Kirk Cousins was one of the best free agent quarterbacks to hit the open market in several years, but he ended up being too expensive for many of the teams in need of help at the position. That includes the Denver Broncos, and they knew it right from the start.
Cousins’ agent, Mike McCartney, spoke at length with Peter King of The MMQB about the days and hours leading up to Cousins signing with the Minnesota Vikings. One of the more surprising revelations was that the Broncos never made an offer for Cousins.
Denver? The Broncos didn’t make an offer. This went to McCartney’s reason for making this a silent auction: Denver liked (Case) Keenum, didn’t want to pay in the neighborhood of $30 million a year guaranteed for a quarterback with so many other prominent players to pay. It came down to this for John Elway: Keenum for $10 million to $12 million per year less than Cousins, and the Broncos knew near the start of the legal tampering period they could get Keenum. Ten hours into the period, Denver had reached agreement with Keenum on a two-year, $36 million guaranteed deal.
As King noted, McCartney basically held a “silent auction” for Cousins. He told teams there would be no back-and-forth negotiations and that they needed to make their first offer their best offer. While he admitted he was surprised Denver didn’t even submit a proposal, the Broncos obviously knew the ballpark price and weren’t comfortable paying it.
One team that was willing to make a respectable offer was the Jets, and we have already heard rumblings that they feel Cousins and McCartney played them like a fiddle. McCartney says he told the Jets they would not be guaranteed a visit from Cousins if the QB wanted to sign with the Vikings after his trip to Minnesota, and that’s what ended up happening.
