REPORT: Minnesota Vikings Expected To Re-Sign Kirk Cousins After ‘Excellent’ 2023 Play Before Injury
The Minnesota Vikings were recently predicted to re-sign Kirk Cousins this offseason by an NFL insider. The 7-7 Vikings are still very much in the playoff hunt over a month following Cousins’ season-ending Achilles injury.
The Vikings record will put them too far back in the 2024 NFL Draft, seeding for them to select a top quarterback prospect in the first round. The Vikings should be in a position to try to compete for a Super Bowl next season with exceptional offensive talent like Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison (in his second season) in Minnesota.
Bill Barnwell with ESPN recently wrote about his prediction for the Vikings at quarterback next season. Barnwell thinks it makes sense for the Vikings to offer Cousins a two-year contract this offseason. That should be enough to cover the Vikings while their rebuilt defense compliments an exciting roster on offense.
Barnwell thinks the Vikings’ front office will want to run it back in 2024 based on Cousins’ play before the injury and the way the defense has improved this season:
“It has gone in every which direction. Kirk Cousins was playing excellent football before tearing his Achilles. Jaren Hall stepped in and immediately suffered a concussion before giving way to recent acquisition Joshua Dobbs, who led the Vikings to back-to-back victories. Dobbs lost two straight and then won a 3-0 nailbiter with the Raiders before being benched for Mullens, who spent time on injured reserve with a back injury.
Without receiver Justin Jefferson and with a rotating cast of quarterbacks, the Vikings should be toast. Instead, a defense that has made the single largest improvement from year-to-year of any unit in the league under Brian Flores has kept the Vikings in games. Since Week 4, the Vikings are sixth in the NFL in EPA per play allowed, which has them in the wild-card hunt alongside three other teams at 7-7.”
The Vikings could be dangerous next season if they play their cards right in free agency and the draft. Not having to build a new offense around a rookie quarterback should make the Vikings a dangerous team in 2024, But only if Cousins can return in 2024 from his Achilles injury and play at the same level he was this season.
That’s not guaranteed for a quarterback turning 36 next August.
