Stable, set Bengals are boring in March

And that's a very good thing

In the NFL, one of the great rewards in knowing what you’re doing is, you’re not running around like crazy people in the offseason. And if you happen to have a generational QB, well, compared to the crazy people, you’re on the metaphorical beach, slugging mai-tais and drawing plays on cocktail napkins.

That’s the Bengals. Solid, stable, smart. Set. Or at least as set as a team in the NF of L gets. The Men are proof that if you live long enough, you’re likely to see just about anything. Including the Bengals connected to words like solid, stable and smart.

Look what’s going on around them:

Just this week, the Washington Commanders released Carson Wentz, a QB they signed last year for three years, and traded two 3rd-round draft picks to obtain. Lucky for DC, Wentz was owed no guaranteed money. But really, how dumb/desperate do you have to be to bring in a guy like Wentz in the first place? He’d been exiled from his two previous teams. Washington’s starter now is Sam Howell, a 5th-round pick last year who has one career NFL start.

The Bears don’t seem likely to trade Justin Fields, but the possibility has been discussed. He was the 11th overall pick in ‘21 and the Bears are so confident of his future success, they’re thinking about trading him.

And of course, the mother of all messes, Lamar Jackson. The Ravens have until March 7 to franchise him. Will they? If not, what team is willing to gamble on giving him $40 million or so a year, fully guaranteed?

Jackson is a great talent who can’t stay on the field. He has missed 34 percent of Baltimore’s snaps in the past two years. It gets worse in December and January, when he has finished exactly one game in the past two seasons. He’s 1-3 in the playoffs, with a QB rating of 68.3.

Meantime, Green Bay waits to see what resident caveman Aaron Rodgers wants to do. Russell Wilson stews in Denver. Can the Browns count on Deshaun Watson? Almost everywhere you look, QB chaos reigns.

Not here. Here, the folks in the offices upstairs are saying, “Waiter, bring me another pina colada.’’ Well, that’s not exactly true. Mike Brown would never order a pina colada.

The Bengals have issues. But they are run-of-the-mill free agency, sal-cap issues. They’re not wondering how they can possibly survive without Carson Wentz.

They’re about $48 million under the cap, according to the website Spotrac. They might part with Joe Mixon which, given his numbers last year, wouldn’t be crippling. Eli Apple is a free agent, which isn’t keeping anyone inside PBS up at night. They can afford free agent Vonn Bell. They might not want to afford Jessie Bates, if he insists on being paid like an elite safety.

Hayden Hurst had a nice year, as did Samaje Perine. Both free agents. Are they irreplaceable?

And of course, Burrow will get the GNP of Burkina Faso to sign an extension.

(Burkina Faso GNP for 2019 was $15.88 billion, a 7.73% increase from 2018.) — macrotrends.net

I dislike everything about the draft, beginning today with the Combine, about which the less said, the better. I do think The Men need to improve the OL via free agency first, then with the draft, given the window of Super championship opportunity will never be bigger than it is right now and protecting Saint Joe remains Priority A.

There will be a need at RB, if Mixon is a cap casualty, and at safety. Beyond that, they’re drafting for depth. That’s a good spot to find yourselves in March.

Smart teams with great QBs are pretty boring this time of year. That’s a good thing.

Now, then. . .

TODAY’S SIGN OF THE APOCALYPSE. . .NFL Network will run more than 50 hours of Combine programming starting today at 10 AM.

HUNTER GREENE liked his performance yesterday, which says more about the meaningless-ness of results in spring training than about anything Greene accomplished on the mound.

There is this thought, though, and it is almost too sad to contemplate:

What if Greene, Lodolo and Ashcraft aren’t who we think they are? Seems to me we’ve concluded already that those three are givens, that the Reds might hit like Jane but they’ll starting-pitch like Tarzan.

What if they don’t?

Greene was great in his last 5 starts last year, allowing two earned runs in 29 innings while K-ing 45. That applied makeup to his first four months, when Greene made 19 starts, allowed 23 homers in 96 innings and worked to an ERA in the mid-5s.

Lodolo offered similar stats and reason for optimism: His ERA was 5.81 in his first six starts and 2.92 in his final 13. Ashcraft didn’t offer the same positive results.

The Reds are hoping beyond hope that the successes of those three will keep your minds off what else is (or isn’t) going on. After Greene/Lodolo/Ashcraft, there isn’t much of an immediate Plan B.

ONE MORE THOUGHT ON the Brandon Miller situation, ie the Alabama basketball player who brought the handgun to a friend, who gave it to another friend, who used it to murder a 23-year-old woman. Allegedly.

A Mobster offered a considered response to what I’d written:

“The degree to which my outragemometer rises these days is necessarily grounded in these little things I quaintly refer to as “the facts.” I haven’t followed this quasi-am sports phenom story closely, so maybe the “facts” are out there, but they aren’t in my head where they need to be. I can sit in my comfortable office and run through the list of basic questions I’d want answers to before I feel “justified” in concluding what this incredibly young person likely from an incredibly different world did was just “not right” and therefore should be “held accountable” by people who hold his future in his hands outside the parameters of the legal system that supposedly defines this country, BUT…do I really need to finish this sentence?’’

I dunno. Do you?

Once upon a time in America, there was the notion that playing big-time college sports was a privilege not a right. That’s even more true now in the age of NIL. Privileges are earned, not bestowed. Did Miller’s actions that night honor the privileges he has?

I’m not a social worker, nor do I pretend to be, so I have no idea of the “incredibly different world’’ Miller might or might not inhabit. It just seems to me that he abused the privilege he has been given.

Regardless, youse always pleasantly surprise me with your civil, smart banter. It makes This Space stand out from much of the rest of the social media-verse.

Jimmy Carter and Gregg Allman

JIMMY CARTER WAS COOL. . . We’re learning more about the former president as he lives his final days. This, from the Wall Street Journal, via Peter King:

In the mid-seventies, Gregg Allman, of Macon, Ga., and his red-hot band helped make Jimmy Carter cool to a generation of young voters who helped propel the little-known governor of Georgia into prominence in the Democratic Party, and into the White House in 1976.

“The Allman Brothers helped put me in the White House by raising money when I didn’t have any,” Mr. Carter said in the documentary film “Jimmy Carter: Rock and Roll President.”

Mr. Carter’s friendship with the band began in January 1974, when he hosted a reception for Bob Dylan and the Band following an Atlanta performance. The members of the Allman Brothers Band were invited, but none of them made it—at least while the guests were still there. In a 1987 interview with Kirk West, the band’s official archivist, Gregg Allman recalled that when he finally rolled up in a limousine, the lights were being turned off. As he was getting back into the car to drive the 90 miles back to Macon, a guard called after him and said the governor was waiting for him.

The limousine was waved ahead, and Allman saw Mr. Carter standing on the porch of the darkened house wearing a pair of Levi’s and a T-shirt, barefoot and with a baseball cap on his head. The governor greeted Allman and then surprised him by saying, “Come on in. I got some new Elmore James albums we can listen to.” As they walked inside, Mr. Carter praised Allman’s songwriting and started “rattling off the lyrics” to his songs.

WHICH CAN ONLY MEAN ONE THING here today. . .

My personal, all-time, no-doubt-about-it favorite tune ever.

Early mornin’ sunshine tells me all I need to know.