The date was December 28, 2008. The 9-6 Chicago bears were entering Week 17 in a tight playoff picture. Needing a victory against the Houston Texans, as well as losses from Tampa Bay and Dallas, the Bears' chances of making the playoffs' weren't great, however they were very, very possible.
Dallas and Tampa Bay both lost, meaning all that it would take for the Bears was a win. The Bears fell short in a 31-24 loss, and immediately the finger was pointed at Bears quarterback Kyle Orton. Two years removed from a NFC Championship and a Super Bowl appearance, the Monsters of the Midway were missing the playoffs for the second straight year. Their defense was still one of the league's best, however there was a clear problem with the offense. The Bears' offense revolved around run and screen plays for Matt Forte, Devin Hester punt and kickoff returns, and throwing up deep passes and hoping for pass interference. In other words, they had no passing game, and the thrill of having Kyle Orton or Rex Grossman behind center, was not much of a thrill for Bears' fans.
After years of decades of dismal quarterback play and years of trying to replace "the punky QB known as [Jim] McMahon," Bears GM Jerry Angelo panicked. Here he had this supremely talented defense, with very little life on the offensive side, and a championship window that is only open for so long.
Out of panic, Angelo shipped away Orton, and three draft picks (18th overall and 84th overall in 2009, and a first round pick in 2010) for a 25 year-old gun-slinger coming off a Pro Bowl season, who forced his way out of Denver after not getting along with their new head coach Josh McDaniels. Many Chicagoans reacted the same as they did last week when the Cubs' signed Jon Lester, as if a savior was coming to resurrect a Chicago team and elevate them to a championship-caliber team. I was not one of those Chicagoans.
You see, I never thought Orton was that bad. The reason why the Bears couldn't generate any offense was in addition to having one of the league's worst offensive lines, their wide receivers were Devin Aromashodu, converted corner Devin Hester (who still can't consistently run good routes), a washed-up Marty Booker, Rashied Davis, and Brandon Rideau. Two years later, Rideau and Booker were out of the league. Two years after that Davis and Aromashodu were out of the league. Want to guess how many career touchdowns Davis and Aromashodu combined for in their careers? 10. The Bears' receiving core sucked. The only way you could get any kind of production out of that group was if Tom Brady or Aaron Rodgers was your quarterback. Very few guys can turn chicken crap in to chicken salad, and I had no reason to believe that giving up three picks, that the Bears could use to bolster the receiving core or offensive line, would make any difference. So while many Chicagoans felt this was a great trade, where the Bears were getting a franchise, game-changing quarterback who would transcend the offense, which paired with a great defense would equal a championship, I thought otherwise, and I was interested in seeing what those draft picks would become so that one and if one day I could point back to those picks and say that I was right.
On December 18, 2014, I can declare that I was right. I hate to be the "I told you so" guy. It doesn't fit my persona. But Chicago, I told you so.
The Broncos turned those picks in to two-time Pro Bowler Demaryius Thomas, Eric Decker, two of the better receivers in the league, and linebacker/defensive end Robert Ayers. While Ayers may be on his second team now, that was the 18th pick in talented draft where Pro Bowl talents still on the board, like Clay Matthews, Alex Mack, Max Unger, Jairus Byrd, LeSean McCoy and Percy Harvin to name a few. That trade has allowed the Broncos to become the team that they are now: a legit Super Bowl threat for the third straight year, AFC West champions for the fourth straight year, and one of the most dynamic offenses in the NFL. The trade also opened up an opportunity for the Broncos to acquire Peyton Manning a few years later, an opportunity that would not have come otherwise. The Broncos would not be the team as we know them now if they had not made this trade, and I'm sorry Bears fans, but there is no possible way that the Bears won that trade.
Something I have been arguing for years is that while the NFL is a passing league, quarterbacks are being overvalued. Very few quarterbacks are actually worth what they are getting paid. An average or slightly above average quarterback can thrive if he is given the right talent around him. There are eleven players on the field for a team at a time, and very few quarterbacks can make up for lack-luster talent that is around them. We'll come back to this, but the bottom line is that in 2008, I believed that the Bears' needed to address their soft offensive line and find receivers that were capable of running decent routes and catching the ball.
So here were are in the 2009 preseason. Cutler has Bears' fans on the edge of their seats. His ballsy decision-making causes concerns for some, but his big-play capability and the rocket attached to his arm gives the fan base far more hope than fear. Peter King picks the Bears to win the NFC and return to the Super Bowl, something that he must have taken off of the internet because I can't find it anywhere, except for the copy of Sports Illustrated I have kept for five years.
Enter the 2009 season, the Bears' receivers are Hester, Aromashodu, Davis, and newly drafted Juaquin Inglesias and Johnny Knox (both out of the league by 2012) and the line still sucks. The result? The Bears start the season a disastrous 5-9, and Cutler leads the NFL in interceptions thrown with 26. Perhaps the best thing to come out of that terrible season, was this YouTube parody.
Haha, I love that. However 2010 was a much different season. The Bears went 11-5, and were one win away from playing in the Super Bowl. Cutler got injured in the NFC Championship game, and Bears fans suggest that if Cutler were to have never gotten injured, the Bears would have won the Super Bowl. That statement is false. Because while Cutler showed improvement, he still turned the ball over 9 more times than he did in the previous season and he was not playing well in that game. Cutty was only 6-14, throwing for just 80 yards and one pick over halfway through the game. While it remains a mystery what would have happened had he stayed in, the Cutler injury is not a valuable excuse. The Bears' were not better than Green Bay that season, nor were they better than the AFC Champion Pittsburgh Steelers.
Cutler looked most valuable to the Bears in the 2011 season, when the Bears started out 7-3, and then dropped five of their last six games after Cutler got hurt and had to miss the remainder of the regular season.
While Cutler did not build up a great resume in his first three seasons, in all fairness to him, it wasn't a fair sample size. Cutler was playing with sub-par receivers and a horrendous offensive line, as well as changes at offensive coordinator. He did not get along with Mike Martz, and with the combination of Mike Martz's scheme and a disastrous offensive line, left him to be sacked and to take more hits than he should have been taking.
Jerry Angelo was fired after the 2011 season, and Phil Emery came in as the new GM. Emery immediately made some big changes, acquiring top-tier receivers Brandon Marshall and Alshon Jeffery, finally giving Cutler somebody to throw the ball to. After a year or two, he was also able to fix up the offensive line. Marc Trestman took over at head coach, and Aaron Kromer took over at offensive coordinator. The Bears' became a team focused on their offense, and for the past three preseasons we have heard talk of Cutler being an MVP candidate, and on the cusp of being one of the elite quarterbacks in the league. Clearly, Cutler has failed to come anywhere close to those hopes.
In the 2012 and 2013 seasons, Cutler failed to throw 20 touchdown passes with one of the best receiving corps in the game. Believe it or not, he threw more touchdown passes when he had less talent at the receiver positions.
Furthermore, after Cutler got injured once again in the 2013 season, Josh McCown proved my point that quarterbacks are overvalued. McCown, at the age of 34, after being out of the league for a year, came in to back-up Cutty, and in the eight games he played in, McCown led the NFL in quarterback rating, completing 66.5% of his passes, meanwhile throwing 13 touchdowns and just one interception. McCown was being paid $580,000 for one year. Talk about bang for your buck production. McCown excelled as a result of the system he was in. I know I sound like a broken record, but this proved my case that the Bears did not need to pay a quarterback a max contract to win games.
With Cutler's contract coming to an end, the Bears had a decision to make. I wanted the Bears to franchise tag him, and then either keep him for a year, or trade him for an early round draft pick like the Patriots did with Matt Cassell after the 2009 season. I thought that if you looked at the five-year resume of Cutler, as well as the proof that a serviceable quarterback like McCown could dominate, there was just no way that the Bears could pay top dollar to keep Cutler. I thought that the Bears should have learned there lesson, and not repeated history and giving up too much for a guy they gave too much up to five years earlier.
The Bears did the opposite, signing Cutler to a 7-year contract extension, in which he will be paid an average of $18.5 million per year. Upon hearing the news of an extension, I posted on Facebook that I would not be seeing a Bears Super Bowl for the next seven years. People argued with me. People said the Bears had no other options. But they did.
The Bears could have drafted a quarterback and acquired a cheap QB looking for a second chance like Colt McCoy, who has looked very good this year in Washington in RGIII's absence, and had them compete for the starting role. While we do not know how productive that would be, we do know that the Bears are wasting $18.5 MILLION on their payroll this year by paying Cutler. Any quarterback that is getting paid that much should be throwing for 40 touchdowns with the offense the Bears' have. This offense is simply too talented. And with the amount they are spending on the Cutler contract, they could be using that money to fix up a terrible defense.
The Cutler contract will likely cost Emery his job. I believe that Marc Trestman hasn't taken Cutler out because he doesn't want to piss off Emery, and make Emery fire him, putting the blame on Trestman as Emery scrambles to keep his job. But now that it is looking like Trestman will get fired, I am very pleased with the way he is going out. By benching Cutler, he has a chance to showcase how his offense can work with Jimmy Clausen. And if the offense plays well, and Clausen does fine, Trestman can get an offensive coordinator position someplace else. It's also the ultimate F-YOU to Emery.
The Cutler trade and the Cutler contract have played a significant part in breaking the Bears, and turning the "Monsters of the Midway" in to the "Munchkins of the Midway." His inexcusable performance in prime-time and must-win games can no longer be tolerated or ignored. They should have aborted the Cutler project sooner, but hopefully this season is the end of it. I don't think they will be able to trade him for anything. And even if they cut him, they will still have to pay him through the 2016 season. There's a 90% shot (I say only 90% because I give it a 10% chance the Raiders or Redskins do something nutty and make Cutler their franchise quarterback) that Cutler is on the Bears next September, but if the Bears are smart they draft a quarterback this spring. And though it is three decades later, hopefully this time they can replace Jim McMahon.
So yeah, Cutler sucks. And oh, one more thing. It's worth noting that this Sunday, Kyle Orton will be starting and playing for a chance to take his team to the playoffs. Jay Cutler will not.
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