Cutler just can't seize 'Moment'

It isn't fair to expect Bears quarterback Jay Cutler to win a game like Sunday night's at Atlanta.

But we're talking national television, prime time, the kind of moment that is referred to as "The Moment."

Those are just about everything in sports.

Brett Favre loves them. Every Hall of Fame quarterback lived for them. Michael Jordan, Derek Jeter, Tiger Woods - they all find a way to live up to them.

Well, on this night the Falcons wound up with a 21-14 victory in the Georgia Dome as "The Moment" slipped away.

It certainly wasn't that Cutler lost the game. The Bears committed enough penalties - a couple false starts and a pick downfield on a pass play - to blunt a potential tying drive.

But the thing is that Cutler didn't win this game either.

The "Moment" men overcome everything, including bumbling teammates, the opposition, a hostile crowd and even their own misplays.

Everything is magnified in "The Moment." Six-foot-tall athletes become either 10 feet tall or half that size.

Cutler is still trying to be more the former than the latter.

Prime-time NFL games are like training wheels for "The Moment." They aren't exactly playoff games or the Super Bowl but often are like leading indicators.

The rest of the league is watching. Fans from coast to coast are, too. The media make snap judgments off TV from hundreds of miles away.

Reputations are conjured after dark in the NFL. Sunday night at Atlanta was Cutler's second opportunity this season to embrace "The Moment," the first being in prime time at Green Bay in his first game for the Bears.

Cutler flunked against the Packers, throwing 4 interceptions. He now has 6 in those two games.

The Falcons' provided an opportunity to make a second impression. All Cutler had to do was win the game. It didn't happen.

Cutler drove the Bears to the 5-yard line in the final minute, but they kept imploding. Sorry, I still expected Cutler to overcome all the obstacles and win the game.

Maybe I watched Jordan do that too often, but that's what I expect from the most heralded athlete to arrive in Chicago since His Airness showed up 25 years ago.

Cutler is regarded to be the Bears' best player, so it's his responsibility to win the game when "The Moment" arrives.

The best player is supposed to overcome everything and Cutler had that chance on the game's next-to-last play.

While Cutler didn't make any of the gaffes on the final drive, he did make a couple early that compromised his chance to make "The Moment" his later.

Those 2 interceptions he threw in the first half - 1 in the red zone when the Bears were asserting themselves - kept the Falcons in the game.

Still, the victory was there to be had in the last minute - in "The Moment," if you will - but Cutler didn't find a way to win despite all the adversity confronting him.

Some athletes are born to excel in "The Moment" and some have to grow into it. Cutler has plenty of time to get there.

Yet while it might not be fair to point this out, his first two opportunities with Bears came up empty.