Carving out a lucrative NFL career requires a combination of talent, timing, and luck. It also doesn’t hurt to be a quarterback. In fact, the top 16 earners of all time have played that position, including several currently active players.
There are instantly recognizable names among the top five quarterbacks. There’s Matthew Stafford, the reigning league MVP. Aaron Rodgers, who’s been in the league for 21 years. Tom Brady, arguably the greatest of all time. Even Russell Wilson, who’s fallen off in recent years, had an impressive stint with the Seattle Seahawks that included back-to-back trips to the Super Bowl.
But one name on the list is not like the others in terms of postseason success: Kirk Cousins. With nearly $322 million on career salary, he’s the fourth-highest earner in NFL history (and will likely surpass Brady, who’s in third place). Yet he’s only won a single playoff game.
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Here’s the full breakdown of the top-five earners, along with their accomplishments:
- Matthew Stafford, $408.3 million: 1 Super Bowl appearance, 1 Super Bowl win, 1 MVP, 3 Pro Bowls, 1 All-Pro, 7 playoff wins
- Aaron Rodgers, $394.8 million: 1 Super Bowl appearance, 1 Super Bowl win, 4 MVPs, 10 Pro Bowls, 5 All-Pros, 11 playoff wins
- Tom Brady, $333 million: 10 Super Bowl appearances, 7 Super Bowl wins, 3 MVPs, 15 Pro Bowls, 6 All-Pros, 35 playoff wins
- Kirk Cousins, $321.7 million: 4 Pro Bowls, 1 playoff win
- Russell Wilson, $316.9 million: 2 Super Bowl appearances, 1 Super Bowl win, 10 Pro Bowls, 1 All-Pro, 9 playoff wins
Sure, Brady skews the overall competition quite a bit with a ridiculous 35 playoff wins. But across 14 seasons in Washington, Atlanta, and Minnesota, teams led by Cousins have made the playoffs only f0ur times. The lone victory came in 2019, a 26-20 overtime upset victory over the New Orleans Saints in the NFC Wild Card round. Cousins finished that game 19 for 31 with 242 yards and a touchdown.
Despite solid career numbers—44,700 yards on a 66.7 completion percentage, 298 touchdowns, and 131 interceptions—Cousins’s teams simply haven’t found much success. Not all of that is on him, of course. Some of those years in Minnesota and Washington came with minimal expectations (that Cousins even exceeded early in Washington), and the Atlanta situation was a mess almost as soon as Cousins got there. The Falcons drafted a quarterback with their first-round pick shortly after signing Cousins.
Yet Cousins has been a model case study for shrewd negotiations. After leaving Washington to sign with Minnesota, Cousins agreed to a fully guaranteed three-year, $84 million contract. He later signed a two-year, $66 million extension with the team, and then a one-year, $35 million extension. These shorter contracts allowed him to earn a higher annual salary.
Cousins tore his Achilles tendon midway through the 2023 season, and the Vikings made it clear they weren’t going to re-sign him. However, he was able to point to his previous performance and recovery while looking at other teams to join. The Atlanta Falcons, desperate for strong quarterback play since Matt Ryan retired, offered Cousins a whopping $180 million over four seasons, with $100 million guaranteed.
Obviously, back-to-back 8-9 seasons and a public benching are not what Cousins had in mind when he joined Atlanta. But that hasn’t stopped him from earning incredible amounts of money from the team. That’s a skill only the best of the best possess.
