Kirk Cousins has played reasonably well in his three seasons with the Vikings. But he and agent Mike McCartney have played the contract game even better.
First, of course, came the three-year, fully guaranteed $84 million contract.
Coming off a strong season and his only playoff appearance with the Vikings in 2019, Cousins signed an extension to that agreement — basically for two years and $66 million, with a mechanism that made it as close to guaranteed as possible.
In exchange for a lower cap number in 2020 to give the Vikings some flexibility (a year in which the Vikings won just seven games), Cousins hit the Vikings' books for $31 million in 2021.