Minnesota Vikings’ QB Kirk Cousins is a free agent at the end of the 2023 NFL season. Could he finally hit the open market, and where might he end up? He’s perhaps the most interesting QB in the NFL. Cousins is a slightly above-average passer and has been for his entire starting career.
He’s set to enter his sixth season as the starter for the Minnesota Vikings, but outside of this past season, the team has not done much with Cousins under center. Their thinking with Cousins clearly was that he’d be enough to take them over the edge, as Case Keenum had led the team to the NFC Championship game in the 2017 season.
Cousins joined the team in 2018 but has not been able to find that type of success. Even though he’s not an elite passer, he’s very efficient, passing for at least 25 touchdowns in every season since 2015.
He’s remarkably consistent and him being a pure pocket passer bodes well for him sustaining more success into his late-30s.
Could Kirk Cousins hit the market in 2024, and if so, there are the three most logical fits?
NFL Free Agency: Potential fits for Kirk Cousins in 2024
San Francisco 49ers
Here’s a theory that Mike Florio posed recently, and it does make a ton of sense:
"Given that so many other media outlets covering the NFL have seized on something I said last week on Rich Eisen’s show , we might as well write something about it, too. At some point during the discussion from last Wednesday, I blurted out the possibility that, in March 2024, the 49ers and Rams will end up in a tug of war for Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins. I know that, on the surface, it sounds crazy. But it could still happen. For starters, the Vikings have no way to keep Cousins from becoming an unrestricted free agent after the coming season, unless they sign him to a new deal. They can’t use the franchise tag. If Cousins wants to hit the market after six years in Minnesota (where he signed after six years in Washington), he will. So where will he go? In 2017, 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan didn’t even evaluate Patrick Mahomes because Shanahan believed he’d be signing Cousins a year later. Since then, the 49ers have had a revolving door of quarterbacks, due in large part to none of them being able to stay healthy."
His full thoughts can be read here.
It could make a ton of sense. We do know that Shanahan was a fan of Cousins and wanted to bring him on board. And Florio is right in saying that the 49ers have had a revolving door at QB since missing out on Cousins and pivoting to Jimmy Garoppolo.
Kirk Cousins would be, by far, the best QB the Niners have had since that drama about six years ago. He’d be entering his age-36 season in 2024, but Cousins being a pure pocket passer coupled with Shanahan’s QB-friendly offense would be a perfect fit.