Von Miller on Kirk Cousins' pending free agency: 'We need Kirk'

Jason Owens
·Staff writer

Tuesday’s bombshell trade agreement sending Alex Smith from Kansas City to Washington has led to a Wednesday frenzy of speculation about where Kirk Cousins will land.

With the pending free agent having apparently played his last snap in D.C., Cousins’ suitors are expected to be many with the Jacksonville Jaguars, Arizona Cardinals, New York Jets and Cleveland Browns among his potential destinations.

But, as Yahoo Sports’ Charles Robinson wrote, the Denver Broncos present the best combination of cap space and opportunity to win to be the leader out of the gate for Cousins’ services.

Von Miller would prefer to not line up opposite of Kirk Cousins moving forward. (AP)
Von Miller would prefer to not line up opposite of Kirk Cousins moving forward. (AP)

Denver’s dismal quarterback rotation that saw Trevor Siemian, Brock Osweiler and Paxton Lynch play to varying degrees of failure in 2017 led a team with a Super Bowl-caliber defense to finish at the bottom of the AFC West at 5-11.

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The leader of that defense, Pro Bowl pass rusher Von Miller, was asked about Cousins on the Dan Patrick Show on Wednesday.

After some initial pushback to recruiting a free agent quarterback on air, Miller came clean about his feelings with just the slightest of prodding from Patrick.

“Yeah, we need Kirk,” Miller told Patrick. “I would like to have Kirk. We have great quarterbacks now. Kirk could take us over the edge.”

You can ignore that part about having great quarterbacks now, where Miller realized in the middle of his sentence he very well might end up playing with a quarterback already on the Broncos roster next season.

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Miller is right about needing Cousins. Denver’s signature defense is getting older, as are offensive weapons Demaryius Thomas and Emmanuel Sanders — that is if the team decides to keep one or both of its top receivers. Regardless, the time to win in Denver is now, and the Broncos need a quarterback who can step in from day one.

It’s something that Miller has clearly been thinking about and maybe even been working toward.

“I’ve talked to him before,” Miller said. “He knows exactly how I feel about Kirk Cousins and what he would mean to our team.”