[Schneed10]

Here's average annual value of contracts for QBs who are not currently on their rookie deals. I'm also excluding bum starting QBs like Matt Cassell, and backups, so you can get a feel for the market.

Aaron Rodgers $22,000,000
Russell Wilson $21,900,000
Ben Roethlisberger $21,850,000
Eli Manning $21,000,000
Philip Rivers $20,812,500
Cam Newton $20,760,000
Matt Ryan $20,750,000
Joe Flacco $20,100,000
Drew Brees $20,000,000
Ryan Tannehill $19,250,000
Colin Kaepernick $19,000,000
Jay Cutler $18,100,000
Tony Romo $18,000,000
Matt Stafford $17,666,667
Alex Smith $17,000,000
Peyton Manning $17,000,000
Carson Palmer $16,500,000
Andy Dalton $16,000,000
Sam Bradford $13,000,000
Nick Foles $12,250,000
Tom Brady $9,000,000

First thing that jumps out is that Brady took a huge hometown discount. Easy to do that when your wife is a mega millionaire SuperModel. Some life, huh.

So Brady really needs to be excluded from the analysis.

It's also important to consider when each of these deals were signed. Wilson was very recent, which partially explains why he's so expensive. Meanwhile Peyton's deal was executed back before the 2012 season, so if you want to estimate what that deal would look like now, it'd be a bit more.

Then you play the overpaid/underpaid game in your mind. Eli, Flacco, Ryan, Tannehill and Rivers feel a little overpaid to me. Brady, Palmer and Dalton (given this past season), look a little underpaid.

So you think about where Cousins should go and you could say you have a hard time seeing why he deserves to get more than Brees or Cam Newton at the $20M mark. But you say does he deserve every bit of what Alex Smith and Matt Stafford are getting at the $17M mark? Probably.

McCloughan can argue that Cousins only has one year under his belt so this represents a risk for the Redskins, and push for $17M. I don't think Cousins will haggle to get up to $18M or $19M.

I think they get it done well before tag time.