Jay Cutler deservedly received harsh criticism for his three-interception outing in Monday night’s 31-15 loss to the New Orleans Saints, but in the wake of that debacle, the quarterback and Chicago’s public relations staff caught heat for the ensuing press conference.

Cutler answered just three questions during his press conference before leaving the interview area, and it was believed reporters in the locker room weren’t alerted to the start of the session in time to attend it. That’s true to a degree, but Monday night’s situation was more a product of circumstance than anything else.

What typically takes place after Bears home games is coach Marc Trestman conducts a radio interview with WBBM while Cutler showers. When Trestman finishes up with WBBM, he heads over to the interview room to conduct his press conference. While Trestman addresses the media in the press conference area, Cutler usually finishes up his shower, dresses and grabs a chair outside the interview room to sit in as he waits for the head coach to finish his presser.

This time, however, the interview order was thrown off for a couple reasons.

Instead of immediately taking care of his weekly postgame hit with WBBM, Trestman headed over to his office, where he stayed a few minutes, while Cutler showered. By the time Cutler finished up in the shower, Trestman was just heading over to conduct his WBBM interview, while the quarterback was ready to face the media in the press conference area.

So Cutler headed that direction.

At that time, the staff alerted reporters Cutler was walking to the podium, and several -- some even running -- headed that direction. It’s worth noting the walk is fairly long between the team’s locker room and press conference area. So by the time the reporters arrived, Cutler already had answered questions and left.