Every NFL team wants to create an edge for itself, in every way possible. It requires an understanding of the rules, the limits of the rules, and the manner in which any loopholes can be exploited.
The Raiders have taken advantage of a fairly glaring loophole in an effort to give quarterback Kirk Cousins $20 million for 2026 while only paying him $11.3 million.
It happened like this. The Falcons owed quarterback Kirk Cousins $10 million for 2026, subject to offset. Other quarterbacks in recent years who have been cut with remaining guarantees (Russell Wilson, Kyler Murray, Tua Tagovailoa) signed one-year deals for the minimum salary, sticking their former teams for the balance.
As to Cousins, his market value exceeded $10 million. When the Falcons didn’t cut Cousins after the 2024 season (despite a Sunday Splash! report from December 2024 that they were expected to do so), some concluded that the Falcons were content to guarantee $10 million for 2026 since he likely would get more than $10 million on the open market, allowing the Falcons to escape the final installment.
Enter the loophole. If the Raiders had signed Cousins to a one-year, $20 million deal, Las Vegas would have owed Cousins all of it — and the Falcons would have owed nothing. Instead, the Raiders paid Cousins $1.3 million this year, with a $10 million full guarantee in 2027.
As mentioned on Thursday, it seems too easy. Too convenient. Too obvious that the Raiders came up with a way to get Cousins to $20 million while paying only $11.3 million of it.
Albert Breer of SI has wondered aloud whether the league will attempt to close that loophole. Frankly, it’s amazing the loophole even exists.
It’s something other teams could have been doing, whenever a player has guaranteed money from another team. Pay him the minimum now, and promise more later.
Legitimate or not under current rules, it seems as if the Raiders have pulled a fast one. Which should — as Michael Holley said on Friday’s PFT Live — dry any lingering crocodile tears regarding the Ravens’ decision not to proceed with the Maxx Crosby trade.
The rules are the rules. The rules allowed the Ravens to back out of the Crosby deal, at any time and for any reason before the trade became official. The rules apparently allowed the Raiders to find a way to pay Cousins more than the $10 million he was guaranteed to receive from the Falcons this year by putting the Falcons on the hook for $8.7 million.
All’s fair in love, war, and football. And every NFL team needs to know the rules. To understand how to use them to their advantage. And, more importantly, to have a plan for keeping those rules from being used against them.
