Bears Blitz

Published by Bear Heiser on September 28, 2014
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Chicago Bears

What gives, Jay Cutler?

You go out in the first half Sunday against Green Bay and complete 15-of-21 passes for 173 yards with two touchdowns and zero interceptions only to then complete just 7-of-15 for 83 yards and two interceptions in the second half?

What happened, Jay? What happened at halftime that made your switch flip from Good Jay to Bad Jay?

As Cutler goes, so go the Chicago Bears. The Bears trailed by only four at half, 21-17, but the Green Packers went on to score 17 second-half points to seal the game, 38-17.

The downhill spiral began on the last drive of the first half, when the Bears had over a minute on the clock with three timeouts in hand. Head coach Marc Trestman, as head coach Marc Trestman often does, mismanaged the clock and left the Bears scrambling to score before the half.

With 63 seconds remaining, from the Packers 20-yard line, Forte led the drive with gains of 13 and five yards. Cutler then found tight end Martellus Bennett for gains of 26 and 27 yards. The Bears were in position to go up at the half.

Then, with nine seconds left and the ball on Green Bay’s nine-yard line, Cutler hit Bennett once again, this time for eight yards, only to be stopped short of the goal line by two Packers defenders. The play was reviewed, but safety Micah Hyde was blocking the goal-line camera, making it virtually impossible to see whether the ball crossed the line.

“I liked the call, I liked the throw, I thought the defender made a heck of a play,” Cutler said of the drive’s final play, via Kevin Fishbain of ChicagoFootball.com.

That point-less drive is when the fortunes of Cutler and the Bears seemingly started to go sour.

Cutler had the Bears offense moving to open the second half, moving the ball 61 yards on six plays before Packers cornerback Tramon Williams, a Bear killer, cut in front of Josh Morgan and deflected the ball to linebacker Clay Matthews who completed the interception and ran it back 40 yards to put Green Bay in position to score. And that is exactly what Aaron Rodgers and the Packers did—score

The switch was flipped, because, on the Bears’ next drive, Cutler did the most Cutler-like thing possible, he threw another interception—this time to a wide-open Sam Shields, who only found himself wide open because Brandon Marshall didn’t come back on his route. Instead, Marshall ran upfield. Shields returned the ball down to the Bears 11-yard line, once again putting the Packers in position to score. And score is exactly what Rodgers and the Packers did.

It was the ugliest of interceptions; one of for which coach Trestman says Marshall is to blame. Cutler, though, says it was a miscommunication “on my part and his part.” Now Marshall and Cutler are the bestest of pals. So, of course Cutler is going to come to Marshall’s defense.

Marshall didn’t speak to the media after the game, so we have no idea what was running through his mind on that play. It really doesn’t matter, though. There’s enough blame to go around.

Two turnovers for Chicago equals 14 points for Green Bay. That’s how it all went wrong, in a nutshell.

Entering Sunday, Cutler had been stellar in the second halves of games for the Bears this season, completing 43 of 57 passes (75.4 percent) for 398 yards with five touchdowns and an interception; whereas, in the first half, Cutler had a completion percentage of 59 percent on 36-of-61 passing for 307 yards, three touchdowns and one interception.

It’s truly a difficult thing to understand. In trying to understand it, one must remember that Sunday’s loss is only “one game” of a 16-game season. Cutler seems to live and die by the one-game mantra. It’s probably how he’s able to stay so level all of the time, rarely showing emotion of any variety.

The whole one-game response, or excuse, if that’s what you want to call it, is old and tired. This is the NFL we’re talking about. Every game is big. Every game is a must-win. No game can be taken for granted. Every game contains pieces of information that we all use to compile a framework of who Cutler is as a quarterback and who the Bears are as a football team.

OK, so, for the sake of this conversation Bears fans, let’s just agree that Sunday’s loss isn’t really that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things. We all thought the Bears would be 2-2 after four games. So, no big deal, right?

Right.

Now, moving this conversation forward, having accepted the status quo for what it is, the biggest question now is whether or not the Bears can win a Super Bowl, even win the division or how about make the playoffs, with bad Cutler rearing his head every so often.

So how bad is bad, you ask?

Let’s put Cutler’s season in perspective. Here are the touchdown and interception numbers for four quarterbacks who played in early games Sunday, one of whom is Cutler.

Ready. Set. Go. Find Cutler. Did you guess B? If so, then you win 10 points in Stevie Johnson’s fantasy football league. Well done. If you’re curious: Rodgers is QB 1; Cutler is QB 2; Stafford is QB 3; Luck is QB 4.

Good and bad Cutler have thrown for a combined 1,006 yards on 102-of-155 passing with 10 touchdowns and four interceptions. His 65.8 completion percentage is the highest of his nine-year career.

Whether you like it or not, Cutler’s numbers are those of a top-10 quarterback. Cutler is a good quarterback. He also happens to be a quarterback who makes mistakes at very inopportune times, in very inopportune ways, which allows the entire football-viewing public to collectively pile on and crush the guy who could go down as the best quarterback in the organization’s history, or at the very least be the second best behind Sid Luckman.

What makes the loss tough to swallow, aside from the fact that the loss came at the hands of the Packers, is the 235 rushing yards the Bears gained on the day. Do you know how many rushing yards the Bears had in three previous games entering Sunday? Hold on while I count them with my hands—192 rushing yards!

The Bears offense, on Sunday, finally featured some balance. Matt Forte was above 100 yards. Ka’Deem Carey actually was getting chances, and he cashed them in to the tune of 72 yards on 14 carries.

Cutler was unable to hold up his end of the bargain on Sunday, but he’s not the reason the Bears are now 2-2.

Is two turnovers two too many for the quarterback of this Bears team, with a defense that gives up 38 points at home to a Packers team that had only played one good half of football entering Sunday? Yes, two turnovers is too many.

But it’s hard to know how this game would have played out had the defense not allowed Rodgers and the Packers to march down the field and score virtually every single time they had the ball. Actually, wait, the Packers did score on every single drive. There were no punts in Sunday’s game. No punts!

Blame Cutler all you want. This loss shouldn’t all fall on his shoulders. If you do blame Cutler, you’re taking the easy way out. Sports is a game of emotion, a game of momentum. The offense plays off the defense and vice versa.

One of these days, Cutler will play a turnover-free game against the Packers. Hopefully, when that day comes, the Bears defense can force the opposition to punt, maybe just once, even.

So, to answer the question we’re all looking to answer: Yes, the Bears absolutely can overcome a two-turnover day from Cutler. What the Bears cannot survive is a defense that can’t even force the opposition to punt the ball.

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