Before you set fire to your Jay Cutler jersey...
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The Colorado Rockies' opening day is this Friday, April 10. Normally, this would be a great thing to write about in a sports column like Jock Itch, and I planned to do just that. But the endgame of the Jay Cutler mess was such an unprecedented clusterfuck of bruised egos, bad management, and fan opinion (God bless you, Internet morons), I had to revisit the latest chapter in the Broncos saga one last time.
If you haven’t looked at a TV in the last week, quarterback Jay Cutler was traded to the Chicago Bears for a slew of first-round draft picks (and bearded QB Kyle Orton). The trade was a good haul for the Broncos, and now the team can focus all of its energy on the bountiful picks that were acquired in the swap. The deal received a very mixed reception here in Denver, but the team really had no choice but to ship the disgruntled Cutler to Chicago and reap the benefits of a bad situation gone worse. And, of course, we'll all be revisiting how well this really turned out after the NFL draft on April 25.
I tried to stay away from the Jay Cutler story. I wanted to close the book on the mercurial QB once and for all and not drag it out any further. Anyway, aren’t we all exhausted from being beaten over the head by the story for the last few weeks? Even if you aren’t a football fan, you couldn’t escape the media hissy-fit that surrounded Cutler. Only the story about tap water catching on fire in Fort Lupton homes came close to garnering the same amount of attention—but since that didn’t involve a sensitive, shaggy-haired millionaire with a rocket arm, it couldn’t compete. I know some of you Broncos fans are sensitive as well, so here are some suggestions for what to do with all those Cutler jerseys before you burn them on your front lawn:
1. Outfit the homeless. If everyone gives his or her old Cutler jersey to local panhandlers, we'll be able to see that huge "6" coming a mile away. No more awkward excuses about not having any change on you while your pockets are jingling.
2. Paint the letters “GSH” on the sleeve and put it on eBay. The Bears uniform looks enough like the Broncos' (except for the initials honoring Bears owner George Stanley Halas) that those drunken Midwestern bastards won’t know the difference.
3. Sew them together and make a sail. Attach the sail to a trash barge and put it in front of Ward Churchill. The hot air coming from his mouth will blow that fucker straight into space.
Jay Cutler, of course, isn’t leaving the planet, so I’m sure we’ll hear from him again. Actually, he’ll be right back here in Denver on August 30 when the Bears play the Broncos. If you haven’t gotten rid of your Cutler jersey already, you've got time to think of something creative—so feel free to use our comments section below to post your craziest suggestion about how to mutilate and/or make good use of a Cutler jersey. The best suggestion, as chosen by yours truly, will win two tickets to see the upcoming football documentary Harvard Beats Yale 29-29 at Starz FilmCenter (or any other Starz movie of your choice) as well as a $25 gift card for Mezcal. The contest closes on Friday, April 10—the night Harvard Beats Yale opens—so get those thinking/hating caps on.
