Last offseason, Kirk Cousins signed a lucrative contract with the Atlanta Falcons, ending his six-year stint with the Minnesota Vikings. After struggling during the 2024 season, Cousins was benched for Michael Penix Jr. Rather than trading or waiving Cousins, the veteran quarterback entered the 2025 campaign as Penix’s backup. Let’s break down Cousins’ deal, his salary, net worth, and career earnings.
What Is Kirk Cousins’ Contract and Salary?
One of the best businessmen in NFL history, Cousins signed a four-year, $180 million contract with the Falcons in March 2024.
Cousins received $90 million guaranteed at signing: a $50 million signing bonus, $12.5 million base salary for 2024, and a $27.5 million base salary for 2025. His 2026 roster bonus ($10 million) became fully guaranteed on the fifth day of the 2025 league year.
In season two of Netflix’s “Quarterback,” Cousins opened up about feeling “misled” by the Falcons since they didn’t disclose their plan to draft a young quarterback. He revealed that he would have just stayed with the Vikings if he had known that was going to happen.
It’s worth noting that Cousins has a no-trade clause, giving him say over his future if Atlanta wants to trade him. If the Falcons trade him, they would carry a dead cap number of $37.5 million in 2025. Also, Atlanta has essentially zero incentive to cut Cousins before 2026 since his 2025 salary is already fully guaranteed.
#Update: The 2025 NFL Trade Deadline has passed, and Cousins is still on the Falcons roster.
If they decide to release Cousins, they would carry a dead cap hit of $65 million in 2025, the largest in NFL history. Below are the four current dead-cap-hit leaders in NFL history.
- Russell Wilson, $49M APY (23.5% of 2022 salary cap)
- Deshaun Watson, $46M APY (22.1% of 2022 salary cap)
- Derek Carr, $40.5M APY (19.4% of 2022 salary cap)
- Daniel Jones, $40M APY (17.8% of 2023 salary cap)
If Atlanta was going to move on from Cousins, they likely would have done so before March 16, when another $10 million of his 2026 salary became fully guaranteed.
In a league where guaranteed money isn’t the norm, Cousins and his camp have done an incredible job negotiating fully guaranteed deals. In fact, he has played on a fully guaranteed contract for the last decade.
Cousins’ deal pays him $45 million per year,which is tied with Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes for the 14th-highest-paid quarterback in the NFL.
What Is Cousins’ Net Worth and Career Earnings?
Cousins’ net worth is estimated to be a whopping $160 million.
Throughout the course of his 13-year career, Cousins has earned $294,169,486 from his NFL contracts alone. That’s the sixth-highest career earnings in NFL history, and fourth-most among active players.
Only New York Jets QB Aaron Rodgers ($380,658,010), Los Angeles Rams QB Matthew Stafford ($364,313,912), NFL legend Tom Brady ($332,962,392), Pittsburgh Steelers QB Russell Wilson ($305,362,520), and retired NFL QB Matt Ryan ($303,713,631) have earned more than Cousins throughout their careers.
MORE: Who Are the NFL’s Highest-Paid Quarterbacks?
While the majority of Cousins’ wealth comes from his NFL contracts, he also has several endorsement deals.
Cousins has partnered with brands such as Bose, Nike, Pizza Ranch, Kay Jewelers, Neuxtec, DraftKings, TLC Laser Eye Centers, KW Sports + Entertainment, Raising Canes, Maison Realty Group, and KFC.
Cousins has even ventured into the breakfast cereal world, where he created his own brand of cereal called “Cousins CinnaMinn Snaps,” with the proceeds going to the Kirk and Julie Cousins Foundation.
Despite his massive wealth, he still leads a simple lifestyle, famously dressing at Kohl’s and driving a 2000 GMC Savana van. For years, he and his wife even lived in his parents’ and in-laws’ basements during the offseason to save money.
Falcons Players’ Fantasy Outlook for Week 10
Here’s what PFSN’s Kyle Soppe wrote on the notable Falcons players’ fantasy outlooks for the Week 10 matchup against the Indianapolis Colts:
Michael Penix Jr.
The knee didn’t look to hamper Michael Penix in a major way last week, and now he’s gone three straight without an interception.
If you want to say that he’s slowly developing at the NFL level, I’ll listen. But he’s been held under 6.5 yards per attempt in four of his past six games and has just three finishes this season better than QB17.
On the bright side, we saw him be rewarded for funneling all of the valuable looks in the direction of Drake London, and that’s Penix’s impact on our game.
Darnell Mooney
The idea of a secondary pass catcher next to Drake London’s tracks, but with only two catches on 70 routes over the past two weeks, suggests a lack of involvement that simply doesn’t happen to a player worthy of our interest.
Darnell Mooney is filling a field-stretching role, and it seems to be more of a decoy mold than anything else. His 15.7-yard aDOT suggests to me that Atlanta is running him in straight lines and hoping that the occasional shot to him opens up everything else.
I’m not sure this is a great plan, but I know it doesn’t do anything for us.
Mooney played every offensive snap last week, and it resulted in next to nothing for us. I’m giving him at least one more week, as this is a game where the expectation is for them to be playing from behind. But his spot at the end of rosters should not be viewed as safe.
Bijan Robinson
It’s a little quirky that Bijan Robinson has gone three straight games without a touch gaining more than 17 yards, but I’m not worried about it.
There’s been no rushing efficiency to speak of over those games, but he’s received 21 targets over that stretch, and for a player this dynamic, that’ll work.
His 17-game pace is for over 87 receptions this season, and when you consider that he is always in scoring position, that level of volume is golden. Without efficiency, he can still give you borderline RB1 production, and if he can get on track on the ground, he’s got as good a shot as anyone to lead the position in scoring.
Robinson is a Tier 1 running back every single week and should allow you to get fantasy points in bunches with your morning coffee this week, even against a Colts run defense that looked good in Pittsburgh last week (23 carries for 38 yards).
Drake London
Drake London outscored every other receiver by 5.7 PPR points last week, and if you flip on the game film, I’m telling you that the performance he put forth Sunday in New England was even more impressive than that.
From sharp routes to high-pointing the ball, he was virtually unstoppable against a defense with a shutdown corner and the ability to make your offense one-dimensional.
London has a quarterback problem, that much we know, but with 10+ targets being funneled his way in four straight, who are we to complain?
His recent run is similar to what Nico Collins has experienced in the past and serves as a nice reminder that he deserves to be considered among the top 10 talents at the position.
Only time will tell if Atlanta can find a quarterback who unlocks consistent Tier 1 production from him: he’s a lineup lock every week, and this matchup abroad doesn’t provide me with a moment of pause.
If you roster London, I think you’ll want to delay your morning plans a bit to watch him get your team off to a good start in Germany.
Kyle Pitts Sr.
Kyle Pitts saw his first end zone target of the season last week and has racked up 26 looks during this three-game skid. Darnell Mooney has been a non-factor since returning, and that, on Sunday at least, meant that Pitts was left handling his duties.
His 11.9-yard aDOT against the Patriots was easily a season high. While that introduces more single-play upside than the shallow target role he’d been occupying prior, it also ramps up the weekly variance, a trade-off I’m not thrilled about making with Michael Penix pulling the trigger.
If Mooney can get going, I think we get stable TE8-12 production from Pitts. That’s what I’m ranking for this week on a fast track in Indy, but last week, despite the seven targets, was more concerning than encouraging for those with exposure to Pitts.
