Getty Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins
Minnesota Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins hung of the best performances of his career on the Green Bay Packers on Sunday.
The 10th year veteran quarterback threw caution to the wind and made several spectacular throws against his better judgment — including a pass to Adam Thielen where Thielen nor Packers corner Rasul Douglas were looking his direction on the final drive of the game.
Douglas bit on a comeback route while Thielen reacted to the early throw, turning his head and shifting his body upfield enough to catch the inside throw he took for a 26-yard gain that effectively won the game.
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Adam Thielen with the quick reactions
Cousins’ final throw of the game capped one of his best performances of the season: 24-for-35 for 341 yards and three touchdowns.
The Vikings have shown how effective the offense can be when playing aggressively. The offense is the fifth-ranked unit in the NFL in expected points added per play, per The Athletic’s Chad Graff.
However, despite the recent success that has vaulted the Vikings into serious playoff contention, Cousins admitted he’s not entirely comfortable with the risks he took on Sunday.
Cousins Reveals Concerns With Throw to Thielen
In his postgame press conference, Cousins made an eyebrow-raising admission that he felt several throws were “too aggressive” on Sunday, including the clutch pass to Thielen that he thought he should have thrown shorter to Tyler Conklin.
“I mean, I could point to a half-dozen throws there that were too aggressive, and I could argue that that’s one of them and I don’t think you want to live doing that,” Cousins said, per Graff. “I think that we got away with it a couple times. I keep saying we’re (on the) razor’s edge, but that’s a play where it’s an example of it. The difference between (Thielen) catching that and making the play he did and it going the other way is very small. Tyler Conklin did a great job on his route winning on that play, and so I’ve got to go back and look at it and say, ‘How can we give Adam a better chance to create separation?’ Maybe a different route concept for me to give to him and then even what took me there, should I have worked with Tyler instead? And so you’re hard on yourself working through all that because you don’t want to live in a world throwing the ball into a covered player and crossing your fingers. You don’t want to live in that world. There’s a time and a place for it, but you also want to be a smart football player.”
Cousins says he doesn’t want to make a living throwing a ball to a covered player. Meanwhile, Justin Jefferson relishes deep-ball opportunities where he can make a play on a 50-50 ball. He posted a 92.3% contested-catch rate his senior year of college, which was nearly 20% higher than the next best receiver and drastically better than the mean average of 46.5% posted by FBS receivers in 2020.
“I’m extremely confident,” Jefferson said in a Nov. 18 press conference leading up to the Packers game. “I always tell Kirk, ‘If you see me over there 1-on-1, give me the opportunity go up and make a play. That’s what I love to do.”
Jefferson is coming the best two-game span of his young career, posting 312 receiving yards on 17 receptions.
“We showed if we go up and throw the ball to us, we go and make the play no matter the situation,” Jefferson said of himself and Adam Thielen becoming more significant parts of the offense. “That’s what we live for. That’s what we do.”
Graff speculated that Cousins’ statement suggests that the Vikings’ aggressiveness on offense, which has helped the team claim back-to-back wins, could be more of a mirage than a long-term change.
“If there’s a reason for concern, it’s quotes like the above one from Cousins,” Graff wrote. “It suggests that the Vikings’ downfield passing the last two weeks — a tweak that has resulted in wins over the 6-4 Chargers and 8-3 Packers — is more of an aberration than a philosophical switch. It doesn’t matter that they’ve been two of his best games this season, combining for five touchdowns and 635 yards. It doesn’t matter that receiver Justin Jefferson has caught fire the last two games, catching 17 passes for 312 yards and two touchdowns. And it doesn’t matter that Mike Zimmer continues to urge Cousins to take more chances and seek those deep shots. As Cousins said after Sunday’s game, those deep passes of late were simply because of the way the defense played against the Vikings.”
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Zimmer Urges Cousins to Throw Deep
The prevailing narrative that coach Mike Zimmer is behind the team’s conservative approach on offense is losing validity with each game that Cousins exceeds expectations.
“I talk to Kirk every week, and I told him, ‘Look, you try to score touchdowns, you let me back the game down when it’s time to do it,'” Zimmer said, per Graff. “So that’s kind of our approach.”
Cousins, playing the best football of his career, has impressively thrown a league-low two interceptions among starting quarterbacks this season. He’s on pace for nearly 5,000 passing yards and ranks fifth with 21 passing touchdowns on the season.
After throwing a league-worst 10 picks in the first six games of the 2020 season, Cousins has since thrown 45 touchdowns and five picks in his past 17 games — a full season’s body of work that rivals Aaron Rodgers, who threw 48 touchdowns and five picks last season as the NFL’s Most Valuable Player.
Cousins’ comments Sunday could be out of humility. However, it seems the organization is continuing to urge Cousins to air it out between comments from Zimmer and Jefferson.
This season’s final seven games could define Cousins’ tenure with the organization as the team’s mediocre defense continues to lean on him, leading late-game heroics.