A Closer Look At The Cutler Trade

Now that several days have passed since the Broncos shipped quarterback Jay Cutler to the Bears, lets take a closer look at what went down, and why. Both the Bears and the Broncos have reason to be optimistic. The Bears got the first potential franchise quarterback they’ve had since Sid Luckman. And to get the guy they only had to give up a couple of first-round picks and a third-round pick -- selections that haven’t exactly yielded a bountiful harvest during the Jerry Angelo era in Chicago. The Broncos arguably got a lot more than they would have received if Cutler had been shipped to the Lions or the Buccaneers and Matt Cassel had come to Denver. Cassel played for a year, in a passing game featuring a veteran offensive line and Randy Moss and Wes Welker. Though he might do well on a new team, he’s not nearly as established as Cutler. Speaking of Cassel, the booty that the Bears sent to Denver for Cutler makes the second-round pick that the Pats got for Cassel seem even more glaring, at first blush. Though Cassel is not Cutler, the gap between them isn’t equivalent to the gulf between a second round pick and two ones and a three. But one fact that has routinely been overlooked in connection with the Cassel trade is that the Patriots had to move quickly to clear Cassel and his $14.65 million franchise player cap number off the books. Then there’s linebacker Mike Vrabel, who ended up going to Kansas City with Cassel. He was due to receive a $1 million roster bonus on March 1. So the Cassel deal had to go down. The Pats already had lost receiver Jabar Gaffney and long snapper Lonie Paxton to Denver in only one day of free agency. New England needed to dump the Cassel and Vrabel cap room so that the team could then keep current players and/or pursue new additions. Broncos coach Josh McDaniels, who was a member of the coaching staff in New England until the middle of January, knew or should have known that the Pats needed to move Cassel quickly. But yet the Broncos waited too long to make their move. And as to the notion that the Broncos merely answered the phone when the Patriots called offering Cassel, we know enough about what really went down to know that the discussions were far more extensive, both between the Broncos and the Patriots -- and between the Broncos and Cassel. As we understand it, the Broncos were aggressively pursuing Cassel, and then when it didn’t happen they tried to make it look like they merely responded to an inquiry that came to them unsolicited. It went much farther than that, and if the Broncos had gotten their act in gear more quickly, Cassel would be a Bronco, Cutler would be a Buccaneer or a Lion, and the Pats would have an extra first-round pick instead of simply an extra second-round selection.