The Ringer NFL Show - The Kirk Cousins Scale of QB Competence

Episode Date: August 8, 2022

Danny Heifetz and Steven Ruiz rank NFL quarterbacks based on if they're better, worse, or just about the same as Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins. Hosts: Danny Heifetz and Steven Ruiz Producer: Kaya McMullen Additional Production Supervision: Conor Nevins Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's the NFL preseason. Check out the Ringer Fantasy Football Show on Spotify or wherever you get your podcast. Also, if you need fantasy rankings, we've got our rankings and sleepers at Fantasyfoolback. So come listen to Danny Hyfitz, Craig Horlebeck, and me, Danny Kelly, on The Ringer Fantasy Football Show. Welcome to the Ringer NFL show. My name is Danny Hyfitz, and I am joined by Stephen Ruiz. And today we are measuring the Kirk Cousin scale. I am going to ask Stephen one question about every starting quarterback in the NFL.

And every question will be the same one. is this guy better or worse than Kirk Cousins? Stephen, I wanted to do this because I feel like Kirk Cousins is not just the most average quarterback in the NFL. I kind of feel like he's the most average person in the world. And he's like the embodiment of fine. And before we dive into this, I kind of wanted to ask you, like, why is he so average?

What is so Kirk Cousinsie about Kirk Cousins? First of all, if he's the most average person in the world, maybe we should expand this and just start listing everyone on earth and saying whether they're better or worse than Kirk Cousins. I'm going to say you're better than Kirk Cousins. I'll give you that too. I'm probably a little worse. I'm probably a little worse.

I'm not better than him, but I'm not worse. I'm on the level. I'm average. You are Kirk Couss. You're the Kirk Cousins of content. Yeah, I'm extremely average.

Okay. That's definitely how it goes. But on the field, like what makes him, but why is he like that? Why is he better than half the quarterbacks in the league and why is he worse? Like, what is it about him?

Because he will read what's on the prompter, so to speak. He's got that Ron Burgundy thing going for him, where like, you lay out a play design and he's going to follow it to a T, no matter what the defense does. It doesn't matter what the defense does. He's not going to adjust.

And I can see why like coaches love him and love a quarterback like that because he's basically an on-field avatar for them. They're basically playing mad and Kirk Cousins is going to do whatever button they press. But there are downsides to that, obviously, because the defense doesn't always react like the coach wants them to. and Kirk Cousins has a problem with, he doesn't have a plan B, I think is the best way to describe it. And we're talking about,

I'm talking about like the general perception of a Kirk type quarterback. Because I do think over the last two or three years that Kirk has evolved past his own, his own, the idea of who Kirk Cousins is. Yeah, the caricature of Kirk Cousins. I think he has improved. And I think we need to maybe rename this scale because I think it has changed

he's kind of pushed himself beyond what we believe Kirk Cousins is. Well, that's why I wanted to do this, because the Vikings are in kind of an interesting position for the NFC North, but suddenly you have to talk yourself into Kirk Cousins beating Aaron Rogers for the division, and you're like, what are you talking about here? So I think this is, I'm really interested in this exercise. I think it's a good point. He's Ron Burgundy. Like, I'm Kirk Cousins, but we'll see.

All right. Shall we go through this little list we got here? Let's do it. All right. So here's how this is going to work. First of all, the parameters. we're talking about can you win what we want you to win one game it's not like the next 10 years no contracts none of that it's like i need you to win this playoff game for us so that's that's really

all we're talking about so i'm going to start i'm going to knock off just some some quarterbacks that i assume are indisputably better and someone's that are indisputably worse so that we can get to the heart of the kirk cousins middle cool that works for me all right so tier one here i assume there will be no disparity tier one i've got indisputably better than kirk cousins so tom Brady, Aaron Rogers, Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, Justin Herbert. I assume no problem with that, right? No, no problem whatsoever. Then I've got tier two here, which is obviously better than Kirk Cousins,

Matt Stafford, Joe Burrow, Russell Wilson, Lamar Jackson. No problems there either, right? All those guys are better than Kirk Cousins. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, all better. Okay. Now I want to shave off a little off the bottom. These guys, I think, are definitely worse than Kirk Cousins. Okay.

And I just tell me if you disagree. Got Carson Wence, James Winston, Zach Wilson, Justin Fields, Davis Mills, Marcus Marioota, Sam Darnold, Mitchell Tribescu, whoever the hell the Steelers have a quarterback this year, Gino Smith and Drew Locke. All those guys are worse than Kirk Cousins, right? Yes, yes. The only one that I would even, that like raised my eyebrows would be, and this is going to sound a little weird, would be James Winston.

I think, I would think about it. I would ultimately decide on Kirk, but I'm admittedly, I'm higher on James than most people. I think he's going to have a good year this year, but Kirk's still better. Okay. So here we go. This is where, oh, wow, voice cracked for me right there. See, we're getting excited. Like, you like that. That's what Kirk Cousins does. That is. Wait, should we insert, should we drop that you like that every time he's better than someone?

Yes. Yes. Can we, Kai, let's see if Kaya can drop the, though you like that for being better than James. Okay. You like that. Beautiful. All right. Let's, let's get to the meat of this. These are the guys I have real questions with. Kyler Murray. Is he better than Kirk Cousins? Oh, 100%. This is, I'm not even going to, I'm not going to, I'm not going to, dignify that answer with an explanation. Yes, he's better. Dak Prescott. Dak Prescott is also better. Jack Prescott is like a super version of Kirk Cousins, like the evolved version of Kirk Cousins.

If Kirk Cousins was better at adjusting post-snap to what the defense is throwing at him, he would be Dak Prescott, but he's not. I was playing golf the other day, and like, you know, they filled the foursome if you can't get four people. And it was a Cowboys fan who was telling me that he thought Kirk Cousins was better than Dak, and it was the strangest interaction. ever had with another person. It never talked to that person ever again. I don't think I ever will.

Okay. Derek Carr, is Derek Carr better or worse than Kirk Cousins? Okay, now we're starting to get a little close. And I would say yes. I think Derek Carr has improved over the last couple of years. Three years ago, if you asked me this question, I would have said Kirk Cousins is better. But I do think Derek Carr, he has all of the positives you get from Kirk, but he has more physical talent.

He's more athletic, even though he doesn't use it enough. He has a better arm, even though. he doesn't use it as often as he should. But I do think he's turned the aggressiveness dial up a couple notches over the last two years. And that was always the thing is you're not aggressive enough. You're too conservative. But I think he has turned that up

and he has surpassed Kirk because of that. Okay. What about Trevor Lawrence? Oh, this is a tough one. This is a tough one. What I think Trevor Lawrence will be in year two, like a conservative prediction for what he will be this year coming up, I would take

Trevor Lawrence. Based on last year, I would take Kirk Cousins. I think Trevor Lawrence is he's more aggressive. He's more talented. He's faster. He has a bigger arm. I think he's just as smart. Like over the second half of the year, we saw fewer mistakes. I'm like talking myself into even taking 20-21 Trevor Lawrence over him. Now, I'm taking Trevor Lawrence. Screw it. Why am I don't know why I'm hesitating. I'm taking Trevor Lawrence. But that's interesting to me because even though you're saying Kirk Cousins can't, he always just reads the teleprompter, but like you're saying rookie Trevor Lawrence is even better at that.

Why can't Kirk Cousins? Like, do you think Kirk Cousins has evolved? Like, that's kind of my question here. Like, is he still reading the teleprompter? Yeah, yeah. He doesn't do it as often as he did in the past, but he'll still throw like a checkdown to a running back that has a linebacker right on him.

Like it's a play that's doomed to fail in Kirk Cousins. I think part of it is, honestly, Kirk Cousins doesn't like taking hits in the pocket. And this has been a thing since like Washington where you'll see him. You could find examples of this, multiple examples of him about to take a sack and like the running back is behind him or to the side of him blocking, not even out in the route. And Kirk Cousins will be like, it'll be like hot potato. He'll just toss it off to him and go, no, you take the hit for me.

And I think that explains Kirk Cousins. Wait, so you're basically saying that instead of him like he's basically like having his running back as like human hostages basically. Right, right, like a human shield. Like, you take this one for me. Wow. Okay. So there's like foxhole guys. There's like guys would be like, you know what? I want this quarterback with me in the foxhole. And then there's guys, the other guys that you're like, actually, we want them out of fear or else they're going to like put us in the line of fire. Like you know that that scene in, uh, the first Captain America movie where they, he kind of like proves himself because he jumps on the, the grenade at the beginning. Yes. Kirk Cousins would have

picked up the grenade and thrown it. At the rest of the crew. At the checkdown running back is blocking. At the running back specifically. At least, hey, at least Kirk Cousins knows positional value. You got to give him that. There you go. He's the contract stuff.

He's always up on the contract stuff. Okay. Kirk Cousins or Matt Ryan? Oh, Matt Ryan. Matt Ryan is like another super Kirk Cousins. Like Matt Ryan does everything that Kirk Cousins does well, but he does it better. He does it like 15% better across the board. Kirk Cousins or Mac Jones?

Kirk Cousins. You like that! Mac Jones, I think, will become a Kirk Cousins type player in a year or two, but he's not there yet. I think he still needs to add some strength to his arm. I think he needs to, I don't know how to put this, but I think he needs to speed up his process just a little bit more. Because his thing, right, is like being smarter than ever. Like, he's the smart quarterback. He's the brainy quarterback who knows what the defense is in.

He can get rid of the ball quickly. but he was still like a rookie version of that. And I think you need a year or two to become like a pro version of what he can become. So at this point, I need to see it first. And I know that's kind of like hypocritical because I'm saying that Trevor Lawrence is already better than Kirk Cousins. But I do think Trevor Lawrence has more of a plan B if the defense takes away the play design. So basically what you're saying, I feel like Kirk Cousins is like a degree from a college. Right.

And like you're saying Matt Ryan has like, it's not an undergrad. Matt Ryan has like a graduate, like a master's degree in Kirk Cousin's. Dak Prescott has like a PhD in the field of Kirk Cousins. And then like Kirk Cousins is the undergrad diploma. Mac Jones is like a high schooler trying to get into the college to study the Kirk Cousins. And he's taken like a bunch of AP classes. So he's got scholarships. He's going to get there.

He's going to graduate. We know he's going to graduate. The question is will he become Matt Ryan? That's the real question. Like he's going to become Kirk Cousins. We know he's going to graduate college. Is there like a post-grad situation going on? That's the question.

Okay. So I'm so curious. Okay. So what about like Jared Goff? Oh, no. Jared Goff is still in middle school. Okay? If we're going to continue with this metaphor, he's still in middle school.

And he's been in eighth grade for a couple years now. It got held back. Why, though? Because in seventh grade, he had this great teacher who basically did the work for him. And then the school found out about it and said, yo, you can't do this anymore. You can't do this anymore. You got to do it on your own. And then now he has this.

Now he basically has a teacher that, I mean, it's, it's a cool teacher, but I don't know if he's the best teacher in Dan Campbell. Okay. That's, but all right. Well, what about like Jimmy Garapolo? Where is he the Kirk Cousins? See, Jimmy's different. Like Jimmy, like that Kirk Cousins, Jimmy Garapolo, Jared Gaw. triumvirate is like, I don't know, that's like the perfect midsection of the NFL

quarterback hierarchy. And I would say that Jimmy is, is closer to Kirk than he is Jared Zoff, but I don't think he's quite yet at Kirk's level. Because one thing you can't say about Kirk reading the prompter is he's not going to, he does throw some weird interceptions, but he's not going to be overly aggressive where one bad game turns into like a horrific game. I don't think Kirk's that type of quarterback anymore. He kind of like manages his bad games a little better than Jimmy G does. It's, it's kind of like in golf, sometimes you know you're going to get a boge or double bogey, but Jimmy Garoppola is a special ability to turn it into like a quadruple boge. He's the last scene in tin cup. That's Jimmy Garoppel. That's Jimmy Garoppel. That's not fair to Jimmy Garoppel. He's better than that.

That's Carson Wentz. But you know what he knows. Wenz who's like, wait, I'm getting sacked. I'm going to take a safety. Let me throw it with my left hand to make sure it's a pig six. Right. exactly he's going to make it worse he's going to find a way to make the worst play possible Kirk's not that Kirk's going to find a way to make the most boring play possible that's a good way to put it what about Tua

where does Tua come in at all of this Tua should have been in that group where you said the people that are definitely worse than Kirk Cousins Tua should have been in that list okay I'm just going to reserve my comments for later no no do it do it right now

Tua's bad man Man, I watched two, again recently, like four games, and it's not even a tough evaluation. Like, people are making it out to be. He's just bad. He's not good. He's a bad quarterback. What does that mean? Like, how is this guy?

Everyone's coming out of college, and they're like, is he the best quarterback I've ever seen? And then he comes in. How is he just immediately bad? Is it the hip? Or were people just wrong? What kind of question is that? Ryan Lee, Blake Bordals, there's a bunch of quarterbacks that we get wrong. I think.

But what were we wrong about? What specifically was the miss? What is he not doing at the NFL level? I think we overvalued his strengths. They were good blue chip style strengths at the college level, but at the NFL level, they're more average, closer to average. Like his accuracy is good.

It's good on certain throws. Like I do think we have one thing wrong about him, and that's that he can't throw a deep ball. I think he actually throws a really good deep ball. If he's throwing like a vertical route that's breaking into space, he does a good job of leading the receiver and putting a lot of loft on it to get it over the cornerback

and it drops right into the receiver's hands. The problem is like those throws that require a little more zip, the driven throws over the middle of the field. And then that's when you see the accuracy is just inconsistent. It's all over the place. And then when he's under pressure,

I do think he does a good job of like navigating the pocket, like sliding away from pressure. But if the pocket closes in on him, then you start to see him get happy feet. He starts to panic. And he just like, he doesn't throw the ball away. Like look at his stats. He never throws the ball away.

He just throws it into coverage. And sometimes it turns into a pick. Sometimes it gets batted down. But it's hard to be a quarterback who we think is like that sharp processor who gets rid of the ball quickly. He throws it short, kind of like Tom Brady. But if you keep making mistakes, it's hard to sustain an offense like that. The thing with Tom Brady is, yes, he throws short passes.

Or at least he did in New England. but he never made mistakes so they could sustain drives. Tua makes too many mistakes, and it's hard to play offense like that. Well, speaking of Tua, okay, I'm kind of with you on all the Tua stuff. So one AFC's team that just spent a lot to justify Tua, what about the Jets, the other team who just went all in? What about Zach Wilson? I said he was obviously worse, but I'm curious if you've, like, while we're on this topic,

is Zach Wilson also just kind of like bad? Okay, here's my problem with Zach Wilson. I think you could put together like a cut up or like a high, highlight reel of plays that make him look like a very talented quarterback. But if you watch all of those great plays that he made a lot of good throws last year. But if you watch them, none of them are really in structure. He has to kind of do the Russell Wilson thing where he breaks the pocket, the play breaks down. And then he throws a great throw down field across his body.

But it's like the Sam Darnold's situation. I know Jets fans aren't going to want to hear this, but they're kind of like the same quarterback, where at least they have at least they have the same problem. And that's not being able to create those explosive plays within the structure of the offense. And that's what separates mediocre quarterbacks from the great quarterbacks in the NFL, is they can consistently create explosive plays within the structure of the offense. And until Zach Wilson proves he can do that, I think he's going to be a sub-kirk-level quarterback. Okay.

So what about Ryan Tanahill? See, Ryan Tanna Hill, I think he's the new Kirk. I think he is the bar where he's he's not not a franchise quarterback, but he's not a franchise quarterback. He's like in purgatory. He's franchise quarterback purgatory. Because he's too good to get you to be bad enough to get a good draft pick to replace him, but he's not good enough to get you to a Super Bowl. And I think his floor is even better than that.

I think he's good enough to get you to the playoffs if the right pieces are around him. And the thing is like he can, he'll make a tough throw. Like he's not afraid to throw it over the middle into a tight window. He's got a good arm. He's got some good downfield accuracy. So he's another quarterback where you put like his highlight reel on and you're like, holy shit, this guy's making a bunch of franchise quarterback throws. But it's just, it's in between those plays where you kind of, where he kind of loses it.

He's just a beat or too slow with his processing. And if he ever speeds that up, which is on the table, because he's not that old. And when you see quarterbacks, especially in that category, like in the processing category, get better at this point in the career. So maybe like he improves by 5%. And that's the difference between him being the new Kirk Cousins and him being a quarterback that commands top 10 money. So there are a few guys that had no idea what to do with, starting with Jalen Hertz and Trey Lance. Trey Lance, I feel like, I mean, he's played like 200 football snaps in the last like 700 days. So I don't have to do with him.

And then Jalen Hertz, I also had no idea what to do with the Kirk Cousins comp. Yeah, I'm still putting Kirk ahead of Trey Lance. I think Trey Lance belongs in that one group with the obviously worse than him until he proves it. I think we need to see it. Even though there were flashes, there were a lot of flashes last year, then the accuracy is a problem for me. I need to see the accuracy before I'm ready to annoy him. But if he is accurate this year and he's hitting layups, then I think he's special. And I think he's going to be a top 10 quarterback, at least based on production.

under Kyle Shanahan. Jalen Hertz is a tough man. Jalen Hertz is tough. He's not a franchise level quarterback at this point, but he has just enough in his toolbox where you could build a good offense around him. Like if you look back at DVOA from last year, they were a top 10 offense.

I think they were 10th. They're right in the top 10, which is kind of surprising because you didn't think of the Eagles as like a top 10 offense. But it's because Jalen Hertz is a special runner so the run game is always going to be good. And he can hit those downfield throws

enough to create explosives. And if you have those two things working in tandem, you can put together a good offense. Okay, one very near and dear to my heart. I was an objective about this, so I don't know what to say it. Daniel Jones. Is Daniel Jones better or worse than Kirk Cousins?

He's worse. Yeah, I think so. By a lot. But he's Ryan Tanna Hill Light. He's in the Ryan Tanna Hill. he's just trying to go to the Tannahill finishing school. Right, right. If he gets in, then nice.

If he plays in a good offense, if he plays in a good offense that kind of just turns him into Ryan Tannahill, like here's what you do, Daniel. You do what you do already. You stand in the pocket forever. You're willing to take a hit from a pass rusher, but you're also willing to throw down field. So if we can kind of find ways to mitigate the pressure

by using play action, that would be a good way to do it, which the Titans did with Ryan Tannock. Then we can kind of hide your weaknesses and highlight your strengths. And I think if he gets a coach who can do that, then we'll see him kind of have a Tannahill like Renaissance at this point in his career. Yeah, for a different team. I reminds me of like peekie blinders when in the beginning he's like, I put my son with the apprenticeship.

I know he'll make four minutes. I'm like, you know what, Daniel Jones, get him a better. I know he can be Ryan Tannehill. All right. I saved one for last year to be a little mean. That was near and dear to my heart. I'm going to cut straight to yours. Baker Mayfield, healthy, healthy Baker Mayfield,

not the abomination with the shoulder last year. Is healthy Baker Mayfield better or worse than Kirk Cousins? He's worse. He's way worse. He needs all the schematic shortcuts that Kirk Cousins has required throughout his career, although I think Kirk doesn't rely on them so much now. But Baker doesn't know his limits. He doesn't know how, he thinks he's one of the best players in the NFL.

He thinks he has one of the best players in the NFL. arms. He thinks he's one of the best scramblers. Apparently, like, when he gets outside of the pocket and he does that little, like, high step type juke move, I don't know if you remember that. He does it like, he does it like once a game and it's never worked. It's never worked. And why would it ever work? Why would a high step juke ever work when you're, when, what does he run? Probably like a four seven. Like, you're not going to outrun NFL defensive players. It's like when you celebrate Madden by accident because you don't know the box. Yes. Yes. You're playing your Xbox guy and you're playing on PlayStation and you're like, oh, no,

and you're celebrating, but you're at like the 20-yard line. That wasn't what I was meant to do. But that's Baker every time he runs. Do you know what happened? Probably. He probably pulled it off and it worked against someone and he's been trying to recreate that feeling ever since. It's like in pickup when you make your first three-pointer or golf and you're

jacking for the rest of the game. And then you're like, I got it. And then you're terrible the rest of the day, but you don't know it because you made the first one. That's exactly right. Yeah. Okay. So to button this all back up, the Packers. have won the AFC, sorry, the NFC North for three years in a row.

I think the first team in NFL history to win 13 games three years in a row. But they lost Devante Adams. The Vikings are in position, like they could win this division. But do you think that Kirk Cousins, like, you know, they're taking a lot of the Rams offense this year, do you think Kirk Cousins could actually have the best season in his career? Like, is there a world where we feel differently about Kirk Cousins by the end of this season? I'm like, oh, he's actually good.

Yeah, I do. I do. I think if the Vikings win like nine, ten games, and we know Kirk's going to produce. That's the thing with Kirk is like, no matter how it looks when you're watching, the box score is always going to look pretty good. And his stat line's always going to look pretty good.

So if the Vikings win like nine games and surprise some people, and at the end of the year, you see that he threw for 4,000 yards and 30 touchdowns. You're going to be like, oh, damn. No, no, no, no. That's where we're already at. I'm talking about like Sunday night football.

And we're like, oh, wow, Kirk Cousins is on. Like, wow, am I, like, excited for Kirk Cousins? And this is why Kirk is the subject of this show is. It depends on what the defense is. Is he playing the Lions defense? Then yes, we're going to be like, holy shit, Kirk, he's better than we thought.

If he plays like, I don't know, the bucks, and he's getting blitzed 50% of the time and he has no answer for it and he just panics and he does one of those Kirk plays where, for example, when he kneeled instead of spiking the ball and he forgot that that kneeling actually keeps the clock running instead of stopping

it. I think we would get one of those moments. But that's Kirk. That's why he's so fun to talk about. He's just reading the teleprompter. As am I. That's all we got. Thank you, Stephen. I'm Danny Heifitz. Thank you to Kai McGowan for production help. This is the Ringer NFL show.