During his Tuesday press conference, Falcons quarterback Kirk Cousins was asked what his leadership approach would be with rookie quarterback Michael Penix Jr.
Will Cousins lead by example? Will he work to build the rapport? Does he have a responsibility as a veteran to help the younger player learn the system?
Cousins noted that everything is likely involved because everyone in the QBs room has to work to help one another.
But head coach Raheem Morris had a different kind of answer when he was asked about Cousins sharing knowledge with Penix.
“I think the onus really belongs to Michael when it comes to those things,” Morris said in his Tuesday press conference. “Kirk is trying to win a Super Bowl, Kirk is in full-blown preparation mode to set the Atlanta Falcons up for the best success that they can possibly have. And I think you get no better person to sit behind than a Kirk Cousins type of guy. Obviously, there are probably better arguably on other people’s teams but I’m talking about the one on our team.
“I just think it’s a great experience for Michael and I think he will learn a lot from watching him move and move in silence with his guys. He’ll learn on the run because really it’s empathy and humility of Michael that’s going to come out more when it comes to learning those types of things. And I think that’s the most important part of it all. Everybody wants to make Kirk have to tell him what to do, but really he is showing him what to do by his everyday movements and his actions.”
As for Cousins’ reaction to Atlanta already drafting his replacement, Morris noted that it’s “my job to manage everything” as the Falcons’ head coach.
“I have to manage the expectations from the fans and them wanting you to do something maybe quicker than you want to do it,” Morris said. “But we really had a plan going into this thing and Kirk’s our quarterback and that’ll play out as it plays out. And we’ve got a guy in the building that we hope can be our potential guy moving on in the future.
“I really love both of the people and it’s really about the people when you go look at these types of things. We invest in people first — just from an overall, organizational standpoint. These two people, I feel great about. You may not like the initial goal, the initial reaction of what is about to happen. But if you sit down and you go through the process, you talk to enough people, you figure out what the goals are and you get it on the line and let’s go — let’s go to work.”
So far, the dynamic in Atlanta appears to be tenable between Cousins and Penix. But we’ll have to see if that changes over the coming months and into the season.
