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Hawks’ Campbell in Cutler’s corner

Blackhawks defenseman Brian Campbell, who missed almost six weeks with a sprained right MCL suffered during the preseason, came to the defense of Bears quarterback Jay Cutler on Tuesday.

“I know when I did mine I came off and even on the ice I said, ‘Oh, I can play,’ but as soon as I got back to the room here I knew something was going on and it started to tighten up,” Campbell said.

Campbell suffered a Grade II sprain to his MCL, which is the same knee injury as Cutler. Campbell did not require surgery, and neither does Cutler.

“I don’t know anything about Jay Cutler or anything, but I’d like to see everybody put in his position and going out there if you can’t move around,” Campbell said. “I know when I was rehabbing, I would never be able to plant a foot or I wasn’t allowed to do anything laterally for probably three weeks.”

Cutler’s character, as well as his courage, has been brought into question since he hurt his knee in Sunday’s NFC championship game and missed most of the second half of the Bears’ 21-14 loss to Green Bay.

Much of the Cutler bashing has taken place on social media outlets such as Twitter and Facebook, as well as sport s talk shows.

“It’s pretty disappointing, the reaction of it all,” Campbell said. “At least don’t react right away. Find out details about it and then react for a guy like that.

“You feel bad for him and his friends and his family. You see people burning his jersey and everything. Hopefully the fans and we can all, in our own way, apologize to a guy like that if that is his injury.”

Other NFL players have been critical of Cutler as well for not staying in Sunday’s game, something Campbell couldn’t imagine happening in the NHL.

“They’re probably at home watching the game and eating popcorn or whatever else,” Campbell said. “True warriors know what guys do. The guy as been sacked and beaten on how many times in the last two years and just keeps going about his business.

“Yeah, maybe he doesn’t talk the best in the media, but that’s just him,” Campbell said. “Everybody’s different. Not everybody’s perfect. Not everybody is Peyton Manning. He goes out and gets his job done and works hard and that’s all you want. Sometimes guys aren’t the best at everything. Well, he’s good at playing football and that’s what us as Bears fans should be pretty happy about.”

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