HONOLULU — In front of Jay Cutler was the clear-blue but chilly-watered swimming pool at the Ihilani resort.
The gang of Pro Bowl football players had been gathered around the tables, swapping stories, when suddenly the Broncos’ quarterback had 300-pound Nick Mangold pushing from one side, 310-pound Kris Dielman holding the other and his cellphone swindled into the hands of a coy Peyton Manning.
Cutler’s radar had gone up, but he never had a chance.
Splash!
“We gave him a Pro Bowl baptism,” said Dielman, the star offensive guard of the rival San Diego Chargers.
Great fun. Big laughs. There was just one problem. Cutler is a Type 1 diabetic, and in his pocket was his blood-sugar monitor.
“That was a prank where
I thought we were smart enough to get the cellphone out of his pocket,” Dielman said. “But then, ‘Oops.’ “The monitor was fried by the chlorinated water. Fortunately, Hawaii has drug stores, and after a few calls here and there, Cutler was well-equipped by lunchtime Wednesday.
“It was a bad audible on our part,” Manning said. “I think we were thinking right, trying to get the cellphone. Then we realize, the guy gets insulin shots. We missed that.”
Here in the island of warm breezes, soft sand and chilled lagoons, Cutler has been making friends. It’s just that football friendships tend to include a few more hijinks than, say, relationships forged in a corporate office on the mainland.
After his Tuesday night dunking, Cutler had returned to the scene for Wednesday afternoon lunch.
“It’s been great,” Cutler said, his back to the Pacific Ocean and the warm sun. “All the guys have been good. Working with Peyton has been fun. Just to see what he does day to day, how he goes about it. He’s such a professional.”
No sooner had Cutler complimented Manning than guess who strode through the pool area, greeting guests at a table across the deck? Make no mistake, Peyton Manning knows how to work the room.
“He’s the mayor here,” Cutler said.
This is Cutler’s first Pro Bowl appearance, which is one more than expected for a quarterback who has been starting for only two full seasons. He has made a favorable impression here, and not just poolside. During the first quarterback meeting with the Baltimore Ravens’ and AFC coaching staff, the playing time rotation was revealed. Manning would start, Cutler would play next and veteran Kerry Collins would take a few series in the second half.
Coach John Harbaugh had even said Cutler would get most of the reps.
Cutler said hold on, here. Collins is 36, a 14-year NFL veteran invited to only his second Pro Bowl. Cutler insisted Collins play ahead of him.
“I thought it was a real nice gesture on his part,” Collins said. “And I said to him, ‘You were voted ahead of me and you should go.’ And he said, ‘No, no.’ It was respectful, and I really appreciated it. I’ve enjoyed getting to know him. He’s definitely a good guy to hang with.”
At lunch Wednesday, Dielman pulled up a chair at Cutler’s poolside table. Mr. Charger and Mr. Bronco. Aren’t these guys supposed to dislike each other?
“He’s like a lot of us, (we) play it up a little bit,” Cutler said. “I wasn’t sure how he was going to be because he’s Philip’s boy, but he’s been great.”
As the football nation knows, Cutler and Chargers’ quarterback Philip Rivers don’t like each other. It must be the island.
“We’re all out here in Hawaii having a good time,” Dielman said. “We’ll deal with that during the season. Jay’s a good dude. Philip’s a good dude. They’re two competitors. That’s what happens when you have two competitors going at each other.”
Collins is here because Brett Favre first alternate Rivers passed on the trip. The way it has gone this week, Cutler and Rivers probably would have gotten along fine.
“I think we probably would have,” Cutler said. “It’s hard not to get along with people down here in this environment.”
For the sake of the Broncos-Chargers rivalry, perhaps it was better Rivers isn’t here.
Source: Jay Cutler Article
Originally posted 2009-02-06 15:29:24.
Popularity: 2% [?]
Today, Wizards All-Star forward Caron Butler(notes), now blogging for NBA.com as “Agent Zero 2.0,” dives deeper into the caffeinated murk of his addiction to the “neon-yellow rocket fuel” known as Mountain Dew:
