ANALYSIS/OPINION:
I asked Redskins coach Jay Gruden in the press conference following Sunday’s impressive 47-14 win over the New Orleans Saints at FedEx Field how we should view quarterback Kirk Cousins after a day like this.
“Maybe you should write a positive article for a change,” he responded.
OK, coach. You got it.
Five years ago to the day, on this very same field, Michael Vick completed 20 of 28 passes for 333 yards, four touchdowns, a 155.3 quarterback rating and zero interceptions on the way to leading the Philadelphia Eagles to a 59-28 win over Washington.
That night, Vick got paid.
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On Sunday, Cousins completed 20 of 25 passes for 324 yards, four touchdowns, a perfect 158.3 quarterback rating and zero interceptions on the way to leading the Redskins to a 47-14 win over the Saints.
It’s time to pay Cousins.
There you go, coach. Pay the man. Commit to the quarterback who was, in your own words, “very good. You have a perfect passer rating, you’re going to be pretty good.”
Cousins didn’t just pass for 324 yards on Sunday. He put a good amount of distance between the good Kirk and the bad Kirk, the one who, many times in the past, would have allowed the Saints to climb back into this game with poor decision making and mistakes.
And he did this the week after the debacle against the Patriots in Foxborough, Massachusetts, where Cousins did his job well enough to perhaps keep this Redskins team in the game against the undefeated Patriots, only to have his teammates let him down with seven official dropped passes.
If that game was rattling around in Cousins head, he didn’t show it on Sunday.
In fact, Cousins showed poise and confidence when, after his team started the game on their own four-yard line following penalties on the kick off and first down, connected on a beautiful 42-yard pass to DeSean Jackson — yes, I said DeSean Jackson — on third down from his own 10-yard line.
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That pass was Cousins sending a message to everyone who wondered if he could hold up his end in an anticipated shootout against future Hall of Famer Drew Brees.
The message? I got this.
“I think it was a shot in the arm for us,” Cousins said. “To be able to throw that ball accurately enough and convert on third down and get us out of being backed up in our own territory … it certainly got us going.”
He took his team down the field for a score on that opening drive — a 96-yard scoring drive, ending with a 16-yard touchdown pass to Jordan Reed to give Washington a 7-0 lead.
The Saints came right back and scored in under three minutes to tie the game at 7-7, but Cousins answered back with an eight-play, 80-yard scoring drive and an 11-yard touchdown pass to rookie Jamison Crowder to put the Redskins back on top, 14-7.
You want to get nuts, Cousins said. Let’s get nuts.
On going toe-to-toe with Brees, Cousins said, “I think if you get in that mindset, you put yourself in trouble. But at the same time there’s less room for error going against a really good quarterback. Fortunately, with the way we ran the ball and the way we were able to throw it, we didn’t make those errors and we were able to put up enough points where we could come out with a win.”
Also, fortunately, the Redskins defense managed to muster just enough of a fight, after the Saints came back to tie the score at 14, to keep it there for the remainder of the game, while Cousins took the foot of the offense and planted it firmly on the throat of Rob Ryan’s pathetic Saints defense.
I get that New Orleans is likely the worst defense in the NFL. But Cousins treated them accordingly, and in the process, did not beat himself. As a result, Washington is 4-5 and in the race in the NFC East.
When Cousins came off the field Sunday after the New Orleans win, his reaction wasn’t the release of frustration and tension that we saw after he led Washington to a dramatic comeback win three weeks ago against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, when he declared passionately, to the world, “You like that! You like that!”
This time, after disposing of a Saints team that had won three in a row — including a 52-49 win two weeks ago against the New York Giants, before losing 34-28 to Tennessee last week — Cousins was relaxed, and joked as he left his press conference Sunday, “Gotta like that.”
Yes you do. You gotta like it enough now to put the commitment questions about Cousins, at the age of 27 and in his fourth year in the league, to rest. He will be a free agent at the end of this season. The Redskins could, of course, franchise him moving forward, but that would be financially foolish.
No, the discussions at Redskins Park this week should begin about making the financial commitment to Cousins as your quarterback not just for this season, but in the future as well — which, of course, then means saying goodbye to you-know-who and putting all that drama in the rear-view mirror, because the final commitment doesn’t happen until that move is made.
Coach, it that positive enough for you?
⦁ Thom Loverro is co-host of “The Sports Fix,” noon to 2 p.m. daily on ESPN 980 and espn980.com.
• Thom Loverro can be reached at tloverro@washingtontimes.com.
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