Washington Redskins: The impossible rise of Kirk Cousins

Kirk Cousins; Professional Pitcher

Professional pitcher?

Doesn’t have the same ring to it. But by his senior year in high school, Cousins had failed to even make an impression on college coaches, while dozens of other recruits had been on the trail since junior high school. For a time, he saw baseball as his future.

The high school scene is unexpectedly brutal. It takes talent, devotion, some connections, and a fair bit of luck to even get noticed. Many professional football players today had scouts’ eyes on them as early as seventh grade. Many had lines of schools offering scholarships. Lines longer than the line for the bathroom at the end of the first half during any given sporting event.

Kirk Cousins had no lines. But he had the same dream. As early as fourth grade, he envisioned himself on the biggest stage in college football. A pawn on the hallowed turf where legends were born. He dreamed that dream during the hours of the day and night. Like so many others, he grew up playing catch in the backyard. One of his favorite Christmas presents was an Iowa Hawkeyes football jersey. He aspired to live in that image.

As is often the case in life, however, dreams endlessly clash with the sobering lull of reality, and by its hand, dreams seem to die. Cousins dreamed of playing college football. But he didn’t expect it. For much of his career, before and during high school, Cousins, realistically thinking, believed that, to have the best shot of playing at any level in college, he would be better off pursuing baseball.

Kirk Cousins. Professional pitcher.

Still doesn’t sound right.

Cousins may have played baseball competitively in high school, but football was always his favorite. It all felt so right to Cousins. The team atmosphere. The winding struggle. A sixty-minute war of attrition. Cousins relished the juxtaposition. The complexity of the process, paired with the sheer simplicity of the result.

Cousins was all-in on football by high school, but football wasn’t all-in on him. While other talented prospects were elevated to varsity level in just their freshman or sophomore year, Cousins would remain on the junior varsity team, sustaining moderate success. His chance would finally come, however, in his junior year. When he was anointed the starting quarterback of Holland Christian’s varsity team.