Soooo....Is it time to shut up about Kirk?

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@PurplePastor said:

@Bullazin said:
not even close. he’s playing very well, but to be great means he has to do transcendent stuff. If he wins a couple games for us by making great clutch plays, ill start to believe. 

And just as you start believing, the Vikes become the Vikes.  :p That's how it works. Maybe not this year???

PP I am a man of faith also, but obviously, we will never have certainty with our Vikes. 

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Cousins is playing his best ball and not looking flustered but calm and decisive in the face of pressure.  He is earning his high salary this season!  This offense can go toe to toe with any in the league.   I was impressed how the defense looked in the second half as well after such a horrible start!

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Cousins isnt the problem, nor was he LAST year.

OUR DEFENSE FINALLY held an opponent to UNDER THIRTY POINTS.



Cousins currently ranked #2 ESPN Total QBR.
but yeah, hes the problem...

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time to quit blaming cousins

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@PSBLAKE said:
Cousins is playing his best ball and not looking flustered but calm and decisive in the face of pressure.  He is earning his high salary this season!  This offense can go toe to toe with any in the league.   I was impressed how the defense looked in the second half as well after such a horrible start!

Yeah, that horrible start was Seattle's opening game script...that they executed flawlessly and we were unprepared for. But one thing Zimmer does well is adjust. I told my son, you watch, Zimmer will have an answer for this in the 2nd half. I think Wilson had, what, 50 yards in the 2nd half? Reminded me of that Packer game a few years ago. 

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@Bullazin said:

@Zanary said:

@Bullazin said:
not even close. he’s playing very well, but to be great means he has to do transcendent stuff. If he wins a couple games for us by making great clutch plays, ill start to believe. 

For now he is still a top 10-15 QB and having a very good year so far. He didnt make clutch great plays in our 2 losses, but to be fair, the defense and head coaching did not help much. 

It could be mentioned that the "clutch plays" that ended up deciding both games happened when the ball was specifically not given to him.

Today, he made clutch 3rd down conversions pretty well, and added 3 TDs with no picks...in fact, he added to his position as the QB who's gone longest without a pick.

8 TDs, over 900 yards, in a run-heavy offense.  None of that is opinion.

5 GW drives in 3+ years. 

And what should have been 2 this year. Cousins didnt steal the refs glasses in cincy or miss the field goal in AZ. 

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Confident and clicking, Kirk Cousins shows some swag — even without a shoeThe Vikings quarterback pushed all the right buttons against Seattle and continued to leave the impression that something new is clicking this season.Kirk Cousins ran one play missing a shoe. Later, he kept the ball on a read option run. Teammates openly rave about his "swag" now. And if that isn't enough crazy talk, the new Cousins revealed himself in the most decisive way on Sunday.

He outdueled Russell Wilson.
Cousins was masterful on a day when a Vikings win felt as necessary as oxygen to prevent their season from imploding before October arrived.
He passed for 323 yards and three touchdowns in a tension-relieving 30-17 win over Seattle at U.S. Bank Stadium.
Cousins pushed all the right buttons, showed poise and command when pressured and continued to leave the impression that something has clicked this season.
Shoeless Kirk is playing the best football of his career.
"He's been a different Kirk," receiver Adam Thielen said. "He's just locked in."
Players, coaches and front office officials alike notice a more relaxed and more self-assured Cousins both in the locker room and on the field. Coach Mike Zimmer, at odds with Cousins over his vaccination status in the preseason, has gone out of his way recently to praise his quarterback's leadership.
"It's been so much better," Zimmer said.
Teammates seem amused after getting to see more of their quarterback's personality behind the scenes.
"He has a little more swag to him this year," running back Alexander Mattison said. "Some of the stuff he says is pretty funny coming from him. But he's definitely opened up a little bit."
Swag? Kirk Cousins?
Cousins offered up that his offensive coordinator in Washington, Kyle Shanahan, told him as a rookie that his "swag is having no swag" after Cousins showed up for his first preseason game with a jersey so large that it looked like a Halloween costume.
"There's a hint of truth in the joke," Cousins admitted.
Performances like Sunday's will only boost his swag-ometer. Cousins completed all five pass attempts on the opening drive, including a 7-yard touchdown to Tyler Conklin. He looked in complete control thereafter in dissecting a Seahawks defense that lacks the ferocious bite that it once possessed.
His season stats are impressive – zero interceptions, in particular — but it's the eye test that suggests Cousins has settled into a good space. He seems in tune with coordinator Klint Kubiak's system and play-calling.
Cousins targeted four teammates at least eight times Sunday, which shows trust in the group but also his confidence in everything that is happening around him. That comfort stems from receiving solid protection from his line in back-to-back games.
Asked what stands out about his quarterback, Thielen noted, "Attitude."
"He has no fear," he said.
One play in the fourth quarter underscored that confidence. On third-and-5, the Seahawks brought a blitz, and linebacker Cody Barton had a free run up the middle. Cousins backpedaled to buy time and then fired a perfect pass to K.J. Osborn for a 15-yard completion.
Cousins admitted that his throw was risky and that the safe play might have been to "eat" it and take a sack. But he trusts Osborn and, more specifically, Cousins probably trusts that he will do something positive, even though he acknowledged that he didn't see Osborn clearly.
"You see a flash of purple," he said. "You have a ballpark idea. Reps give you the ability to play on instinct."
Again, something feels different. Zimmer likes that Cousins is playing "very fast."
"He's playing outstanding," he said. "He's very confident where he's throwing the football."
So confident, it seems, that Cousins tried throwing in his socks. Well, one sock.
Cousins had his right cleat come off on second down in the second quarter. He asked the referee if he would stop the play clock so he could fix it before third down. Nope, he was told.
As he lined up in shotgun, Cousins reached down, ripped off his cleat and tossed it backward. Seattle blitzed and the pass was incomplete.
"I realized I was better off just going without the cleat," he said.
Maybe this is what Cousins' teammates mean by his new swag.

https://www.startribune.com/vikings-seah...600101168/

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Cousins is playing some of the most efficient football of his career, currently on both the league's longest active streak of passes without an interception (162) and the second-longest streak in NFL history of games with a passer rating of 90 or better (16). 
Cousins has thrown 29 touchdowns against three interceptions since the Vikings' bye week last year, is Pro Football Focus' fifth highest-graded passer this year and has gone 11 of 15 in a pair of two-minute drills, throwing for 118 yards to set up Greg Joseph's game-tying field goal in Week 1 and put the kicker in position for a game-winning attempt last week.
"He looks terrific," Seahawks coach Pete Carroll said. "He's throwing all of the throws, whether it's the drop-back stuff or the [play-]action stuff on the edge. He uses the whole field. He uses all the rhythms. ... I've seen him as good as I've ever seen him."

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He played awesome. More of this Kirk, please!

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I think the thing we need to really stop doing is trying to
nitpick which one person is the reason for all the problems or toggling
between the black and white choices of Cousins is perfect and Cousins is
garbage.  This is a team sport, and there
is a lot of room for shades of gray.


I think it’s pretty clear that Cousins is playing some of
the best ball of his career recently, but that hasn’t really led to wins, and he
hasn’t been the primary issue in those losses, but he also hasn’t really
carried the team on his back.  One win doesn’t
really mean that we’re on a new trajectory, or that this is the new normal for
the Vikings.  I do feel pretty confident in
saying that if you want to get the most out of Cousins, focus on the
OLine.  They played well today.  Keep them playing well.