When Bears quarterback Jay Cutler left the NFC Championship Game after suffering a knee injury, he was widely criticized. Two weeks later, when Packers cornerback Charles Woodson and receiver Donald Driver left the Super Bowl with injuries, no one criticized them.
Bears coach Lovie Smith doesn’t get that.
"[Woodson] walked off, and he was standing on the sideline,” Smith said today, per Sean Jensen of the Chicago Sun-Times. “Donald Driver walked off, and he stood on the sideline. But we’re not questioning them. I never question them. Totally off base for that to happen.”
Smith says he thinks that if anything, the conversation in the football world after the NFC Championship Game should have centered on Cutler’s attempt to keep playing for one more series after suffering his knee injury.
“To me the story should have been, how tough a player Jay Cutler really is,” Smith said. “He was hurt, but he just wouldn’t take that. He still tried to go back out there and help his team win.”
And Smith wasn’t happy that FOX, which broadcast the game, repeatedly put the cameras on Cutler.
“To me, for the network, to choose those pictures, it’s wrong too,” Smith said. “On the sideline, you can portray a player whatever way you like. You can look at any player that’s injured.”
Overall, Smith is getting sick of the Cutler questions.
“That’s an insult, almost to the point where I’m tired of talking about,” Smith said. “There’s nothing to the story. For people to search for stuff like that; shame on them.”