Months after Kirk Cousins signed a lucrative contract with the Falcons, former player Roddy White has taken to Twitter to criticise the criticism the team is facing for selecting quarterback Michael Penix Jr. in the first round of the NFL draft.
The Falcons selected Penix as their expected successor with the No. 8 overall choice in the draft on Thursday night, even though Cousins had just inked a massive four-year contract for $180 million with $100 million guaranteed.
Reports quickly surfaced claiming the Cousins were taken aback by the selection.
White justified his former team’s choice of Penix in a post on X.I met Michael Penix Jr. today; he’s a really cool guy who will be fantastic for the city and for us. Why did we have to listen to this bullshit on Friday night about Kirk being taken by surprise?” wrote White.
“We’ve been selecting in the top 10 for the past five seasons because, lesson learned, we didn’t acquire a quarterback when Matt Ryan was almost done.”
In the tweet, White added, “RG was blindsided,” perhaps alluding to the fact that Washington selected Cousins in the fourth round of the 2012 NFL Draft, the same year they selected Robert Gryphon III with the second overall pick.
White, 42, spent his whole 11-year NFL career with the Falcons from 2005 to 2015; he was chosen for the 2010 first team All-Pro team and won four Pro Bowls.
The primary source of information regarding Cousins’ response to the selection is his agent, Mike McCartney, who made public remarks about it to reporters (though he may have also spoken off the record).
It was a win-now decision to sign Cousins, and the eighth overall pick might have been utilised to add a starter who could contribute right away to that acquisition.
However, there are situations in which the Falcons may benefit from selecting Penix, such as if Cousins suffers an injury like he did this past season—a ruptured Achilles—or if there is a change in quarterbacks several years from now, such as the one that occurred in Green Bay with Aaron Rodgers to Jordan Love.
Head coach of the Falcons Raheem Morris defended Penix’s pick by pointing to the Packers’ “blueprint.”But if Penix falls behind Cousins by three years, as Love did with Rodgers, he will be 27 years old when he takes the field.
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