Throughout a Saturday morning appearance on “SportsCenter,” ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler repeated earlier stories that the Pittsburgh Steelers may pursue Atlanta Falcons quarterback Kirk Cousins if free agent Aaron Rodgers chooses to not play for the Steelers later this 12 months.
Through the newest version of his “Overreaction Monday” podcast, league insider and NFL Community character Wealthy Eisen shared a harsh fact for the Steelers about viewing Cousins as a attainable backup plan forward of the summer time.
“In the event you really feel [Rodgers is] simply going to depart you on the altar, properly, what that does is it places you over a barrel in a negotiation to get anyone like Kirk Cousins,” Eisen mentioned, per Jeremy Pike of Steelers Depot. “…The minute you elevate the telephone and name Terry Fontenot and ask, ‘What about Kirk Cousins,’ he is aware of you are involved about Rodgers not displaying up. So, you are over a barrel already.”
Fontenot, the overall supervisor of the Falcons, reportedly wants a crew “to pay a good portion” of the remaining assured cash hooked up to the four-year, $180M contract Cousins obtained from Atlanta in March 2024. Whereas Cousins misplaced the Atlanta beginning job to 2024 first-round draft choose Michael Penix Jr. this previous December, Fontenot has insisted he’ll maintain onto the 36-year-old except a membership matches the Falcons’ asking value for the veteran.
In the meantime, it certainly seems that some throughout the Steelers need outsiders to imagine the membership could be “advantageous” if it needed to begin longtime backup Mason Rudolph in September. Maybe such leaks are Pittsburgh’s method of telling Fontenot and Co. that they might must decrease their expectations relating to a Cousins commerce in the event that they need to get something for him from the Steelers within the occasion that Rodgers rejects the AFC North franchise.
Additionally on Monday, Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio prompt that Rodgers will not signal a deal by the point the Steelers start the primary of six organized crew exercise practices set to happen from Tuesday by means of June 5. It is unclear if Steelers basic supervisor Omar Khan would name Fontenot about Cousins if Rodgers remained unsigned by means of the completion of Pittsburgh’s obligatory minicamp, which is scheduled to run from June 10 by means of June 12.
It is also possible that Fontenot could finally need to get Cousins out of the constructing to make sure a quarterback controversy will not come up if Penix performs poorly early within the upcoming marketing campaign. That mentioned, it is troublesome to think about a crew aside from the Steelers would hand over something of worth for Cousins except a unique starter suffers a major harm between now and the in-season commerce deadline.
