Quote: @"Jamie Demaree" said:
First of all Cousins has to GET 30 million for this to be a story. With Brady, Rodgers,Stafford and Brees all making between 20-25 million how is it that Cousins a very good QB but not the caliber of the top 3 or 5 in the NFL going to justify getting 30 million. I understand that Rogers is having his contract reworked and he should get around 30 but that doesnt mean Cousins will unless there is a bidding war and he is overpaid.
You might have answered your question there - it does happen in free agency. The current highest-paid QB in the NFL has started a total of 7 games, right? So no logic need apply, I'm afraid.
OTOH, if your premise is right, and Cousins won't get more than $25M per year, then all the more reason he better end up wearing purple next fall.
I'm with you Jor-El, I think going after Cousins right now is a no-brainer. So what if it upsets your cap structure a bit for a few years. Quite frankly, what the fuck are you waiting for if you aren't going for broke/SB victories RIGHT NOW!? Is there some reason not to?
You've got 3 question marks at QB on the roster now and a 13-3 team with a window that will be open for maybe 2-5 years depending on how the defense evolves. Give Cousins weapons like Diggs, Cook, Rudy, Thielan and a better O-line to work with along with this defense and you are competing for SB's the next few years. OTOH, try to cook up some combo of Sam, Teddy, Case, Sloter and whoever and you are pretty much gambling that the injuries and question marks will all work out because oh, I don't know, the purple are so historically lucky in this area, lol!
Pay the man!
Quote: @"Geoff Nichols" said:
@"Jor-El" said:
@"Geoff Nichols" said:
Here is the Cousins contract that would be fair for both sides. If he gets more money or a better deal elsewhere, this is the line you don't cross and let him walk away.
The below deal is for 5 years $140M ($28M AAV) with $66.5M (47.5%) guaranteed at the time of signing. The contract layout and cap hits are as follows:
2018 - Base Salary: $20,900,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $0 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $27,000,000 / Dead Money: ($60,000,000) / Savings: ($33,000,000)
2019 - Base Salary: $15,600,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $300,000 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $22,000,000 / Dead Money: ($33,100,000) / Savings: ($11,100,000)
2020 - Base Salary: $17,900,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $4,000,000 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $28,000,000 / Dead Money: ($18,000,000) / Savings: $10,000,000
2021 - Base Salary: $24,900,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $0 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $31,000,000 / Dead Money: ($12,000,000) / Savings: $19,000,000
2022 - Base Salary: $25,900,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $0 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $32,000,000 / Dead Money: ($6,000,000) / Savings: $26,000,000
If possible the Vikings would be best served utilizing their abundance of cap space in 2018 to offer a semi front loaded deal with a reduced cap hit in year two. This would allow the Vikings to retain their core players. By year three of the deal you can re-evaluate Cousins value to the team and either opt to move on from him saving $10M against the cap or make future plans by re-negotiating the contracts of Griffen, Joseph, etc.. Last off-season those deals were constructed without long-term guarantees to facilitate restructure bonuses. This structure gives the Vikings safety and flexibility.
So the question becomes, why does Cousins sign this specific deal? First and foremost at a high level it makes him the highest paid player in NFL history by both average salary and total contract value. $66.5M in guarantees at signing also sets an NFL record. But cash flow is really what matters in these types of deals. In the first year of the contract Kirk would take home $51M which ties Matthew Stafford's deal a year ago and tops Garapollo's extension by $8.4M. By the end of year three Kirk would have taken home $89M which puts him slightly behind Stafford ($92M), but ahead of the extensions for both Carr and Garapollo. Ultimately this is window dressed as a market leading deal offers strong cash flow but still contains enough upside where it should regress back to the mean once Aaron Rodgers, Matt Ryan, and Russell Wilson sign their upcoming extensions.
Beautiful work to lay that out. I hope it happens. I just threw out $30M as a ballpark, as I don't know the contract nuances well (obviously!)
And I'm not trying to crap on anybody else's roster/salary design, but it kind of feels like there is a mood that the Vikings need to be overly conservative at QB because we cannot risk losing ANY players, especially defenders, and by the way we need to buy another UFA 3T and CB to make Zimmer's unit that much closer to perfection...
We've got to make choices and sometimes sacrifices. If Danielle Hunter digs in his heels and won't sign here unless he gets a contract making him the highest-paid DE in the league, maybe we let him walk. Didn't Hunter - and other players on our defense - become as good as they are in large part because of the coaching of Zimmer and his staff? So isn't there a chance our crack defensive coaches could turn Bower or Weatherly into a decent DE, too?
Quote: @"Geoff Nichols" said:
At $30M you start to lose flexibility. It seems silly that $2-3M annually could throw off the cap but once you factor in roll-over, increased guaranteed money, etc... It can start the snowball effect. I am not suggesting you'd lose a key defensive starter, but you'd have to start manipulating the cap (restructure bonuses, additional pay cuts, etc) to keep veteran depth on the roster. In essence the more money you start to add past $27M ties success more and more to the middle rounds of the draft. You're expected to hit on your 1st and 2nd round picks. But now you're going to be asked to draft your replacement for Jarius Wright, Latavius Murray, etc... .
Good examples, and, again - a strong front office and coaching staff HAS to start trusting they will be able to do things like replace your #3/4 WR and your goal-line RB. If we're so scared of losing such role players that we have to pay them significantly (as they just get older), it's going to catch up to us, too. We should have confidence we can fill those spots. Finding a long-term QB is much, much harder.
You make a lot of good points here. Ultimately the key to being successful is finding your core squad that'll help you win games on a regular basis. The rest of the roster will turn over every few years.
But the debate on Cousins comes down to this. If you're not willing to give Case a long-term extension because you want him to replicate his 2017 success in 2018, what are you going to do if he doesn't? Maybe Bridgewater comes back but there are still plenty of unknowns there as well. There isn't a guarantee Cousins comes to MN, but passing on him does open the door for the Vikings to be sitting here next year with no QB they're comfortable with and unattractive FA options. With Cousins there are still risks but at least you know you're getting top 15 QB play for the foreseeable future.
This is exaCtly my concern...And wouldn't it just be the Viking way? I mean how many QB's have we had here since Pepp went down vs Carolina?
How many titles in that time? How many NFCCG wins in that span?
Quote: @"purplefaithful" said:
@"Geoff Nichols" said:
@"Jor-El" said:
@"Geoff Nichols" said:
Here is the Cousins contract that would be fair for both sides. If he gets more money or a better deal elsewhere, this is the line you don't cross and let him walk away.
The below deal is for 5 years $140M ($28M AAV) with $66.5M (47.5%) guaranteed at the time of signing. The contract layout and cap hits are as follows:
2018 - Base Salary: $20,900,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $0 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $27,000,000 / Dead Money: ($60,000,000) / Savings: ($33,000,000)
2019 - Base Salary: $15,600,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $300,000 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $22,000,000 / Dead Money: ($33,100,000) / Savings: ($11,100,000)
2020 - Base Salary: $17,900,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $4,000,000 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $28,000,000 / Dead Money: ($18,000,000) / Savings: $10,000,000
2021 - Base Salary: $24,900,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $0 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $31,000,000 / Dead Money: ($12,000,000) / Savings: $19,000,000
2022 - Base Salary: $25,900,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $0 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $32,000,000 / Dead Money: ($6,000,000) / Savings: $26,000,000
If possible the Vikings would be best served utilizing their abundance of cap space in 2018 to offer a semi front loaded deal with a reduced cap hit in year two. This would allow the Vikings to retain their core players. By year three of the deal you can re-evaluate Cousins value to the team and either opt to move on from him saving $10M against the cap or make future plans by re-negotiating the contracts of Griffen, Joseph, etc.. Last off-season those deals were constructed without long-term guarantees to facilitate restructure bonuses. This structure gives the Vikings safety and flexibility.
So the question becomes, why does Cousins sign this specific deal? First and foremost at a high level it makes him the highest paid player in NFL history by both average salary and total contract value. $66.5M in guarantees at signing also sets an NFL record. But cash flow is really what matters in these types of deals. In the first year of the contract Kirk would take home $51M which ties Matthew Stafford's deal a year ago and tops Garapollo's extension by $8.4M. By the end of year three Kirk would have taken home $89M which puts him slightly behind Stafford ($92M), but ahead of the extensions for both Carr and Garapollo. Ultimately this is window dressed as a market leading deal offers strong cash flow but still contains enough upside where it should regress back to the mean once Aaron Rodgers, Matt Ryan, and Russell Wilson sign their upcoming extensions.
Beautiful work to lay that out. I hope it happens. I just threw out $30M as a ballpark, as I don't know the contract nuances well (obviously!)
And I'm not trying to crap on anybody else's roster/salary design, but it kind of feels like there is a mood that the Vikings need to be overly conservative at QB because we cannot risk losing ANY players, especially defenders, and by the way we need to buy another UFA 3T and CB to make Zimmer's unit that much closer to perfection...
We've got to make choices and sometimes sacrifices. If Danielle Hunter digs in his heels and won't sign here unless he gets a contract making him the highest-paid DE in the league, maybe we let him walk. Didn't Hunter - and other players on our defense - become as good as they are in large part because of the coaching of Zimmer and his staff? So isn't there a chance our crack defensive coaches could turn Bower or Weatherly into a decent DE, too?
Quote: @"Geoff Nichols" said:
At $30M you start to lose flexibility. It seems silly that $2-3M annually could throw off the cap but once you factor in roll-over, increased guaranteed money, etc... It can start the snowball effect. I am not suggesting you'd lose a key defensive starter, but you'd have to start manipulating the cap (restructure bonuses, additional pay cuts, etc) to keep veteran depth on the roster. In essence the more money you start to add past $27M ties success more and more to the middle rounds of the draft. You're expected to hit on your 1st and 2nd round picks. But now you're going to be asked to draft your replacement for Jarius Wright, Latavius Murray, etc... .
Good examples, and, again - a strong front office and coaching staff HAS to start trusting they will be able to do things like replace your #3/4 WR and your goal-line RB. If we're so scared of losing such role players that we have to pay them significantly (as they just get older), it's going to catch up to us, too. We should have confidence we can fill those spots. Finding a long-term QB is much, much harder.
You make a lot of good points here. Ultimately the key to being successful is finding your core squad that'll help you win games on a regular basis. The rest of the roster will turn over every few years.
But the debate on Cousins comes down to this. If you're not willing to give Case a long-term extension because you want him to replicate his 2017 success in 2018, what are you going to do if he doesn't? Maybe Bridgewater comes back but there are still plenty of unknowns there as well. There isn't a guarantee Cousins comes to MN, but passing on him does open the door for the Vikings to be sitting here next year with no QB they're comfortable with and unattractive FA options. With Cousins there are still risks but at least you know you're getting top 15 QB play for the foreseeable future.
This is exaCtly my concern...And wouldn't it just be the Viking way? I mean how many QB's have we had here since Pepp went down vs Carolina?
How many titles in that time? How many NFCCG wins in that span?
How many titles since the 60s? How many nfccg wins since the late 70s? There are no guarantees and Case us as far from one as Sam or Teddy.
Quote: @"purplefaithful" said:
@"Geoff Nichols" said:
@"Jor-El" said:
@"Geoff Nichols" said:
Here is the Cousins contract that would be fair for both sides. If he gets more money or a better deal elsewhere, this is the line you don't cross and let him walk away.
The below deal is for 5 years $140M ($28M AAV) with $66.5M (47.5%) guaranteed at the time of signing. The contract layout and cap hits are as follows:
2018 - Base Salary: $20,900,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $0 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $27,000,000 / Dead Money: ($60,000,000) / Savings: ($33,000,000)
2019 - Base Salary: $15,600,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $300,000 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $22,000,000 / Dead Money: ($33,100,000) / Savings: ($11,100,000)
2020 - Base Salary: $17,900,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $4,000,000 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $28,000,000 / Dead Money: ($18,000,000) / Savings: $10,000,000
2021 - Base Salary: $24,900,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $0 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $31,000,000 / Dead Money: ($12,000,000) / Savings: $19,000,000
2022 - Base Salary: $25,900,000 / Signing Bonus: $6,000,000 / Roster Bonus: $0 / Workout Bonus: $100,000 / Cap Hit: $32,000,000 / Dead Money: ($6,000,000) / Savings: $26,000,000
If possible the Vikings would be best served utilizing their abundance of cap space in 2018 to offer a semi front loaded deal with a reduced cap hit in year two. This would allow the Vikings to retain their core players. By year three of the deal you can re-evaluate Cousins value to the team and either opt to move on from him saving $10M against the cap or make future plans by re-negotiating the contracts of Griffen, Joseph, etc.. Last off-season those deals were constructed without long-term guarantees to facilitate restructure bonuses. This structure gives the Vikings safety and flexibility.
So the question becomes, why does Cousins sign this specific deal? First and foremost at a high level it makes him the highest paid player in NFL history by both average salary and total contract value. $66.5M in guarantees at signing also sets an NFL record. But cash flow is really what matters in these types of deals. In the first year of the contract Kirk would take home $51M which ties Matthew Stafford's deal a year ago and tops Garapollo's extension by $8.4M. By the end of year three Kirk would have taken home $89M which puts him slightly behind Stafford ($92M), but ahead of the extensions for both Carr and Garapollo. Ultimately this is window dressed as a market leading deal offers strong cash flow but still contains enough upside where it should regress back to the mean once Aaron Rodgers, Matt Ryan, and Russell Wilson sign their upcoming extensions.
Beautiful work to lay that out. I hope it happens. I just threw out $30M as a ballpark, as I don't know the contract nuances well (obviously!)
And I'm not trying to crap on anybody else's roster/salary design, but it kind of feels like there is a mood that the Vikings need to be overly conservative at QB because we cannot risk losing ANY players, especially defenders, and by the way we need to buy another UFA 3T and CB to make Zimmer's unit that much closer to perfection...
We've got to make choices and sometimes sacrifices. If Danielle Hunter digs in his heels and won't sign here unless he gets a contract making him the highest-paid DE in the league, maybe we let him walk. Didn't Hunter - and other players on our defense - become as good as they are in large part because of the coaching of Zimmer and his staff? So isn't there a chance our crack defensive coaches could turn Bower or Weatherly into a decent DE, too?
Quote: @"Geoff Nichols" said:
At $30M you start to lose flexibility. It seems silly that $2-3M annually could throw off the cap but once you factor in roll-over, increased guaranteed money, etc... It can start the snowball effect. I am not suggesting you'd lose a key defensive starter, but you'd have to start manipulating the cap (restructure bonuses, additional pay cuts, etc) to keep veteran depth on the roster. In essence the more money you start to add past $27M ties success more and more to the middle rounds of the draft. You're expected to hit on your 1st and 2nd round picks. But now you're going to be asked to draft your replacement for Jarius Wright, Latavius Murray, etc... .
Good examples, and, again - a strong front office and coaching staff HAS to start trusting they will be able to do things like replace your #3/4 WR and your goal-line RB. If we're so scared of losing such role players that we have to pay them significantly (as they just get older), it's going to catch up to us, too. We should have confidence we can fill those spots. Finding a long-term QB is much, much harder.
You make a lot of good points here. Ultimately the key to being successful is finding your core squad that'll help you win games on a regular basis. The rest of the roster will turn over every few years.
But the debate on Cousins comes down to this. If you're not willing to give Case a long-term extension because you want him to replicate his 2017 success in 2018, what are you going to do if he doesn't? Maybe Bridgewater comes back but there are still plenty of unknowns there as well. There isn't a guarantee Cousins comes to MN, but passing on him does open the door for the Vikings to be sitting here next year with no QB they're comfortable with and unattractive FA options. With Cousins there are still risks but at least you know you're getting top 15 QB play for the foreseeable future.
This is exaCtly my concern...And wouldn't it just be the Viking way? I mean how many QB's have we had here since Pepp went down vs Carolina?
How many titles in that time? How many NFCCG wins in that span?
Its a legitimate concern. Sadly there isn't a clear-cut answer either. I wouldn't sit back and call Cousins perfect by any means. But the biggest difference between he and Case is an accurate deep ball. Case got bailed out time and time again last year on under thrown deep balls. With receivers who work well down the field you at least need to give them a chance.
I think we are in a situation much like 1998-99.
Denny Green was the kind of OFFENSIVE coach who could spin mediocre talents into producing amazingly great seasons: Jeff George, Randall Cunningham, Jim McMahon- the rest of the NFL was shocked that we could win with those QBs. If Green was our OC now under Zimmer, I might bet on him getting a great season out of Case or Bradford or Bridgewater this year.
But Denny needed to go out and add a defensive star to balance his offense. Instead, in 1999 he wanted to polish his offensive diamond a bit closer to perfection. He drafted a really gifted QB (Cunningham) even though he had a proven record of being able to get good play from resurrected veterans, and passed up Jevon Kearse, who fell into our lap in the draft and fit our top defensive need perfectly. The 1999 Vikings had an opportunity to BUY correction of one position - by using the high draft pick from the Brad Johnson trade - but Denny thought he could go cheap on the side of the ball, defense, which was not his expertise.
Zimmer is somewhat like Denny on the opposite side of the field. I'm sure there is temptation to spend some of the salary cap space we have for 2018 to make a great defensive unit even greater: imagine Sheldon Richardson or even Ndamukong Suh, maybe even add Eric Reid to our secondary!
That would turn Zimmer into a mirror image of Green. What the Vikings need to do is recognize that the strength of their coaching staff is on the defensive side of the ball, and Zimmer and staff should be able to plug holes or get steady improvement by developing lower-round players or castoffs from other teams. We have capital in our current salary cap space, enough to buy a star in one area. That should be QB, and a rare starting passer might be about to fall into our lap in free agency. Are we going to pass up Cousins to have money for a couple more defensive players? If we do, I think Zimmer's fate will be a lot like Green's.
Interesting take Jor-El. I agree with you. We aren't currently spending all that much on the Offensive side of the ball. We have one of the best defenses and need to shore up the offensive side of the ball.
We need DL rotation players. I think they'll address both sides. Gotta keep the great defensive unit great, that also helps the offense.
#1 defense statistically was fun to watch and key to 13/3. But I agree with other posters, as great as some of the individual pieces are, this is not a dominating Ravens or Bucs Defense.
It wasn't enough to keep us from getting destroyed in the CG.
Regarding The Sheriff, Denny's teams were always pretty good on O and adding a HOF rookie WR in 98, with arguably our best OL ever, HOF WR CC and Cunningham catching lightening in a bottle for a year - put it over the top.
Unfortunately, Denny always had middle of the pack D's at best and some of the worst secondaries I've had to watch.
Back to now - our priority needs to be more juice on offense. Cook will help, but QB needs to get settled once and for all and we need to improve depth and starter quality on some OL positions.
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