After Aaron Rodgers' decision, where the heck do the Falcons go from here with Kirk Cousins?

The long-awaited Aaron Rodgers decision has arrived. After months of speculation, Rodgers will be headed to Pittsburgh to try to add more chapters to his Hall of Fame career. The news is an exciting development for the Steelers. It is much less exciting, however, for the Atlanta Falcons. It serves as a major blow to the Falcons and their hopes of offloading the Kirk Cousins contract to a quarterback-hungry team elsewhere across the league this summer.

The train has left the station for Pittsburgh to pivot to Cousins, who was rumored to be the Steelers’ backup plan at the position as the Rodgers saga pressed into early June. Falcons general manager Terry Fontenot has been steadfast that the Falcons would not simply punt on their losses with Cousins, and the stage is now set for a very awkward summer unless a turn of events elsewhere across the NFL opens up the opportunity for Cousins to be shipped out of Atlanta.

There’s just one major problem. Where are the Falcons going to find a landing spot willing to offload an asset and absorb all (or most) of Cousins’ $27.5 million salary? The two most quarterback-hungry teams in the league also happen to be the two most salary-cap restricted teams in the league, and both drafted quarterback(s) this spring.

The Cleveland Browns have Joe Flacco, Kenny Pickett, and rookies Dillion Gabriel & Shedeur Sanders in their quarterback room amid the albatross that is Deshaun Watson’s contract. And the New Orleans Saints were left to pivot at quarterback two years into a four-year, $150 million contract with Derek Carr. Carr retired this offseason. But the Saints drafted quarterback Tyler Shough with a top-40 draft choice in April and would undoubtedly like to see him play, not ship away valuable draft picks for another cost-averse veteran quarterback in his mid-30s.

The investments both teams made in the draft at quarterback, along with their team outlooks for the upcoming season and cap management trends, make adding Cousins, who will be 37 years old in August, a move that would require massive amounts of denial. Is there an out to be found elsewhere across the league?

It may require an injury to a starting quarterback. The Indianapolis Colts disclosed today that young quarterback Anthony Richardson had suffered an(other) injury to his throwing shoulder and should be available sometime during training camp. Yikes! But the Colts prepped for this already and have former Giants quarterback Daniel Jones in tow. Some felt Jones would even beat Richardson out this summer for the starting job — a position I’d have been inclined to agree with even before the injury.

The Falcons need an injury to the starting quarterback of a team facing pressure to win that hasn’t invested in an alternative option at quarterback. The argument could be made that the Colts (Jones), New York Giants (Jaxson Dart), Miami Dolphins (Zach Wilson), and Minnesota Vikings (Sam Howell) are all teams that could have been tabbed as emergency Cousins destinations amid a starter injury if not for their investments this offseason. Perhaps a team like the Los Angeles Rams, if Matthew Stafford went down early in the year, would consider an asset and absorb part of his salary for a rental on Cousins? Surely they don’t like Jimmy Garoppolo THIAT much, right? Maybe Minnesota, if JJ McCarthy suffers another injury, finds out Howell is not grasping the offense in training camp?

That’s a lot of “ifs”.

The safest bet at this point is that the Falcons are going to eat Cousins’ salary and then be on the hook for the $10 million of 2026 guaranteed salary that triggered this spring. Atlanta put on a brave face in the buildup to that deadline, only to let it pass and see the extra money guarantee. There are many worse things in the football world than an experienced (and expensive) backup quarterback. But the Falcons will need to smooth things over with Cousins to get through the season because only a goldilocks scenario can spare them from taking it on the nose now.