WASHINGTON — Captain Kirk is moving on, and he wants Burgundy-and-Gold fans to know they’ll be missed.
After six seasons with Washington, quarterback Kirk Cousins said goodbye in a blog post Monday.
“I am filled with gratitude over the unwavering support and devotion from you, the fans, both on and off the field,” Cousins wrote. “… No words will express the depth of my gratitude, but ‘thank you’ will have to do for now.”
It’s a farewell that’s long been in the works: Washington’s front office opted to forgo a multiyear deal with Cousins (age 29; career QB rating 93.7) and instead traded in January for Kansas City Chief Alex Smith (age 33; career QB rating 87.4).
The Michigan State grad was left to dive into the free agent waters, and he probably won’t need to swim for long: The ESPN pundit class has linked him to nine teams.
In his blog post, the quarterback was downright sentimental about the organization that took a chance on him in the fourth round of the 2012 draft. “When [son] Cooper someday asks: ‘Hey Dad, what was it like playing for the Redskins?’ I’ll proudly tell him it was a dream come true,” he wrote.
Robert Griffin III was unavailable for comment.
All in all, it was your standard pro athlete farewell letter to the local fan base — full of loving shout-outs to teammates and even ownership — with the exception of one delicious little item.
When the blog post originally went up earlier Monday, only two of his potential suitors were tagged at the bottom: the Minnesota Vikings and the New York Jets. The tags were later removed, but media and fans on Twitter had already noticed.
Kirk Cousins is either smoke screening us or his web guy probably shouldn’t have included post tags on each page. #jets #vikings pic.twitter.com/4NepbzIJhX
— Will Brinson (@WillBrinson) March 12, 2018