Washington Redskins: The impossible rise of Kirk Cousins
By Ian Cummings
A Spectacular Transformation
The lake gets colder and colder. But until the temperature strays past a certain numerical point, a certain natural standard defined by atomic laws few may understand, it will not change.
There is a breaking point. A solidus.
More than a month after newly hired head coach Jay Gruden uttered the famous words, “It’s Kirk’s team”, Kirk Cousins was in grave danger of losing his team.
The Washington Redskins, deprived of success came into their Week 7 matchup against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers desperate for a win, middling at 2-4. Too familiar a place for an impatient owner and his impulsive personnel director.
Kirk Cousins had squandered his opportunity up to that point. In six games as the starter, he had thrown six touchdowns to eight interceptions. He’d thrown one touchdown in every game, but in every other game, he had a pair of picks to sullen his name. Cousins was on the hot seat, and with one more lackluster outing, Colt McCoy would unseat him again, as he had done the season before.
The game was prescribed as a code red affair by Gruden himself, and after crushing losses to the Atlanta Falcons and the New York Jets, one more consecutive loss would seal the fate of their season. Like a wave in icy waters. The downward momentum was too much to halt.
It was that downward momentum that rendered the Washington Redskins inert against the Buccaneers in the first half, and by the midway point of the second quarter, they were down 24-0. Dan Snyder could be seen squirming in his luxury booth after a strip sack gave the Buccaneers yet another touchdown. On Alumni Day, where former Redskins’ players flocked to see their team perform, they were being given quite an underwhelming show.
But then… something clicked.
Like the water of Lake Michigan, when it passes the point of highest density at 4 degrees Celsius. And the ice crystals begin to form. The temperature keeps dropping, the pressure rising, the molecules tensing up until it reaches a point of pure stillness. And everything clicks. The waves of doubt frozen in focus. Bustling waters, turned to ice. A spectacular transformation.
Cousins transformed that day. All the hours, the days of hard work, the months of waiting, the years of growing, praying, waiting, and trusting, all leading up to that one game. That one half. That one moment. That spectacular transformation.
Cousins was a different player in the second half. His throws were crisp. His footwork was immaculate. His eyes never blinked. His team mates started to believe, and when the Washington Redskins needed a goal line stop, down 24-27 with less than three minutes to go, the defense made that stop. Because Cousins gave them the chance.
The rest is history. Cousins marched down the field and won the game, and the Washington Redskins would go on to win the embattled NFC East with a record of 9-7. They didn’t see great success that year. But 2015 served a purpose. It gave the team hope, when greater players failed to do so.
From that game on, Cousins would be the best quarterback in the league. In the final ten games of the 2015 season, he threw 23 touchdowns to three interceptions. And from that point to this day, Cousins has been the Washington Redskins starting quarterback, and he hasn’t been half bad. Since the Buccaneers game, he’s thrown for over 10,000 yards, 75 touchdowns, and 28 interceptions.
Kirk Cousins. Professional quarterback.
Sounds better than ‘pitcher’.