The Bears released Jay Cutler on Thursday, letting him go after eight seasons and the most appropriate career winning percentage with the team I could imagine: .500 (51-51 in the regular season, 52-52 including playoffs).
Often when I think of Cutler, reports from 2009 that the Vikings were among the teams trying to trade for him come to mind. Instead, of course, the Bears landed him in a deal with the Broncos. For better or worse — exactly the same amount of each given his record — he's been Chicago's QB ever since.
Because I'm a sucker for revisionist history, it's hard not to think about how different life would have been had Cutler been traded to the Vikings instead of the Bears. Namely:
1) Minnesota clearly wouldn't have signed Brett Favre later that year. The Vikings already would have had their starting QB. So 2009 would have been completely different — again, for better or worse.
2) Assuming Cutler stayed healthy, the Vikings never would have drafted Christian Ponder. If he stayed in Minnesota as long as he stayed in Chicago, the Vikings wouldn't have drafted Teddy Bridgewater, either.
3) Vikings fans probably would have hated Cutler.
4) But sometimes they would have loved him, too.
5) The Vikings probably would have fared better against the Bears over the past eight years. Cutler has a 9-5 career record vs. the Vikings, including 8-5 as a Bears starter. His career record against the Packers? 2-11.
