Imrem: Let the Chicago Bears quarterback controversy begin
This is how desperate the Chicago Bears' 70-year quarterback puzzle has become.
Brian Hoyer looked Sunday like the next in line to go where QBs come to die: the Bears' starter.
Not just as injured Jay Cutler's replacement for however long he's needed this season.
For a while longer.
Wake me up and slap me down for thinking this.
Seriously, though, just as some are saying anyone but Hillary, and others are saying anyone but The Donald, still others are saying anyone but Jay.
Even injured and out of uniform Sunday in Soldier Field, the Bears' starting quarterback hovered above the 17-14 victory over the Lions.
Quarterback controversy!
We have to have some fun this season, don't we?
QB intramurals are as indigenous to the Bears as food fights are to college cafeterias.
Fox started throwing around mystery meat last week by saying that Cutler isn't promised the starting job when his bum thumb is healed and added Sunday, “We'll cross that bridge when we get to it.”
Dispatching Cutler after this season, as many suspect will happen, is one thing.
Replacing him is another thing.
Don't snicker, but how Hoyer does is important to the Bears' always dubious search for a quarterback.
The primary question about divorcing Cutler the past few years always comes back to finding a bridge to a quarterback of the future.
Hoyer wasn't spectacular against the Lions but he was OK, which is all anyone is looking for at this point.
A 30-year-old NFL journeyman, Hoyer produced only 17 points, but they were enough to win.
“Just going through my reads and progressions,” Hoyer said like a legitimate quarterback would.
Sounds simple, but the Bears' offense seemed to run more smoothly than it has with Cutler, just as it did back when Josh McCown was his reliever.
If the Bears want to dump Cutler after this season, they don't need Aaron Rodgers to magically appear at Halas Hall.
Bears fans are an aware bunch when they aren't snoozing. They know that all the temp replacing Cutler will have to be is a competent professional.
The faithful would understand that the next Cutler, maybe Hoyer, will be a placeholder until the Bears find a legitimate quarterback of the future.
Hoyer isn't as bad as Bears fans first believed and now, after a first-down completion here and a touchdown completion there, the realization is that the Bears just as easily could lose more games than they win with Hoyer as with Cutler.
No quarterback who plays a single down for the Bears has to fill Tom Brady-size shoes anyway, does he?
“My role,” Hoyer said Sunday afternoon, “is to do whatever is asked of me. Tomorrow, whatever I'm asked to do I'll prepare to do.”
A bunch of tomorrows might leak into next season on a team rebuilding from the quarterback position down. Or is it the quarterback position up for this historically QB-challenged franchise?
Hoyer has to be reasonably close enough to a reasonable facsimile of a reasonable NFL quarterback to make a transition away from Cutler appear to be reasonable.
“I thought it was very good,” Fox said of Hoyer's play. “It was very efficient.”
Very good? Very efficient?
Quarterback controversy!
Duck, there's a plate of creamed spinach flying your way.
mimrem@dailyherald.com