Thank God for the Bears

All the talk on Thursday morning was that my beloved Redskins were trying to trade for Jay Cutler.  Obviously, they would give up Jason Campbell for Cutler.  I was horrified to hear this because anyone who is a Skins fan knows that when Dan Snyder gets an idea in his head it usually happens.  Forget the fact that they gave a defensive tackle who has played a full season once in his career (his rookie year when he only started 4 games) a $100m contract, paid a guy who got cut by the RAIDERS over $50m, and brought back a guy who they let go two years ago and was cut by the Bills on a big time contract too.  I would have been really upset if they had thrown away the 3 plus years they had invested in Campbell for the quick fix.

I thought Snyder had learned that the quick fix doesn't work.  After Deion Sanders, Steve Spurrier, and one play-off appearance I thought Dan had finally figured out that consistency and building a team and a system was the way to go.  Let's look at the facts of what would have happened in this deal.

Rewind to 2006.  With 5 games left the Broncos were leading the AFC Wild Card.  Inexplicably they benched Jake Plummer and brought in rookie Jay Cutler.  They lost 3 of the next five and missed the play-offs.  They have not made the play-offs under Cutler, who is 17-20 as a starter.  Not to mention he let trade talks get into his head.  This is not the kind of guy I want leading my team on a fourth quarter drive.

The Redskins have no reason to give up on Campbell.  Sure he hasn't taken them to the play-offs (Todd Collins did in the 2007-2008 season).  However, he has been in a new offensive system every year since his junior year at Auburn, save one year with Al Saunders.  If this were next year and his performance was still "sub-par" I wouldn't be as upset.  But the thing is, I don't think his performance has been bad.  Last year he lead a few game winning drives and showed that he was a leader and was growing as an NFL player.  Maybe he hasn't thrown as many TDs as Cutler, and has a slightly lower career passer rating.  But they have an almost identical win-loss record and Campbell has one thing Cutler doesn't: a position in the Redskins locker room.  I was not about to see the Skins give up a first rounder the next two years for pretty much the same player.  

Luckily the Bears swooped in and took Cutler before Snyder could.  I don't think he has learned that consistency wins in the NFL, but the Monsters of the Midway forced him to stick with their guy.  The best thing about all of this is that Campbell has repeatedly said he is not taking it personally; it shows he isn't going to be easily rattled.  So for now I can look forward to a Redskins season that should be pretty good.  Hopefully Zorn won't coach himself out of a job and Campbell can continue to grow.  Remember he was the last quarterback to complete an undefeated season in the SEC.