Jay Cutler Historical Comparison Discussion

[Hail Casares]

In recent vintage I guess you could say he is a Jake Plummer/Jon Kitna hybrid.

I'm looking for some guys though from the 90's 80's and possibly 70's.

Tough to find. Anyone really from that time on PFR's similar career value had some peak seasons where they were league MVP(Sipe), made multiple PB's(Meredith), lead the league in a major passing stat..aside from INT's(O'Brien, Lamonica, Kramer, Bartkowski).

The only guy that lead the league in INT's on that list was Lamonica but it was during an All pro season.

Cutler is an interesting historical case study. Started in the NFL for 10+ years, 1 Pro Bowl, One Post season victory, consistently middling production, lead the NFL only in INT's(twice).

Anyone have any comps for him that make some sense in that regard?

[rhickok1109]

In recent vintage I guess you could say he is a Jake Plummer/Jon Kitna hybrid.

I'm looking for some guys though from the 90's 80's and possibly 70's.

Tough to find. Anyone really from that time on PFR's similar career value had some peak seasons where they were league MVP(Sipe), made multiple PB's(Meredith), lead the league in a major passing stat..aside from INT's(O'Brien, Lamonica, Kramer, Bartkowski).

The only guy that lead the league in INT's on that list was Lamonica but it was during an All pro season.

Cutler is an interesting historical case study. Started in the NFL for 10+ years, 1 Pro Bowl, One Post season victory, consistently middling production, lead the NFL only in INT's(twice).

Anyone have any comps for him that make some sense in that regard?

It probably makes no sense statistically, but I think he's a lot like Jeff George: Great arm, little brain, doesn't handle adversity well.

[Hail Casares]

It probably makes no sense statistically, but I think he's a lot like Jeff George: Great arm, little brain, doesn't handle adversity well.

George is decent too. He lead the NFL in passing yards one year and wasn't the turnover machine Cutler is. Relative to his peers George's peak was easily higher.

[L.C. Greenwood]

It probably makes no sense statistically, but I think he's a lot like Jeff George: Great arm, little brain, doesn't handle adversity well.

George is decent too. He lead the NFL in passing yards one year and wasn't the turnover machine Cutler is. Relative to his peers George's peak was easily higher.

good numbers

Jeff George is the first guy I thought of as well, put up good numbers, but wasn't going to win for you. Vinny Testaverde is somewhat similar, although he played longer. Even at Miami, Testaverde couldn't win the big one, despite playing on a stacked Hurricanes team.

[JohnH19]

I've compared Cutler to Jeff George for years. Both are/were enormous physical talents who can't seem to lead a dog to a steak.

[74_75_78_79_]

All this said, however, there is a chance (just a chance) that Cutler may end up redeeming himself before career's end. And if so, John Fox could be the reason. Despite always being more a defense-guy, he as a HC has had a way of making otherwise unspectacular QBs better such the case with Jake Delhomme and Tim Tebow along with being at-helm for Peyton's record-breaking 2013 campaign. Could last Monday Night's win vs Vikings serve as a 'corner-turner'? Guess we'll see.

[Hail Casares]

My one issue with the George comp is this: Jeff George, despite being a Grade A Jerk was a more efficient player at his peak and did it multiple times. Using Rate+* from PFR.com Cutler during his career as a fulltime starter is:

108
104
92
103
101
95
103
100
104

Jeff George is:
96
96
80
99
107
116
98
117
94
119
102


And even in behind those numbers George had really good Int% rates for his time. Only 4 time sin his career was he worse than the league average in INT%. Jay cutler has spent half his career worse than the league average in INT rate.

I like the George comp based on his mentality in regards to guys who survived on natural ability rather than ever really refining their game though.



For those unfamiliar Rate+ is passer rating normalized to the era. 100 is league average for qualified passers. Abvoe it is better. Below it is worse.

Explanation of the Advanced Passing table

This is a quick look at how a quarterback did compared to league average in eight different passing stats: yards per attempt, adjusted yards per attempt, net yards per attempt, adjusted net yards per attempt, completion percentage, passing TD percentage, interception percentage, and sack percentage.
First, for each stat for each year for each league, we computed two things:


the league average for that stat in that league during the three-year period with the given year in the middle. For example, the "league average" for the 1963 AFL would be the aggregate average of the stats accumulated in the AFL from 1962 to 1964. (NOTE: the 1960 AFL and the 1969 AFL, as well as the current season, will be based on only two years worth of data rather than three.)


the standard deviation of the stat for all individuals who had 14 or more pass attempts per scheduled game during the three-year period.

Next, we computed how many standard deviations away from the league average each player was in each of his seasons. We multiply that number by 15 and add it to 100, and that is the number you see.

Bottom line:
On all stats, 100 is league average.
On all stats (including sack percentage and interception percentage), a higher number means better than average
The greatest passing seasons of all time are in the 140s. A typical league-leading season in most categories will be in the high 120s or the low-to-mid 130s.
Fine print: Only seasons in which the player attempted 50 or more passes are included in the Advanced Passing table
The career score at the bottom is an attempt-weighted average of the numbers in the column. I.e. (yr1 attempts)*(yr1 score) + (yr2 attempts)*(yr2 score) + ..... + (yrN attempts)*(yrN score)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
total attempts


For seasons in which times sacked was not recorded, the stats involving sacks are blank. For these stats, the totals at the bottom include only the seasons for which the yearly score is not blank, so in some cases they might not be representative of the player's entire career.

[L.C. Greenwood]

I've always felt statistics can help tell part of the story, but aren't the complete picture. Jeff George, Jay Cutler, etc., are among those QBs with some good career numbers, but they also failed to make key plays during games which cost their teams. Later in games, when their teams were trailing, these QBs often complied statistics against conservative coverages when the game was close to being decided. In other words, I'll take the QB who is less efficient but converts a key play to help win, as opposed to the QB who completes a eight yard pass on third down and 11.

[Jeremy Crowhurst]

The guy I think of is Jeff Blake. A numbers comparison is a bit tricky since Blake only started 16 games twice in his career, but his Rate+ numbers are similar:
98
105
104
100
101
100
107
-
97
86

[rhickok1109]

All this said, however, there is a chance (just a chance) that Cutler may end up redeeming himself before career's end. And if so, John Fox could be the reason. Despite always being more a defense-guy, he as a HC has had a way of making otherwise unspectacular QBs better such the case with Jake Delhomme and Tim Tebow along with being at-helm for Peyton's record-breaking 2013 campaign. Could last Monday Night's win vs Vikings serve as a 'corner-turner'? Guess we'll see.

Cutler didn't have a really outstanding game Monday night, although he did manage to avoid throwing an INT. The game was won by the Bears' D and Jordan Howard's running.