The talk of the last couple of days in NFL circles has surrounded Jay Cutler. The questions are plentiful and they all revolved around the knee injury that took him out of the NFC Championship game. Was he hurt so badly that there was no way that he could return? Did he choose not to return despite being healthy because he was struggling? Did he quit on his team in the biggest game of the season?
There are a lot of current and former NFL players that believe that he was more than capable of staying in the ball game and were quick to call him out via any type of media that was readily accessible. Most chose Twitter to spew out their attacks on Cutler in 140 characters or less and a few even went to more traditional forms to voice their concerns, but were any of them really fair?
My answer to all of them would be no. Only Jay Cutler could truly know whether or not he had enough ability to play in that second half. Only he truly knows if the pressure of the moment got to him and he quit on his team because he was playing so poorly. I think it’s unfair to question a man’s commitment to a team because of injury. People have different pain thresholds and his may just not be high enough to live up to football standards.
I also think that a lot of people are forgetting the idea that it’s not Jay Cutler who ultimately decides who ends up on the field, but it’s Lovie Smith, the head coach. It was clear from the beginning that something was bothering Cutler and that he was not going to be his best that day. Whether it was the pressure of the moment, the Packers stifling defense or a combination of the two, don’t tell me that you weren’t thinking of who the Bears’ backup was even before Cutler got hurt?
If we were all thinking it as we watched that game, then Smith had to have been thinking about it as well. Of course, his options of Todd Collins and Caleb Hanie have very limited skill-sets and experience, but in a winner-take-all game, you look at all your options when faced with a major problem. So, if Smith is already thinking about pulling the plug on Cutler’s day and then he finds out that Cutler may have a problem with his knee, maybe all the pleading in the world would have fallen on deaf ears and Jay wouldn’t have made it back onto the field.
All I want to try and convey is that before you decide to hang Jay Cutler by the thumbs and pelt him with rocks for a lack of toughness, just take a moment to think of all the other factors, scenarios and elements in play for Cutler, Smith and the entire Bears team in general. If you do that and still feel the same way, then I feel really bad for the future of Jay Cutler.