Eagles vs Vikings: 5 intriguing storylines for Monday Night Football

Kirk Cousins owns a 6-3 lifetime record versus the Eagles.

This is one of those cold, hard facts. The Eagles have taken the field versus a Kirk Cousins-led offense nine times. They’ve won three of those games. Cousins has taken the other six. It’s hard to explain why he’s had Philly’s number when he’s only 62-62-2 in his career, painfully average.

His first two wins came in a 2015 season sweep when Washington won the NFC East (Chip Kelly’s final season in Philadelphia. The next two came in 2016, Carson Wentz’s rookie season and Doug Pederson’s first as a head coach.

The Eagles finished with a mark of 7-9, one that was identical to their finish in 2015. Any loss to a division rival is painful. Watching the Eagles get swept in consecutive seasons was a tough watch, but that was a long time ago. Cousins has since switched teams. This is a much different team than it was five years ago.

Kirk Cousins’ most recent wins versus Philadelphia, were a pair of victories in October of 2018 and 2019 that came as QB1 of the Minnesota Vikings. Both fell during some miserable autumn Carson Wentz slumps post-Super Bowl LII victory. This time around, Justin Jefferson and Jalen Hurts make their mark on this extended rivalry. This also doubles as the first head-to-head matchup between Nick Sirianni and Kevin O’Connell.

This is perhaps a meeting of the two most talented Vikings and Eagles rosters since the NFC Championship Game in 2017. This may be the best Eagles team that Kirk Cousins has faced.

Week 2’s final game could be decided by a quarterback duel, one that goes to the signal-caller that is better able to freelance and make things happen on the fly. We know Jalen Hurts can do that. The questions are about whether or not Kirk Cousins can do the same.