Jay Cutler: Career Performance in the 2nd Quarter of Season

by Dane Noble on Oct 16, 2009 9:42 AM CDT in Notes

As teams enter the second quarter of their schedule, they have had four games to knock off the rust, get a good idea of where they stand personnel and scheme wise, and evaluate what direction to go in for the rest of the season.

As the Bears enter this part of the schedule, I thought it might be interesting to look at how Jay Cutler has performed in the second quarter during his career. Obviously, he didn't assume a starter's role until the last 5 games of the 2006 season, so we'll have to start in 2007 to get a look at his numbers.

In the four games of the 2007 season, Jay Cutler posted a 1-3 record, despite having 3 of those games at home. He completed 66.9 % of his passes, threw for 4 TDs and 3 INTs. It is noteworthy that he was injured in the 4th game (a loss at Detroit) during the second quarter, and had only thrown 4 passes to that point. His only win (at home vs. Pitt) came after the Bye week.

Looking at 2008, Cutler again posted a 1-3 record in the 2nd quarter of play, again with 3 games at home during the stretch. He completed 59.4% of passes, with 6 TDs and 6 INTs. Coming off the Bye week, he threw 2 TDs versus 3 INTs during a loss at home against the Dolphins.

Cutler's win/ loss record of 2-6 in the second quarter of the season is not good, especially considering he had the luxury of playing at home in 6 of those 8 games. He has never won on the road in the second quarter of the season. Overall, his second quarter numbers are: 63% completion of passes, 10 TDs, and 8 INTs.

Looking at the Bears second quarter games this season, we play @ Atlanta, @ Cincinnati, then at home versus Cleveland and Arizona. Cutler has shown steady improvement since the first game at Green Bay, and surely we can expect his second quarter performance in 2009 to be better than the previous two seasons.

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We certainly can expect an improved performance in this year's second quarter.

And don’t call me Shirley.

If you can't laugh at yourself you must not be very funny.

by Just Dave on Oct 16, 2009 10:49 AM CDT reply actions

Nice write up GB

Seeing that his defense was one of the worst in football over the past 2 seasons he would have had to throw alot leading to some of those picks. But i am sure he also had his fair sure due forcing throws and some bad decisions with part of his maturity process. Hopefully those days are gone (after the packer game!). He has made much better decisions the last three games, a trend that must continue to get us through this tough stretch of games.

Roachy love the run stuffin', but don't forget about the TE over the middle!!

by tfrabotta on Oct 16, 2009 11:24 AM CDT reply actions

I think I saw something that said the Broncos usually won while he was in charge if the Defense held the other team to under 21 points.

The Bears have a Defense that can do that a lot better than the Broncos did while he was there, Cutler should be fine.

Lifelong Arizona Cardinals/Chicago Bears fan.

No band-wagoner fans allowed, pick a team and stick with em, throughout the good and the bad.

by JoeCB1991 on Oct 16, 2009 3:50 PM CDT up reply actions

A Bobby Douglass Quote

this ties in nicely from the sun-times article about him today, he said:

“Quarterbacks get blamed for things they can’t control and praised for things they didn’t do.”

yes, the QB is the most important player on the field but it is still a team sport.

by genetic on Oct 16, 2009 1:46 PM CDT reply actions

Those stats contradict your optimism.

That being said, I still have this feeling that he’s gonna kick it up a notch.

by Big Ike on Oct 16, 2009 3:50 PM CDT reply actions

Maybe I could shead some light--and give some hope.

In 2007 Denver’s defense couldn’t stop anything. We were dead last against the run, and with Bailey having to worry so much against the run we got beat constitantly with deep passes. Our defense was a ‘play-action dream’ for everyone’s offense. We had no running game at all and fell behind so many times that Jay had to carry us alone. For 2007 our only offense was Jay Cutler to Brandon Marshall—-and everyone knew it. Every team just teed off towards Jay every play.

In 2008 things started out better, we added Eddie Royal, who, along with Marshall gave us one of the best WR tandems in the NFL. We still had no defense, but started the year with a pretty good running game.
Unfortunately we sent all our top running backs to IR by the end of the fourth game and after starting 3-0 we began to repeat 2007 exactly .

If we hadn’t had Cutler those two years we might well have been another Detroit.

Guardian of the Gate to La La Land!
Gonsoulin, Taylor, Little, Wright, Gradishar, Atwater, Davis, and Sharpe...
Why are they not in the Hall...I just don't understand.

by Mike Clark on Oct 18, 2009 1:23 PM CDT reply actions