With the game on the line during Sunday afternoon’s Wild Card round playoff game against the New York Giants, Minnesota Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins chose not to throw to star receiver Justin Jefferson on 4th-and-8 late in the fourth quarter. And after the game, he explained his decision.
During his postgame press conference, Kirk Cousins said that he just “didn’t feel good” about throwing the ball up to Justin Jefferson.
“[I] saw single-high [safety],” Cousins told reporters after the game according to Pro Football Talk, “tried to work Justin, didn’t feel good about putting it up to Justin, and when I went to progress, I just felt like I was about to get sacked and I felt like I’ve got to put the ball in play, and I can’t go down with sack, so I thought I’d kick it out to T.J. I had thrown short of the sticks on a few occasions in the game and even going back a few weeks and just felt like just throwing it short of the sticks isn’t the end of the world. It’s just obviously tight coverage, so didn’t have the chance to pull away. But I just felt like I was going to go down and take a sack if I didn’t put it out.”
Jefferson may have been covered, but it wouldn’t have been the first time Jefferson made a play on the ball despite being blanketed in coverage. But we’ll never know how it would have turned out now.
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