way to win an argument and I suggest switching tactics.

More or less that's what it comes across as. Of course we complain about OL, or the OC, or whatever. But in the end, blame falls mostly on the quarterback. You sit there in almost every post and say "well Kirk posted this record" and "Kirk lost to this team", etc, etc. No the TEAM lost to the Bills. The TEAM lost to the Bears and so on. Just because Kirk is the QB doesnt mean he is responsible for every bit of that record. The team is. For example, if it wasnt for Kirk Cousins, that GB game wouldnt have been a tie, it would have been a loss. We wouldnt have been a drive away from tying the Rams, we would have been blown out. If it was for Cousins, we lose to the Eagles. Sure, games like Seattle he didnt play well. But this is my whole point with all this and with someone like Case Keenum. The TEAM didnt play well. The OC was awful. The D took a step back. Why anyone thinks Keenum could have done anything for this team other than maybe win 5 or 6 games is dreaming and blinded by the 2017 miracle. If Carlson makes that FG at GB, and we're in the playoffs. Something that simple screwed us from making the playoffs. Sure, Kirk Cousins could have beat the Pats or Seahawks and didnt, but what if Carlson made the FG? Cousins had no control over that. That was a win in my book. Cousins was unreal. And Carlson blew it and it ended up costing us a playoff berth. We could have then sat our starters week 17 and went into Chicago healthy and ready to go. There wasnt a single game this year where I said, "man if we had a different QB, we would have won that game". Maybe Seattle? But outside of that, no. Nor was there a QB out there that could have done better than Cousins. But since he's "paid big money" (which in the end means nothing because in about a year or two he will be the 8th-10th highest paid QB in the league) then everything is his fault. I've said this before and I'll say it again....NEVER have I seen our fan base so hard on a QB in my life. And everyone bases it off of a miracle year that a career backup had. The game always falls on Cousins shoulders. When he plays bad, I'll say it. But if we lose, it doesnt mean we lost because of Kirk Cousins.

Like the first Bears game, we ran the ball 9 times with our starter but threw 46 times. That is the epitome of unbalanced. So Kirk is forced to sit back there when the entire Bears team knows what he's doing and try to pick apart the #1 D in the NFL. No different than the Seattle game. Bobby Wagner said "they did what they always do"....Our offense was predictable. But everyone looks at a game like that and says "yeah Cousins played terrible". How about the OC had zero balance and it fell on Cousins shoulders to light up the best defense in the NFL. Again, I am saying he was at fault in certain games. But how do you blame Kirk for a bad game when he's forced into throwing 46 times with 0 help from anyone else and a defense that knows what you're going to do. I guess even the NE game. Dalvin Cook is averaging 8.9 YPC but yeah...lets give him the ball 9 times and throw Kirk 44. Makes total sense. But yeah, "Cousins sucked that game". In the end, it's a team game. Coaches included. And they didnt put it together this year. Kirk Cousins wasnt the reason we didnt make the playoffs this year.

[The negotiator]

Sorry, Im confused. I thought Cousins was the one throwing to Diggs and Thielan and responsible for the numbers they put up this year. Second, he was the most pressured QB in the league this year.
Third, he’s never had a complimentary running game in his career. FIX the OL and give him a running game of 125 yds per game and he will maul a defense.
Fourth, he needs a TE who can get separation or an optional third wide receiver who can take the pressure off Diggs and Thieland being double covered. Right now opposing defenses have us figured out. IMO, as much as I love Thieland and Diggs, neither are a deep threat who can create separation.
Fifth, I hope Stefanski has some creative juice in him, or else hand the reins to Kubiak. We are just getting out coached on offense and we remain predictable.
Sixth, there is no one who wants to win more than Cousins. He loves it in Minny. And don’t think he doesn’t feel the weight of the contract.

A lot of things have to go right to get to and win a SB. We have a tight window which underscores the urgency of making all the right off season moves. I underscore the OL as priority #1. Without that, we are not going to be a factor regardless of who plays QB. As a side note, I think Cousins was the first QB in history to have a combined 30 td’s 10 int, 4000 plus yds and a completion % of over 70%. Stats are just that, doesn’t translate to wins, but if you said before the year started that if Cousins could get you those numbers, you would have jumped on it. My point is, many things have to fall in place to get to the promised land. As far as the IT factor, get him a competent OL and I’d he fails, I’ll be his biggest critic

Great that he put up those stats on an offense that was 22nd in scoring efficiency. Has his best season of his career and the team drops 14 spots in scoring. What an impact those stats made.

I do actually agree that for this team to have success, we need to run more, and take the ball out of Cousins hands. Bad things will happen if Cousins is asked to carry an offense, and I couldn't agree more with you on that.

We fix the line, which was a part of the issue in 2018, and improve the run game, and I think this offense can be top 10 again. I just don't know how that solves the issue with our QB playing his worse football in the biggest games.

The vast majority of those games, and I’ve seen or been at everyone at Washington and Minny, have been when he has passed for the most yards. The more yards he passes for in a game, we lose. Hard to find a game where his team rushes for 150 yards and they lose. Doesn’t happen. He can’t carry a team with an anemic running game. The great ones can sometimes do it, but not often. Even this years SB shows how much that running game meant to the Pats.
He’s got 4 years as a starter under his belt including one with the Vikings. I’m not an excuse guy. He’s had some games where he hasn’t looked good. But over his career, even going back to MSU, he has shown he can win Big 10 Championships and win some must win games in college. But even in college, he had a good Offensive line and Leveon Bell as his running back. Ball game! The Vikings have two years max to get this right.

[StumpHunter]

I don't believe I have ever seen someone argue all of the issues on offense were Cousins' fault. Or that every bad play was his fault.

What you are doing here is changing the argument from a reasonable, "Cousins was responsible for a lot of the issues on offense" to a very unreasonable "Cousins is 100% to blame for everything that went wrong on this team". It isn't a good way to win an argument and I suggest switching tactics.

More or less that's what it comes across as. Of course we complain about OL, or the OC, or whatever. But in the end, blame falls mostly on the quarterback. You sit there in almost every post and say "well Kirk posted this record" and "Kirk lost to this team", etc, etc. No the TEAM lost to the Bills. The TEAM lost to the Bears and so on. Just because Kirk is the QB doesnt mean he is responsible for every bit of that record. The team is. For example, if it wasnt for Kirk Cousins, that GB game wouldnt have been a tie, it would have been a loss. We wouldnt have been a drive away from tying the Rams, we would have been blown out. If it was for Cousins, we lose to the Eagles. Sure, games like Seattle he didnt play well. But this is my whole point with all this and with someone like Case Keenum. The TEAM didnt play well. The OC was awful. The D took a step back. Why anyone thinks Keenum could have done anything for this team other than maybe win 5 or 6 games is dreaming and blinded by the 2017 miracle. If Carlson makes that FG at GB, and we're in the playoffs. Something that simple screwed us from making the playoffs. Sure, Kirk Cousins could have beat the Pats or Seahawks and didnt, but what if Carlson made the FG? Cousins had no control over that. That was a win in my book. Cousins was unreal. And Carlson blew it and it ended up costing us a playoff berth. We could have then sat our starters week 17 and went into Chicago healthy and ready to go. There wasnt a single game this year where I said, "man if we had a different QB, we would have won that game". Maybe Seattle? But outside of that, no. Nor was there a QB out there that could have done better than Cousins. But since he's "paid big money" (which in the end means nothing because in about a year or two he will be the 8th-10th highest paid QB in the league) then everything is his fault. I've said this before and I'll say it again....NEVER have I seen our fan base so hard on a QB in my life. And everyone bases it off of a miracle year that a career backup had. The game always falls on Cousins shoulders. When he plays bad, I'll say it. But if we lose, it doesnt mean we lost because of Kirk Cousins.

Like the first Bears game, we ran the ball 9 times with our starter but threw 46 times. That is the epitome of unbalanced. So Kirk is forced to sit back there when the entire Bears team knows what he's doing and try to pick apart the #1 D in the NFL. No different than the Seattle game. Bobby Wagner said "they did what they always do"....Our offense was predictable. But everyone looks at a game like that and says "yeah Cousins played terrible". How about the OC had zero balance and it fell on Cousins shoulders to light up the best defense in the NFL. Again, I am saying he was at fault in certain games. But how do you blame Kirk for a bad game when he's forced into throwing 46 times with 0 help from anyone else and a defense that knows what you're going to do. I guess even the NE game. Dalvin Cook is averaging 8.9 YPC but yeah...lets give him the ball 9 times and throw Kirk 44. Makes total sense. But yeah, "Cousins sucked that game". In the end, it's a team game. Coaches included. And they didnt put it together this year. Kirk Cousins wasnt the reason we didnt make the playoffs this year.

Agree that Cousins isn't THE reason we didn't make the playoffs. There are 32 backup QBs who could have come in for much cheaper and not been THE reason we didn't make the playoffs. That is the problem.

We have gone from Cousins being the missing piece to winning it all, to Cousins not being THE reason we missed the playoffs. Some of us see an issue with that, and point it out. Others make one excuse after another for the QB.

[VikingLord]

Has anyone pulled in any stats to this discussion? If not, I'll pull some in for comparison, along with Case Keenum and Tom Brady just for reference.

Also, I know raw stats alone aren't going to provide a complete picture of anything, but they do help to frame performance relative to others. That can be helpful to assess how a given QB performed in the context of his contract.

Anyway, the stats referenced here can be found at http://www.espn.com/nfl/statistics/play ... asontype/2 for anyone interested.

So, let's begin with total yards.

#1 - Ben R. with 5,129 yards
#7 - Tom Brady with 4,355 yards
#10 - Kirk Cousins with 4,298 yards
#14 - Case Keenum with 3,890 yards

What jumps out to me here is that there is a big gap between #1 and #7, and a big gap between #10 and #14, but not a huge gap between #7 and #10.

Let's look at completions next.

#1 - Ben R. with 452
#3 - Kirk Cousins with 425
#8 - Tom Brady with 375
#11 - Case Keenum with 365

Interesting spread here. Very little separating Brady and Keenum.

How about attempts?

#1 - Ben R. with 675
#4 - Kirk Cousins with 606
#6 - Case Keenum with 586
#9 - Tom Brady with 570

Big Ben put the ball in the air a lot. He attempted a lot more relative to his peers, completed a lot more relative to his peers, and as a result, racked up more total yardage than his peers.

Let's look at accuracy.

#1 - Drew Brees at 74.4%
#2 - Kirk Cousins at 70.1%
#18 - Tom Brady at 65.8%
#27 - Case Keenum at 62.3%

It shouldn't be a huge surprise to see Brees ranked first in this stat. What is surprising is where Brady and Keenum show up. I was interested to see where Ben R. showed up in this stat. He ranked #12 at 67.0%.

One other stat tracked on the ESPN site is yards per attempt, which gives a rough idea of how aggressive a passer is, although it doesn't account for yards picked up by receivers who run well after the catch.

#1 - Ryan Fitzpatrick with 9.62 YPA
#13 - Tom Brady with 7.64 YPA
#24 - Kirk Cousins with 7.09 YPA
#30 - Case Keenum with 6.64 YPA

Here, while Brady doesn't stand out necessarily at #13, there is solid statistical separation between him and Cousins, and even more significant separation between him and Keenum. Despite this, Brady badly lags Fitzpatrick in this category, suggesting that while he was more aggressive than either Cousins or Keenum during the course of the season, he was not overly so, and therefore his willingness to take a more aggressive approach wouldn't explain the relative success of the Patriots overall.

Let's look at TDs - how many points each of these guys was directly responsible for with his arm over the course of the year.

#1 - Patrick Mahomes with 50
#9 - Kirk Cousins with 30
#10 - Tom Brady with 29
#23 - Case Keenum with 18

And INTs too - how many times the QB, through a bad read, poor throw, or simply bad luck, gave possession back to the opposing team (lower ranking is better in this stat and many players are tied, which explains the difference between Brady and Cousins rankings).

#1 - Ben R. with 16
#2 - Case Keenum with 15
#15 - Tom Brady with 11
#20 - Kirk Cousins with 10

Hmmm....

Let's look at sacks. This is a good indicator of both the prowess of the blockers in front of the QB as well as his ability to avoid loss of yardage and plays.

#1 - Deshaun Watson took 62 sacks
#10 - Kirk Cousins took 40 sacks
#13 - Case Keenum took 34 sacks
#28 - Tom Brady took 21 sacks

Brady definitely took fewer sacks than either Cousins or Keenum.

And lastly, let's look at the overall rating.

#1 - Drew Brees at 115.7
#10 - Kirk Cousins at 99.7
#12 - Tom Brady at 97.7
#29 - Case Keenum at 81.2

So, the subject of this thread is "Why Did Kirk Cousins Not Play Like Tom Brady?"

It is a good question. If it's answered subjectively, it feels like there was a big gap between the relative performance of the two QBs during the year. Certainly, their respective teams had far different outcomes, with one missing the playoffs entirely and one winning the Superbowl. But, an objective look at the stats of the 2 players doesn't really support the claim that there is a huge disparity between the relative performance of the two. Of course, there are some key exceptions, most notably IMHO the total sacks which indicate that Brady took significantly fewer negative plays with the ball in his hands. There could be a variety of reasons for that - Brady benefited from better blocking, a more consistent running game, he was better at recognizing and avoiding pressure, or likely a combination of all three. But there is no question he out-performed in this area, and this is definitely an area where Cousins needs to get better, once again recognizing that improvement can come in any combination of the three factors that determine whether a QB ends up on the ground on a given drop back.

I also think the claim that the Vikings could have paid less for Keenum and gotten the same result is at least called into question by these stats. Keenum consistently and in many areas significantly under-performed on a relative basis to both Cousins and Brady, much less to the best performer a given statistical category. His overall rating reflects that. True, the Vikings would have paid less for him, but, and as hard as it may be to believe it, they would have objectively gotten their money's worth.

This doesn't necessarily answer the question of whether the investment in Cousins was justified or will be successful. I only post this to shine some light on the myth that Tom Brady set the bar this year for QB play (he didn't, not even close), and to separate the relative success of an entire team from the contributions of a given, albeit important, player to those results.

I'll finish this by saying that the Cousins experiment has to be allowed to finish before any final judgments can be made about it. With a better offensive line in front of him, a more consistent running game, and another year in the system, perhaps it will look like a more astute move on the part of the Vikings by the end of next season. Cousins certainly wasn't terrible relative to his peers.

[StumpHunter]

Stats are great in context. Out of context, they don't mean a whole lot.

For instance, I could point out that on a per pass basis, playing on the same team (not a lesser team in Denver), Keenum had a 4.6 TD %, 1.5% Int percentage, 7.4 YPA and a 98.3 passer rating. He only fumbled once and none of his turnovers resulted in TDs.

Cousins had a 5.0 TD %, 1.7 INT%, 7.1 YPA, and a 99.7 passer rating. He fumbled 9 times, 2 for TDs. He also threw 3 pick sixes.

Oh, and the Keenum lead Vikings won 13 games, while the Cousins lead Vikes only won 8.

So lets look at the context of those stats. Watching the games, Case threw passes that should have been picked multiple times a game. He was bailed out time, and time again by his receivers, and was more lucky than good.

To be fair to him though, he also was fantastic on 3rd down and had a 109 passer rating in the 4th when the game was within a score.

Cousins, on the other hand, was far more consistent with his passes, and I have no doubt he will continue to put up good numbers over the next two seasons, against bad teams or against good ones when the game is already out of reach.

On 3rd down, he converted at a Bradford like level (really bad for those that don't remember), and in the 4th quarter in close games his passer rating was 73.7.

[Pondering Her Percy]

More or less that's what it comes across as. Of course we complain about OL, or the OC, or whatever. But in the end, blame falls mostly on the quarterback. You sit there in almost every post and say "well Kirk posted this record" and "Kirk lost to this team", etc, etc. No the TEAM lost to the Bills. The TEAM lost to the Bears and so on. Just because Kirk is the QB doesnt mean he is responsible for every bit of that record. The team is. For example, if it wasnt for Kirk Cousins, that GB game wouldnt have been a tie, it would have been a loss. We wouldnt have been a drive away from tying the Rams, we would have been blown out. If it was for Cousins, we lose to the Eagles. Sure, games like Seattle he didnt play well. But this is my whole point with all this and with someone like Case Keenum. The TEAM didnt play well. The OC was awful. The D took a step back. Why anyone thinks Keenum could have done anything for this team other than maybe win 5 or 6 games is dreaming and blinded by the 2017 miracle. If Carlson makes that FG at GB, and we're in the playoffs. Something that simple screwed us from making the playoffs. Sure, Kirk Cousins could have beat the Pats or Seahawks and didnt, but what if Carlson made the FG? Cousins had no control over that. That was a win in my book. Cousins was unreal. And Carlson blew it and it ended up costing us a playoff berth. We could have then sat our starters week 17 and went into Chicago healthy and ready to go. There wasnt a single game this year where I said, "man if we had a different QB, we would have won that game". Maybe Seattle? But outside of that, no. Nor was there a QB out there that could have done better than Cousins. But since he's "paid big money" (which in the end means nothing because in about a year or two he will be the 8th-10th highest paid QB in the league) then everything is his fault. I've said this before and I'll say it again....NEVER have I seen our fan base so hard on a QB in my life. And everyone bases it off of a miracle year that a career backup had. The game always falls on Cousins shoulders. When he plays bad, I'll say it. But if we lose, it doesnt mean we lost because of Kirk Cousins.

Like the first Bears game, we ran the ball 9 times with our starter but threw 46 times. That is the epitome of unbalanced. So Kirk is forced to sit back there when the entire Bears team knows what he's doing and try to pick apart the #1 D in the NFL. No different than the Seattle game. Bobby Wagner said "they did what they always do"....Our offense was predictable. But everyone looks at a game like that and says "yeah Cousins played terrible". How about the OC had zero balance and it fell on Cousins shoulders to light up the best defense in the NFL. Again, I am saying he was at fault in certain games. But how do you blame Kirk for a bad game when he's forced into throwing 46 times with 0 help from anyone else and a defense that knows what you're going to do. I guess even the NE game. Dalvin Cook is averaging 8.9 YPC but yeah...lets give him the ball 9 times and throw Kirk 44. Makes total sense. But yeah, "Cousins sucked that game". In the end, it's a team game. Coaches included. And they didnt put it together this year. Kirk Cousins wasnt the reason we didnt make the playoffs this year.

Agree that Cousins isn't THE reason we didn't make the playoffs. There are 32 backup QBs who could have come in for much cheaper and not been THE reason we didn't make the playoffs. That is the problem.

We have gone from Cousins being the missing piece to winning it all, to Cousins not being THE reason we missed the playoffs. Some of us see an issue with that, and point it out. Others make one excuse after another for the QB.

Ok so is Kirk Cousins the reason the defenses play dipped in the last year? Is he the reason Cook and Murray werent touching the ball? Is he the reason we gave up the most pressures ever from an OL? Is he the reason for awful play calling? Is he the reason we couldnt make a FG with the game on the line? No. But that is making up excuses? Did those things not happen and am I pulling crap from the clouds?

Clearly Cousins wasnt the "missing piece" because there were a lot of other pieces that didnt do their part this year. Read my post I just made under the failed season thread. You fall under the category of being blinded by those two things. I guess my question for you is, what was the missing piece then? Because you make it sound like it was the QB and that someone could have done better than Kirk this year given all of what went wrong over the year. You said before, you wouldnt take Matt Stafford over Keenum but you would have drafted a QB instead this past offseason....The only QB we were in reach for is Lamar Jackson who literally doesnt know how to throw a football. So since you have no QB to draft last offseason, you have a choice of Cousins, Teddy, Case, and Bradford, who are you signing?? I'm guessing you say Case....so then what? Because he clearly came back down to earth this year and wouldnt have been good....at all. Draft one this year? And do what with the OL? Jump into the dumpster free agent pool? And who do you truly trust in this years draft? And please dont say Haskins. Literally nobody trusts him right now. Oh and chances are we wouldnt be picking first overall so we then have to trade away picks to get who we want without even knowing if he will be worth it or not. So I guess for someone who continuously rags on Cousins, I'd love to see what your 2-3 year plan would look like. Because we'd definitely be wasting a lot of years of our top players waiting for you to flush Case Keenum down the drain.

[VikingLord]

Stats are great in context. Out of context, they don't mean a whole lot.

For instance, I could point out that on a per pass basis, playing on the same team (not a lesser team in Denver), Keenum had a 4.6 TD %, 1.5% Int percentage, 7.4 YPA and a 98.3 passer rating. He only fumbled once and none of his turnovers resulted in TDs.

Cousins had a 5.0 TD %, 1.7 INT%, 7.1 YPA, and a 99.7 passer rating. He fumbled 9 times, 2 for TDs. He also threw 3 pick sixes.

Oh, and the Keenum lead Vikings won 13 games, while the Cousins lead Vikes only won 8.

So lets look at the context of those stats. Watching the games, Case threw passes that should have been picked multiple times a game. He was bailed out time, and time again by his receivers, and was more lucky than good.

To be fair to him though, he also was fantastic on 3rd down and had a 109 passer rating in the 4th when the game was within a score.

Cousins, on the other hand, was far more consistent with his passes, and I have no doubt he will continue to put up good numbers over the next two seasons, against bad teams or against good ones when the game is already out of reach.

On 3rd down, he converted at a Bradford like level (really bad for those that don't remember), and in the 4th quarter in close games his passer rating was 73.7.

I was trying to answer the question posed by the title of this thread, which was about why Cousins didn't play like Brady more than the question about whether the Vikings wasted money by paying Cousins instead of keeping Keenum. That seems to be the point you're trying to argue here and while that is a valid question, it's not the point of my post.

With that said, I think if you looked at Keenum's overall stats as a pro, it would also become pretty apparent that 2017 was an outlier for him in pretty much every category. Something maybe he could repeat, but probably not given his performance as a starter in Denver. So I think the argument that keeping Keenum for less and getting the same result as splurging on Cousins is probably not all that solid even if Keenum's and Cousin's Vikings stats are comparable. But to be fair, I'd need to look at Keenum's career numbers and I don't have time to do that right now.

As far as Cousins goes, he's got a 3 year guaranteed deal. He's going to be the QB for the next 2 years. Spielman and Zimmer made the call and its going to be up to both of them to find a way to reduce that sack rate and the number of negative plays and put him in the best position to help win games. Reducing the sack rate can be accomplished by improving the blocking in front of him and making the running game more consistent and effective. That part will fall mainly on Spielman this offseason. He has his work cut out for him, but it can be done.

Assuming he gets that support, whether Cousins can rise to the challenge against better defenses, late in the season, or in critical situations is largely going to be up to him. If the team otherwise plays well around him and he can't do it, then Cousins, Zimmer and Spielman will all be gone in 2 more seasons and the Vikes will be back at the drawing board.

[Pondering Her Percy]

Stats are great in context. Out of context, they don't mean a whole lot.

For instance, I could point out that on a per pass basis, playing on the same team (not a lesser team in Denver), Keenum had a 4.6 TD %, 1.5% Int percentage, 7.4 YPA and a 98.3 passer rating. He only fumbled once and none of his turnovers resulted in TDs.

Cousins had a 5.0 TD %, 1.7 INT%, 7.1 YPA, and a 99.7 passer rating. He fumbled 9 times, 2 for TDs. He also threw 3 pick sixes.

Oh, and the Keenum lead Vikings won 13 games, while the Cousins lead Vikes only won 8.

So lets look at the context of those stats. Watching the games, Case threw passes that should have been picked multiple times a game. He was bailed out time, and time again by his receivers, and was more lucky than good.

To be fair to him though, he also was fantastic on 3rd down and had a 109 passer rating in the 4th when the game was within a score.

Cousins, on the other hand, was far more consistent with his passes, and I have no doubt he will continue to put up good numbers over the next two seasons, against bad teams or against good ones when the game is already out of reach.

On 3rd down, he converted at a Bradford like level (really bad for those that don't remember), and in the 4th quarter in close games his passer rating was 73.7.

Maybe because your stats aren't telling the whole story? You're saying none of Keenums turnover resulted in TDs? Just because they dont score right then and there off the pick or fumble, doesnt mean it didnt result in a TD. Not sure who looks at any stat like that. If the team scores off the possession received by the turnover, then that turnover resulted in a TD. And that happened plenty of times with Keenum. He literally threw 2 terrible INTs vs Washington. One that put them on the 1 yard line and resulted in a TD. GBs INT resulted in a FG. Baltimores INT resulted in a FG. Clevelands resulted in a TD. 1 of the 2 INTs he had vs Carolina resulted in a TD and the fumble resulted in a FG. And then he also threw one vs. New Orleans that literally put them back in the game and resulted in a TD and he threw a pick 6 vs Philly and fumbled which also resulted in a TD. So out of 2 fumbles and 10 interceptions, 9 of the 12 resulted in either a TD or FG.

Also, Keenum "won" 12 games, not 13. Bradford won week 1.

And as for fumbles, yeah you're taking stats from the 2018 year with Cousins and 2017 with Keenum. But you fail to mention that Cas Keenum fumbled 11 times this year with Denver. Two more than Kirk and I can tell you right now, their OL is better than ours. And in 2017 Keenums was pretty solid. This year it was not for us. Keenum threw 15 INTs and 11 fumbles compared to Cousins 10 INTs and 9 fumbles. And Case had a better OL in Denver....

[The negotiator]

Has anyone pulled in any stats to this discussion? If not, I'll pull some in for comparison, along with Case Keenum and Tom Brady just for reference.

Also, I know raw stats alone aren't going to provide a complete picture of anything, but they do help to frame performance relative to others. That can be helpful to assess how a given QB performed in the context of his contract.

Anyway, the stats referenced here can be found at http://www.espn.com/nfl/statistics/play ... asontype/2 for anyone interested.

So, let's begin with total yards.

#1 - Ben R. with 5,129 yards
#7 - Tom Brady with 4,355 yards
#10 - Kirk Cousins with 4,298 yards
#14 - Case Keenum with 3,890 yards

What jumps out to me here is that there is a big gap between #1 and #7, and a big gap between #10 and #14, but not a huge gap between #7 and #10.

Let's look at completions next.

#1 - Ben R. with 452
#3 - Kirk Cousins with 425
#8 - Tom Brady with 375
#11 - Case Keenum with 365

Interesting spread here. Very little separating Brady and Keenum.

How about attempts?

#1 - Ben R. with 675
#4 - Kirk Cousins with 606
#6 - Case Keenum with 586
#9 - Tom Brady with 570

Big Ben put the ball in the air a lot. He attempted a lot more relative to his peers, completed a lot more relative to his peers, and as a result, racked up more total yardage than his peers.

Let's look at accuracy.

#1 - Drew Brees at 74.4%
#2 - Kirk Cousins at 70.1%
#18 - Tom Brady at 65.8%
#27 - Case Keenum at 62.3%

It shouldn't be a huge surprise to see Brees ranked first in this stat. What is surprising is where Brady and Keenum show up. I was interested to see where Ben R. showed up in this stat. He ranked #12 at 67.0%.

One other stat tracked on the ESPN site is yards per attempt, which gives a rough idea of how aggressive a passer is, although it doesn't account for yards picked up by receivers who run well after the catch.

#1 - Ryan Fitzpatrick with 9.62 YPA
#13 - Tom Brady with 7.64 YPA
#24 - Kirk Cousins with 7.09 YPA
#30 - Case Keenum with 6.64 YPA

Here, while Brady doesn't stand out necessarily at #13, there is solid statistical separation between him and Cousins, and even more significant separation between him and Keenum. Despite this, Brady badly lags Fitzpatrick in this category, suggesting that while he was more aggressive than either Cousins or Keenum during the course of the season, he was not overly so, and therefore his willingness to take a more aggressive approach wouldn't explain the relative success of the Patriots overall.

Let's look at TDs - how many points each of these guys was directly responsible for with his arm over the course of the year.

#1 - Patrick Mahomes with 50
#9 - Kirk Cousins with 30
#10 - Tom Brady with 29
#23 - Case Keenum with 18

And INTs too - how many times the QB, through a bad read, poor throw, or simply bad luck, gave possession back to the opposing team (lower ranking is better in this stat and many players are tied, which explains the difference between Brady and Cousins rankings).

#1 - Ben R. with 16
#2 - Case Keenum with 15
#15 - Tom Brady with 11
#20 - Kirk Cousins with 10

Hmmm....

Let's look at sacks. This is a good indicator of both the prowess of the blockers in front of the QB as well as his ability to avoid loss of yardage and plays.

#1 - Deshaun Watson took 62 sacks
#10 - Kirk Cousins took 40 sacks
#13 - Case Keenum took 34 sacks
#28 - Tom Brady took 21 sacks

Brady definitely took fewer sacks than either Cousins or Keenum.

And lastly, let's look at the overall rating.

#1 - Drew Brees at 115.7
#10 - Kirk Cousins at 99.7
#12 - Tom Brady at 97.7
#29 - Case Keenum at 81.2

So, the subject of this thread is "Why Did Kirk Cousins Not Play Like Tom Brady?"

It is a good question. If it's answered subjectively, it feels like there was a big gap between the relative performance of the two QBs during the year. Certainly, their respective teams had far different outcomes, with one missing the playoffs entirely and one winning the Superbowl. But, an objective look at the stats of the 2 players doesn't really support the claim that there is a huge disparity between the relative performance of the two. Of course, there are some key exceptions, most notably IMHO the total sacks which indicate that Brady took significantly fewer negative plays with the ball in his hands. There could be a variety of reasons for that - Brady benefited from better blocking, a more consistent running game, he was better at recognizing and avoiding pressure, or likely a combination of all three. But there is no question he out-performed in this area, and this is definitely an area where Cousins needs to get better, once again recognizing that improvement can come in any combination of the three factors that determine whether a QB ends up on the ground on a given drop back.

I also think the claim that the Vikings could have paid less for Keenum and gotten the same result is at least called into question by these stats. Keenum consistently and in many areas significantly under-performed on a relative basis to both Cousins and Brady, much less to the best performer a given statistical category. His overall rating reflects that. True, the Vikings would have paid less for him, but, and as hard as it may be to believe it, they would have objectively gotten their money's worth.

This doesn't necessarily answer the question of whether the investment in Cousins was justified or will be successful. I only post this to shine some light on the myth that Tom Brady set the bar this year for QB play (he didn't, not even close), and to separate the relative success of an entire team from the contributions of a given, albeit important, player to those results.

I'll finish this by saying that the Cousins experiment has to be allowed to finish before any final judgments can be made about it. With a better offensive line in front of him, a more consistent running game, and another year in the system, perhaps it will look like a more astute move on the part of the Vikings by the end of next season. Cousins certainly wasn't terrible relative to his peers.

Good post,

[StumpHunter]

Stats are great in context. Out of context, they don't mean a whole lot.

For instance, I could point out that on a per pass basis, playing on the same team (not a lesser team in Denver), Keenum had a 4.6 TD %, 1.5% Int percentage, 7.4 YPA and a 98.3 passer rating. He only fumbled once and none of his turnovers resulted in TDs.

Cousins had a 5.0 TD %, 1.7 INT%, 7.1 YPA, and a 99.7 passer rating. He fumbled 9 times, 2 for TDs. He also threw 3 pick sixes.

Oh, and the Keenum lead Vikings won 13 games, while the Cousins lead Vikes only won 8.

So lets look at the context of those stats. Watching the games, Case threw passes that should have been picked multiple times a game. He was bailed out time, and time again by his receivers, and was more lucky than good.

To be fair to him though, he also was fantastic on 3rd down and had a 109 passer rating in the 4th when the game was within a score.

Cousins, on the other hand, was far more consistent with his passes, and I have no doubt he will continue to put up good numbers over the next two seasons, against bad teams or against good ones when the game is already out of reach.

On 3rd down, he converted at a Bradford like level (really bad for those that don't remember), and in the 4th quarter in close games his passer rating was 73.7.

Maybe because your stats aren't telling the whole story? You're saying none of Keenums turnover resulted in TDs? Just because they dont score right then and there off the pick or fumble, doesnt mean it didnt result in a TD. Not sure who looks at any stat like that. If the team scores off the possession received by the turnover, then that turnover resulted in a TD. And that happened plenty of times with Keenum. He literally threw 2 terrible INTs vs Washington. One that put them on the 1 yard line and resulted in a TD. GBs INT resulted in a FG. Baltimores INT resulted in a FG. Clevelands resulted in a TD. 1 of the 2 INTs he had vs Carolina resulted in a TD and the fumble resulted in a FG. And then he also threw one vs. New Orleans that literally put them back in the game and resulted in a TD and he threw a pick 6 vs Philly and fumbled which also resulted in a TD. So out of 2 fumbles and 10 interceptions, 9 of the 12 resulted in either a TD or FG.

Also, Keenum "won" 12 games, not 13. Bradford won week 1.

And as for fumbles, yeah you're taking stats from the 2018 year with Cousins and 2017 with Keenum. But you fail to mention that Cas Keenum fumbled 11 times this year with Denver. Two more than Kirk and I can tell you right now, their OL is better than ours. And in 2017 Keenums was pretty solid. This year it was not for us. Keenum threw 15 INTs and 11 fumbles compared to Cousins 10 INTs and 9 fumbles. And Case had a better OL in Denver....

Keenum won 13 games as a Viking. Check your math again.

[StumpHunter]

Agree that Cousins isn't THE reason we didn't make the playoffs. There are 32 backup QBs who could have come in for much cheaper and not been THE reason we didn't make the playoffs. That is the problem.

We have gone from Cousins being the missing piece to winning it all, to Cousins not being THE reason we missed the playoffs. Some of us see an issue with that, and point it out. Others make one excuse after another for the QB.

Ok so is Kirk Cousins the reason the defenses play dipped in the last year? Is he the reason Cook and Murray werent touching the ball? Is he the reason we gave up the most pressures ever from an OL? Is he the reason for awful play calling? Is he the reason we couldnt make a FG with the game on the line? No. But that is making up excuses? Did those things not happen and am I pulling crap from the clouds?

Clearly Cousins wasnt the "missing piece" because there were a lot of other pieces that didnt do their part this year. Read my post I just made under the failed season thread. You fall under the category of being blinded by those two things. I guess my question for you is, what was the missing piece then? Because you make it sound like it was the QB and that someone could have done better than Kirk this year given all of what went wrong over the year. You said before, you wouldnt take Matt Stafford over Keenum but you would have drafted a QB instead this past offseason....The only QB we were in reach for is Lamar Jackson who literally doesnt know how to throw a football. So since you have no QB to draft last offseason, you have a choice of Cousins, Teddy, Case, and Bradford, who are you signing?? I'm guessing you say Case....so then what? Because he clearly came back down to earth this year and wouldnt have been good....at all. Draft one this year? And do what with the OL? Jump into the dumpster free agent pool? And who do you truly trust in this years draft? And please dont say Haskins. Literally nobody trusts him right now. Oh and chances are we wouldnt be picking first overall so we then have to trade away picks to get who we want without even knowing if he will be worth it or not. So I guess for someone who continuously rags on Cousins, I'd love to see what your 2-3 year plan would look like. Because we'd definitely be wasting a lot of years of our top players waiting for you to flush Case Keenum down the drain.

I have written about the Oline needing improvements. I have written we need a better #3 WR. Want to know the difference between when I comment about those guys and when I talk about Cousins' deficiencies?

No one makes pages of excuses for the Oline and Treadwell.

[Pondering Her Percy]

Maybe because your stats aren't telling the whole story? You're saying none of Keenums turnover resulted in TDs? Just because they dont score right then and there off the pick or fumble, doesnt mean it didnt result in a TD. Not sure who looks at any stat like that. If the team scores off the possession received by the turnover, then that turnover resulted in a TD. And that happened plenty of times with Keenum. He literally threw 2 terrible INTs vs Washington. One that put them on the 1 yard line and resulted in a TD. GBs INT resulted in a FG. Baltimores INT resulted in a FG. Clevelands resulted in a TD. 1 of the 2 INTs he had vs Carolina resulted in a TD and the fumble resulted in a FG. And then he also threw one vs. New Orleans that literally put them back in the game and resulted in a TD and he threw a pick 6 vs Philly and fumbled which also resulted in a TD. So out of 2 fumbles and 10 interceptions, 9 of the 12 resulted in either a TD or FG.

Also, Keenum "won" 12 games, not 13. Bradford won week 1.

And as for fumbles, yeah you're taking stats from the 2018 year with Cousins and 2017 with Keenum. But you fail to mention that Cas Keenum fumbled 11 times this year with Denver. Two more than Kirk and I can tell you right now, their OL is better than ours. And in 2017 Keenums was pretty solid. This year it was not for us. Keenum threw 15 INTs and 11 fumbles compared to Cousins 10 INTs and 9 fumbles. And Case had a better OL in Denver....

Keenum won 13 games as a Viking. Check your math again.

Lol ok since you’re counting playoffs but I don’t feel like that’s what you meant