When the Falcons signed quarterback Kirk Cousins as a free agent last March, there was little thought that he’d be out of the starting job before the end of his first season in Atlanta but that’s how things went.

Drafting Michael Penix in the first round put a clock on Cousins’s time as the starter and it struck midnight in December amid a run of poor play by the veteran signal caller. Penix started the final three games of the regular season and played well enough that there’s no reason for the Falcons to think about going back to Cousins.

On Thursday, Falcons General Manager Terry Fontenot said that “the plan was for Kirk to play longer” which is backed up by a contract that guaranteed Cousins $90 million over his first two years. That includes his $27.5 million salary for the 2025 season and there’s another $10 million guaranteed if Cousins is on the roster five days into the new league year. It’s a hefty sum for a player projected to be on the bench, but Penix is on a rookie deal and Fontenot said the arrangement works for the team.

“We’re very comfortable moving forward with [Cousins] as a backup,” Fontenot said, via Tori McElhaney of the team’s website.

Cousins said he plans to take about a month after the season to decompress, but there’s little chance he’ll walk away from that money and his no-trade clause means that the Falcons won’t be able to move him unless he approves of the next stop. That’s a possibility along with an outright release and Cousins settling into a backup role for the first time since he was with Washington early in his career.