A great deal of the Cutler criticism in the pre-season, probably mostly coming from upset Denver fans, was that Cutler was only good because he had Eddie Royal and Brandon Marshall to throw to. As soon as he came to the Bears with our inadequate WR core he would be exposed as merely average. Now no one is saying that Cutler has been at his best thus far...although his poise and stellar play in the Pittsburgh game was impressive...but let's take a look at how the Denver top WRs have fared with Orton at the helm in comparison to the Bears' inexperienced core through 2 regular season games of the Cutler Era:
Brandon Marshall: 7 catches, 61 yards, 0 TD
Eddie Royal: 5 catches, 38 yards, 0TD
Earl Bennett: 9 catches, 88 yards, 0 TD
Johnny Knox: 8 catches, 152 yards, 1 TD
Devin Hester: 8 catches, 111 yards, 1 TD
Now this is an understandably small sample set (and it doesn't include Stokley because his stats are padded by a play that would cause all of us to hit 'restart' on our Xbox if it happened in a video game). Two games with a new QB aren't enough to say that Royal and Marshall won't be more productive, but this will be an interesting trend to keep an eye on throughout the season, especially considering the Bears have played the harder schedule thus far.
I should also point out that I feel the Bears WR/TEs still have a long way to go. I'm not rejoicing in the streets at their production through 2 games. Too many drops are still occurring...I counted at least 3 last game not counting the one where Olsen was nearly killed by a Steeler safety. But it is nice to see that all the Bears needed was QB talent to pull productivity out of a phase of the game where it had been nonexistent for so long.
And to add on to 2J's post earlier, I plan to keep my posts as infrequent and poorly prepared as I always do. Consistency is key.
EDIT: no idea why that picture won't show up correctly...obviously the second half of it is Orton.
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