Jay Cutler gets contract extension

Clearly Jay Cutler has made the Chicago Bears better, but he really hasn’t proven that he is the reason they are as improved yet. With that in mind the decision by the Bears to extend him two years for a pretty significant amount of money seems a little premature. Let us not forget that Cutler’s old team, with Chicago’s old QB are 6-0 and headed toward the Super Bowl, while it seems the Bears are destined for a wild card playoff game they might not be able to win. The simple fact here it seems the Bears jumped the gun a little by signing this deal.

It’s not like Cutler was set to leave the team in 2010 or anything. In fact his existing contract was for another two years, and even with performance enhancers it was a very manageable deal. His top guaranteed salary would come in 2011 and be just 1.8 million. It seems the Bears could have served themselves well to let Cutler play this year, and 2010 on his existing contract and then worked out an extension if he had proven himself at that point.

Instead Cutler will be the Bears QB until 2013. The two year extension is reportedly worth as much as 30 million dollars, with around 20 million of that guaranteed. That seems like a lot of money for a very average QB, to this point in his career. However given the Bears struggle to find a franchise QB one can understand their eagerness to lock him up for the long term.