Quote: @purplefaithful said:
@ PurpleCrush said:
@ StickyBun said:
@ PurpleCrush said:
@ StickyBun said:
@ PurpleCrush said:
I have to eat a bit of crow here. I've always liked Kirk, always wanted him to do well...but I never thought he was good enough to carry this team on his shoulders as an elite QB should. He's done that all year long so far. Kudos to him.
You know why? He's had some time to throw. Darrisaw is only going to solidify that.
Even when he hasn't had time he's been able to side step or move around more-so than he has since I've seen him with the Vikings. That play where he got away from Brian Burns in the pocket to gain positive yards is a classic example of where in the past that was a guaranteed strip sack.
Now with an improving O-Line as you mentioned, he's as deadly as any other top tier QB in the game this year.
I saw some stat where he has thrown for 36 TDs and only 5 INTs in the last 10 games? Something like that, I might be getting the game amount wrong.
Those are elite numbers.
I saw that too. Mind boggling numbers. Once they all get on the same page, there should be no reason this offense can't be one of the very best in the league.
The plan was to improve the OL and give olde stone feet a fighting chance - he didnt have much of one before. Couple that with his own maturation and this is the caliber of play resulting since the latter part of last year.
He'll have a clunker or two, they all do. World will blow-up if he misses a bunch of games with Covid, skeptics will still ask when the chips are down will he fold like a cheap tent?
But I think (fingers crossed) its safe to say Cousins has settled into a new plateau of play.
That's the hope. That also should level the playing field when going up against the better teams in the league. Hopefully the rest of the team catches up.
Quote: @PurpleCrush said:
@ StickyBun said:
@ PurpleCrush said:
@ StickyBun said:
@ PurpleCrush said:
I have to eat a bit of crow here. I've always liked Kirk, always wanted him to do well...but I never thought he was good enough to carry this team on his shoulders as an elite QB should. He's done that all year long so far. Kudos to him.
You know why? He's had some time to throw. Darrisaw is only going to solidify that.
Even when he hasn't had time he's been able to side step or move around more-so than he has since I've seen him with the Vikings. That play where he got away from Brian Burns in the pocket to gain positive yards is a classic example of where in the past that was a guaranteed strip sack.
Now with an improving O-Line as you mentioned, he's as deadly as any other top tier QB in the game this year.
I saw some stat where he has thrown for 36 TDs and only 5 INTs in the last 10 games? Something like that, I might be getting the game amount wrong.
Those are elite numbers.
I saw that too. Mind boggling numbers. Once they all get on the same page, there should be no reason this offense can't be one of the very best in the league.
Once Bradbury quits getting his ass handed to him is basically what's slowing down the offense. There were so many plays where he just got leveled Sunday. Past that, I'd love to see them open the offense up some but we're 5th in the league in yards/game.
Of our 3 losses 2 easily could have been wins. Of course of our 3 wins 2 easily could have been losses. I hate that we let games get so close when we don't need them to be.
Quote: @purplefaithful said:
@ PurpleCrush said:
@ StickyBun said:
@ PurpleCrush said:
@ StickyBun said:
@ PurpleCrush said:
I have to eat a bit of crow here. I've always liked Kirk, always wanted him to do well...but I never thought he was good enough to carry this team on his shoulders as an elite QB should. He's done that all year long so far. Kudos to him.
You know why? He's had some time to throw. Darrisaw is only going to solidify that.
Even when he hasn't had time he's been able to side step or move around more-so than he has since I've seen him with the Vikings. That play where he got away from Brian Burns in the pocket to gain positive yards is a classic example of where in the past that was a guaranteed strip sack.
Now with an improving O-Line as you mentioned, he's as deadly as any other top tier QB in the game this year.
I saw some stat where he has thrown for 36 TDs and only 5 INTs in the last 10 games? Something like that, I might be getting the game amount wrong.
Those are elite numbers.
I saw that too. Mind boggling numbers. Once they all get on the same page, there should be no reason this offense can't be one of the very best in the league.
The plan was to improve the OL and give olde stone feet a fighting chance - he didnt have much of one before. Couple that with his own maturation and this is the caliber of play resulting since the latter part of last year.
He'll have a clunker or two, they all do. World will blow-up if he misses a bunch of games with Covid, skeptics will still ask when the chips are down will he fold like a cheap tent?
But I think (fingers crossed) its safe to say Cousins has settled into a new plateau of play.
I saw Zimmer mention it and I was thinking the same before I read it, Cousins put the "clutch" demon to rest against NO in the playoffs with that throw to Theilen and then the TD to Rudy. Since then, he has been as good as any in the clutch. Won't make every play every game, but the throw to KJ was a dime, he moved us into scoring position in two of our losses this year only to have a missed FG and 'fumble' ruin what should have been a win.
I think Kirk Cousins is clearly playing better since week 7
last year than he has previously. He’s
been consistently good. I think it’s fair
to say that prior to W7 he wasn’t really that clutch. He had too many stinker games where he just
didn’t really show up. There was just a
myriad of primetime games, where he came out flat. If you took away the ground game and put
everything on his shoulders it didn’t really work out. I think it’s totally fair that we don’t
pretend that Cousins doesn’t have a history or a track record, but I also think
he’s put together a solid seasons worth of games and has shown clutchness
especially this year. I don’t think the
losses last year are on Cousins nor are they on Zimmer. Last year was doomed to fail, because it was
a reset year. We had a lot of dead cap that
all happened in one year. We blew everything
up and tried to contain the damage to a single year.
I think the coaching staff should be commended for building around
Cousins like they have. I still don’t
think Cousins is an elite QB who will lift those around him, but I do think
that if you surround him with top talent, he’ll give you top level numbers, and
I’m beginning to think he’ll be able to be clutch when surrounded with top
talent. I also think something that hasn’t
helped Cousins has been constantly changing his coaching staff. I think one of the downsides of Kubiak is his
newness, but the benefit is that the offense and Cousins are staying relatively
in the same system.
Quote: @medaille said:
I think Kirk Cousins is clearly playing better since week 7
last year than he has previously. He’s
been consistently good. I think it’s fair
to say that prior to W7 he wasn’t really that clutch. He had too many stinker games where he just
didn’t really show up. There was just a
myriad of primetime games, where he came out flat. If you took away the ground game and put
everything on his shoulders it didn’t really work out. I think it’s totally fair that we don’t
pretend that Cousins doesn’t have a history or a track record, but I also think
he’s put together a solid seasons worth of games and has shown clutchness
especially this year. I don’t think the
losses last year are on Cousins nor are they on Zimmer. Last year was doomed to fail, because it was
a reset year. We had a lot of dead cap that
all happened in one year. We blew everything
up and tried to contain the damage to a single year.
I think the coaching staff should be commended for building around
Cousins like they have. I still don’t
think Cousins is an elite QB who will lift those around him, but I do think
that if you surround him with top talent, he’ll give you top level numbers, and
I’m beginning to think he’ll be able to be clutch when surrounded with top
talent. I also think something that hasn’t
helped Cousins has been constantly changing his coaching staff. I think one of the downsides of Kubiak is his
newness, but the benefit is that the offense and Cousins are staying relatively
in the same system.
My sentiments exactly.
I think it all comes down to protection. As many of us have pointed out before, over the previous two seasons, no QB in the NFL had a better rating than Kirk Cousins from a clean pocket. When he gets time, he's always been very good.
Well, hey, how bout we give him a clean pocket?
Last year, he learned to play well with less than perfect pockets. He played much better the 2nd half of the season as O'Neill developed, Bradbury improved slightly and we replaced Samia with Cleveland. Again, it was far from perfect, but it was enough to see some nice things from Cousins.
This year, we improved just a little bit more. Yes, Bradbury can still play better, but Darrisaw is looking good, Cleveland is looking good, O'Neill is looking good. Udoh's first three games were outstanding. He's fallen off the last three games, but even at his worst, he's still far better than Dozier or Samia ever were.
That's the difference. And if the NFL's youngest line improves like it should over the course of the season, and then again next year, and the year after, you're going to see Cousins put up ridiculous numbers in this offense.
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