Cutler beating a reminder of Martz's system flaws - NFL - Yahoo! Sports
Makes sense to me......
By Charles Robinson, Yahoo! Sports Oct 4, 3:22 am EDT
For a moment, Jay Cutler looked slow. Maybe lost. More likely, what we thought was lethargy was simply the case of being shelled one too many times.
We all saw this coming, didn’t we? We kept watching the Chicago Bears quarterback take it on the chin, in the ear, up the nose. Eventually, something was going to rattle loose. This is what happens when you marry a terrible offensive line with a scheme that exposes a quarterback to the maximum punishment – the guy with the ball crumbles. And that’s what Cutler did Sunday night – a little bit mentally and whole lot physically.
Cutler was sacked nine times in the first half of Sunday’s 17-3 loss to the Giants, the last of which left him concussed and knocked out of the game. Some of the sacks could be attributed to slow decisions on his part. Some could be blamed on poor protection. Some were simply the Giants featuring a pair of Pro Bowl defensive ends who decided to show up on the same day.
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But I think as Cutler accrued hits on Sunday, some of his lethargy might have been from simply being beaten like a burlap sack. It is a reality that if you hit a quarterback often enough, it impacts his decision-making in the pocket. He becomes distracted, makes the wrong reads, or stops looking down field altogether. And eventually, he is shell-shocked. That’s how Cutler looked by the end of the half, like he wasn’t all there mentally – and not in the usual mopey Cutler way. For that, Cutler and the Bears are this week’s biggest loser.
What Sunday’s half of football reminded me of is actually far more frightening. It reminded me of Kurt Warner talking about his head not being entirely right after suffering so many hits in the system of Bears offensive coordinator Mike Martz. Go back to 2002 and 2003 and look at the film of Warner getting constantly decked. Years later, Warner would look back with a strong feeling that those hits, and some of the resulting concussions, accounted for the five-year doughnut hole in his career, when he inexplicably played like a middling journeyman.
It wasn’t until 2006 that Warner felt completely healthy and simply “all there” again. And the result was him returning to his Hall of Fame-worthy form. It’s worth thinking about in terms of Cutler. Anyone who watched him for his first 3½ games this season knows that despite the early success, he has already taken a significant amount of punishment. At first, it seemed admirable. But after seeing him look so physically odd in the second quarter against the Giants, I’m beginning to wonder if maybe it’s just plain dangerous.
The Bears need to think long and hard about their investment and realize that something drastic has to change. Either Martz has to change what he does schematically for the sake of his quarterback (he won’t … ask Warner and Marc Bulger(notes)), or the Bears have to pray for some offensive line help off the street, from the sky, or lord forbid, the UFL. One way another, something has to change.
Now on to this week’s winners and other losers …
Makes sense to me......
By Charles Robinson, Yahoo! Sports Oct 4, 3:22 am EDT
For a moment, Jay Cutler looked slow. Maybe lost. More likely, what we thought was lethargy was simply the case of being shelled one too many times.
We all saw this coming, didn’t we? We kept watching the Chicago Bears quarterback take it on the chin, in the ear, up the nose. Eventually, something was going to rattle loose. This is what happens when you marry a terrible offensive line with a scheme that exposes a quarterback to the maximum punishment – the guy with the ball crumbles. And that’s what Cutler did Sunday night – a little bit mentally and whole lot physically.
Cutler was sacked nine times in the first half of Sunday’s 17-3 loss to the Giants, the last of which left him concussed and knocked out of the game. Some of the sacks could be attributed to slow decisions on his part. Some could be blamed on poor protection. Some were simply the Giants featuring a pair of Pro Bowl defensive ends who decided to show up on the same day.
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Jay Cutler was sacked by the Giants for an NFL-record nine times in one half.But I think as Cutler accrued hits on Sunday, some of his lethargy might have been from simply being beaten like a burlap sack. It is a reality that if you hit a quarterback often enough, it impacts his decision-making in the pocket. He becomes distracted, makes the wrong reads, or stops looking down field altogether. And eventually, he is shell-shocked. That’s how Cutler looked by the end of the half, like he wasn’t all there mentally – and not in the usual mopey Cutler way. For that, Cutler and the Bears are this week’s biggest loser.
What Sunday’s half of football reminded me of is actually far more frightening. It reminded me of Kurt Warner talking about his head not being entirely right after suffering so many hits in the system of Bears offensive coordinator Mike Martz. Go back to 2002 and 2003 and look at the film of Warner getting constantly decked. Years later, Warner would look back with a strong feeling that those hits, and some of the resulting concussions, accounted for the five-year doughnut hole in his career, when he inexplicably played like a middling journeyman.
It wasn’t until 2006 that Warner felt completely healthy and simply “all there” again. And the result was him returning to his Hall of Fame-worthy form. It’s worth thinking about in terms of Cutler. Anyone who watched him for his first 3½ games this season knows that despite the early success, he has already taken a significant amount of punishment. At first, it seemed admirable. But after seeing him look so physically odd in the second quarter against the Giants, I’m beginning to wonder if maybe it’s just plain dangerous.
The Bears need to think long and hard about their investment and realize that something drastic has to change. Either Martz has to change what he does schematically for the sake of his quarterback (he won’t … ask Warner and Marc Bulger(notes)), or the Bears have to pray for some offensive line help off the street, from the sky, or lord forbid, the UFL. One way another, something has to change.
Now on to this week’s winners and other losers …
