Had no idea you were making a triumphant comeback, Doc. It's reminds me of eating Skyline after being in NY for 10 years. There's nothing quite like it. Thank Baby Jesus for your return!
Yep. 3 really good, if not great, receivers. 9 of 10 clubs would trade their QB plus more for Joe. Why can't we take a lead before the last 5 minutes of the game?
Doc, you touched on it, (7-6 with 4 to go last year) but I've been thinking about this 3-3 Bengal team after first 6 games compared to the 2021 team. They could be 6-3 after the next 3. So, there is that, but what I am really wondering is WHY everyone seems to be talking about the offensive woes of the Bengals and Joe Burrow while somehow no one seems to be taking note of the actual failure of the Bengal Defense in each of the 3 losses???? Bengal offense and Joe Burrow actually did just enough at just the right time to position the team for a win in each of the 3 losses. Defense just needed to make the key stop and Bengals squeak out a victory. The D did NOT make the crucial stop necessary in any of those 3 losses. That is not even mentioning the Bengal win over a Dalton-led Saints team that ran all over the Bengal D. Of course the D did make the stop at the end to secure the winning opportunity against .... uh, Andy Dalton who has never risen to the occasion in a critical moment, never. Yep, this Bengal team has a way to go, but it is the whole team, maybe especially the defense, not just the offense and Joe Burrow - special teams and everyone.
Cheers for an out of town baseball team but none for the scrappy local soccer team? They had a nice come from behind win which included enduring 12 minutes of extra time. Their turnaround from being last in the league 3x times to now playing in the final eight is impressive.
Also, the Tennessee/Alabama game was more exciting than any baseball played or forthcoming this season.
The Chase late TD covered up a lot of errors by the Bengals throughout. Hendrickson had a terrible 'roughing' penalty on a 3rd and 25 in the 3rd, defense gave up 5 straight 20+ yd runs in-a-row-!, Bates was out to lunch most of the game, and Collins had a couple more blown plays. Pass defense left middle of field wide open all day, and Dalton kept exploiting it. Bengals shoulda blitzed more: Dalton likes to fire balls halfway up the stands everytime he gets a little pressure. The zone certainly didn't work much. Bengals can't keep counting on Burrow and McPherson to bail them out, game after game. It doesn't work that way.
I was rooting for Chase to not score and go down at the one. Make N'Orleans burn a few TOs, try to score on 3rd down, kick the FG on 4th. Burn some clock. I think I have a bad case of PTSD from so many losses on game winning FGs. These guys remind me of the Kardiac Kids.....good ol' Brian Sipe and the Browns of the early '80s. They could use an easy win really soon. So could the fans. Watching games with a sense of deep dread in the 4th Q all the time can shorten one's life expectancy.
The list of inept QB’s that have abused the Bengals is longer than the north end zone bathroom line. No reason to believe these Bengals are any different other than a charmed season last year of mostly weak and injured opponents. Zach can’t continue to zach and expect a porous secondary and Burrow/ Chase to keep bailing him out. This isn’t quite a Hail Mary team but it’s an offense based on a wing and a prayer.
Maybe. Good Andy showed up yesterday. He led the Bengals to the playoffs more than once. He can be dangerous at crunch time. I doubt the Bengals sideline was underestimating him.
I think the Bengals and Zac Taylor have proven they can’t be relied on to score on “first down and goal to go”. Chase goes down on the two, and we could have been in for a replay of the Baltimore game. I mean, it was just last week..
Last week they left way too much time on the clock for L Jackson to work his magic. FG yesterday gives Bengals a lead with under a minute to play, no TOs left for Saints. Which is lesser of 2 evils? I don't really know. Either way, Bengals have had hard time stopping winning drives this year. I like running out clock as much as possible going forward.
And they’ve lost three games on last second field goals before finally stopping the incomparable Andy Dalton. This team has put up 30 points once, I believe. The Saints scored 39 last week in a win. I’ll take the points with this edition of the Bengals, unless it’s Victory Formation time.
We share the same concern: the Bengals rarely stop a team's final drive, especially when they leave significant time on the clock. I see your side. My feeling is this: if you can bleed the clock down from 2 minutes to under a minute and take away the other team's time outs by waiting till 4th down to kick a FG for the lead, it might be the better option. At least, as you said, they managed to stop the "incomparable" Dalton....finally.
I don't know, Pogo. Bengals were trailing, not tied, so I take the points and make Andy Dalton score a TD. Not his forte, especially with the limited receiving options available to him.
Meanwhile, I thought it was foolish of Saquon Barkley to fall down on the one yard line yesterday with more than a minute to go when the TD would have put the Giants up 11. Take the points. The only good thing is my fantasy opponent had Barkley so it saved me some points. :)
OKOK fair enough. Points are almost always good, especially if you're losing. But the go-ahead points were a 98% given as a 4th down FG, and all 3 losses directly ensued after giving the ball back to the other team with time left. Giving the ball back has been a recipe for disaster for the Bengals. We can't argue that. Granted the opponents only needed FGs in the past instead of a TD, but clearly giving the ball back to the other team has blown up every dang time, till yesterday. I say change it up; sit on the clock and bleed it. Take a knee for 3 downs. Burn that clock. Yeah. I agree about Barkley.
And with this team, despite a new long snapper, a blocked / misplayed FG is always a possibility. If Chase had gone down on the two, and a FG was somehow missed, and the Bengals drop to 2-4, of which all of 10% of 2-4 teams have gotten into the playoffs... how ya feelin’ then?
Oh c'mon....they fixed the snapper problem weeks ago. MacPherson has been golden. He just hit a 50+ yarder earlier in the final Q, and now you got the roof falling in on a chip shot. If that happened again, you and the Bengals got no business suggesting they're a playoff team, not because they're 2-4 but because they're complete chokes. I have way more faith in MacPherson and the FG unit than you do, apparently. Sounds like you don't believe in both the D and the FG unit. Such a conundrum. Go to church next Sunday; they teach all about having a little faith.
The Bengals offense cannot impose it's will without a decent running game. That's what is going to change the opponents scheme. If the Bengals can't run, the defense just sits back in the cover 2 and never gives away anything deep. If the Bengals can run, now the defense needs to put some bodies up front, leaving man-to-man. That's when they can impose their will.
This could be a season-defining win for the Men. The offense definitely got some swagger back in the second half.
I was hoping the Dalton we’d see at the end of yesterday’s game was not the Dalton we saw at the end of the 2015 Seattle game. Of course, it would have been Cincy luck to get that Dalton instead and watch him drive down the field for a game-winning score. Thankfully, we got the more pedestrian Dalton on the last Saints possession.
Not a bad weekend for Cincy squads … FC doing its thing and playing the role of “Little Engine that Could” in winning their first playoff game. They knock off Philly next, they might have a shot at it all … and they’ve played Philly well this year.
Hope the Guardians pull it out tonight. Would love to see an Astros-Guardians ALCS to go with the Phillies-Padres NLCS. No Dodgers, Yankees, Red Sox, etc. playing for it all. That’s a great baseball season right there!
I agree pretty much with what you're seeing NFL wise, Doc. However, regarding the Chiefs, their defense is porous and makes me question their SB credentials. Makes for a fun TV game to watch from Arrowhead though...
You say “poor tackling”. I say a #1 WR who can make his man miss and then “get rubber in all four gears”. That’s why he was a #1 pick. He rarely loses one-on-one battles. So, that’s due to poor technique by the DBs?
Must win? Yes! Losing to a backup QB missing three starting receivers, who then had to rely on only a rushing attack - which was almost enough - to fall to 2-4 while facing the aforementioned gauntlet of “real” QBs later in the season, could have been soul-crushing. Certainly could have led to some vocal questioning by players. (Like last year.)
Chase broke a poor tackle, eluded the next guy because the man took a poor angle. And I say 10-7 wins the North. That would be 8-3 the rest of the way, had the Bengals lost Sunday. Lotsa teams have 8-3 stretches. So, no, not a must win.
I'm betting Chase will have that "bad angle" evasion (which to me looked like a split second freeze when expecting the stiff arm but instead getting the gas) mounted seeing as it was five-time Pro Bowl and Super Bowl winning Honey Badger he left in his wake.
Chase makes for poor tacklers. Chase’s speed makes for poor angles. Glass half-full vs half- empty “analysis”. (I’m usually glass half-empty, but I can recognize Burrow and Chase are special players.) 8-3 a lot tougher knowing you can’t even beat a very hobbled Saints team. As for only 3 more losses, if you can’t beat Andy Dalton playing with no receivers, which of Allen, Mahomes, Brady, or Jackson DO you beat?
The Bengals have much to clean up, but they got the job done. That run defense looked rough and with the injuries on that side of the ball mounting, the run defense may be looking rough for several weeks.
Funny: while mowing the lawn on Friday, I was listening to a Santana compilation album. I do not ever recall hearing “Europa” before. (Abraxas and Caravanserai were 2 favorites). Well, I played Europa 3 times in a row. No better way to make the lawn work fly by than playing great music. BTW, back in the early 70’s I went to an Emerson, Lake & Palmer concert. Santana was the opening act. The Woodstock performance was a big break for Carlos and his band.
Ever heard Santana's work with John McLaughlin and his Mahavishnu Orchestra? I didn't get it back in the day, but it grew on me over the years, and I play it now and then when I need a different sound. Jazz fusion went a lot of strange but intriguing places.
Not certain if I remember Carlos with Mahavishnu specifically, but I agree their sounds would be an obvious match. Caravanserai was an album that would compare.
We listened a fair amount to JMcL and the Mahavishnu’s music, but that was back in the day-back in the early 70’s. We thought it was mysterious and cool. Thanks for the reminder, I should seek out obtaining some of his music. Do you have any favorite albums to recommend?? We also saw King Crimson in concert, it was a rock/blues/jazz fusion band. I still have some of their music. It is definitely a little different too.
Inner Mounting Flame by the Mahavishnu Orchestra, Love Devotion Surrender by Santana and JMcL, Cosmic Messenger and Enigmatic Ocean by Jean Luc Ponty come to mind.
Album titles meant something to these guys, for sure.
Had no idea you were making a triumphant comeback, Doc. It's reminds me of eating Skyline after being in NY for 10 years. There's nothing quite like it. Thank Baby Jesus for your return!
Let’s see if The Men can build on the not so impressive W against NO. At this time they are definitely at lesser echelon than Eagles, Bills and KC.
Another very enjoyable piece to read.
Yep. 3 really good, if not great, receivers. 9 of 10 clubs would trade their QB plus more for Joe. Why can't we take a lead before the last 5 minutes of the game?
Doc, you touched on it, (7-6 with 4 to go last year) but I've been thinking about this 3-3 Bengal team after first 6 games compared to the 2021 team. They could be 6-3 after the next 3. So, there is that, but what I am really wondering is WHY everyone seems to be talking about the offensive woes of the Bengals and Joe Burrow while somehow no one seems to be taking note of the actual failure of the Bengal Defense in each of the 3 losses???? Bengal offense and Joe Burrow actually did just enough at just the right time to position the team for a win in each of the 3 losses. Defense just needed to make the key stop and Bengals squeak out a victory. The D did NOT make the crucial stop necessary in any of those 3 losses. That is not even mentioning the Bengal win over a Dalton-led Saints team that ran all over the Bengal D. Of course the D did make the stop at the end to secure the winning opportunity against .... uh, Andy Dalton who has never risen to the occasion in a critical moment, never. Yep, this Bengal team has a way to go, but it is the whole team, maybe especially the defense, not just the offense and Joe Burrow - special teams and everyone.
Cheers for an out of town baseball team but none for the scrappy local soccer team? They had a nice come from behind win which included enduring 12 minutes of extra time. Their turnaround from being last in the league 3x times to now playing in the final eight is impressive.
Also, the Tennessee/Alabama game was more exciting than any baseball played or forthcoming this season.
Still, so nice to read TML on a Monday morning.
The Chase late TD covered up a lot of errors by the Bengals throughout. Hendrickson had a terrible 'roughing' penalty on a 3rd and 25 in the 3rd, defense gave up 5 straight 20+ yd runs in-a-row-!, Bates was out to lunch most of the game, and Collins had a couple more blown plays. Pass defense left middle of field wide open all day, and Dalton kept exploiting it. Bengals shoulda blitzed more: Dalton likes to fire balls halfway up the stands everytime he gets a little pressure. The zone certainly didn't work much. Bengals can't keep counting on Burrow and McPherson to bail them out, game after game. It doesn't work that way.
I was rooting for Chase to not score and go down at the one. Make N'Orleans burn a few TOs, try to score on 3rd down, kick the FG on 4th. Burn some clock. I think I have a bad case of PTSD from so many losses on game winning FGs. These guys remind me of the Kardiac Kids.....good ol' Brian Sipe and the Browns of the early '80s. They could use an easy win really soon. So could the fans. Watching games with a sense of deep dread in the 4th Q all the time can shorten one's life expectancy.
You underestimated Andy Dalton's ability to not play well at crunch time! I knew he couldn't lead a comeback win for the Saints! :)
The list of inept QB’s that have abused the Bengals is longer than the north end zone bathroom line. No reason to believe these Bengals are any different other than a charmed season last year of mostly weak and injured opponents. Zach can’t continue to zach and expect a porous secondary and Burrow/ Chase to keep bailing him out. This isn’t quite a Hail Mary team but it’s an offense based on a wing and a prayer.
Maybe. Good Andy showed up yesterday. He led the Bengals to the playoffs more than once. He can be dangerous at crunch time. I doubt the Bengals sideline was underestimating him.
I think the Bengals and Zac Taylor have proven they can’t be relied on to score on “first down and goal to go”. Chase goes down on the two, and we could have been in for a replay of the Baltimore game. I mean, it was just last week..
Last week they left way too much time on the clock for L Jackson to work his magic. FG yesterday gives Bengals a lead with under a minute to play, no TOs left for Saints. Which is lesser of 2 evils? I don't really know. Either way, Bengals have had hard time stopping winning drives this year. I like running out clock as much as possible going forward.
And they’ve lost three games on last second field goals before finally stopping the incomparable Andy Dalton. This team has put up 30 points once, I believe. The Saints scored 39 last week in a win. I’ll take the points with this edition of the Bengals, unless it’s Victory Formation time.
We share the same concern: the Bengals rarely stop a team's final drive, especially when they leave significant time on the clock. I see your side. My feeling is this: if you can bleed the clock down from 2 minutes to under a minute and take away the other team's time outs by waiting till 4th down to kick a FG for the lead, it might be the better option. At least, as you said, they managed to stop the "incomparable" Dalton....finally.
I don't know, Pogo. Bengals were trailing, not tied, so I take the points and make Andy Dalton score a TD. Not his forte, especially with the limited receiving options available to him.
Meanwhile, I thought it was foolish of Saquon Barkley to fall down on the one yard line yesterday with more than a minute to go when the TD would have put the Giants up 11. Take the points. The only good thing is my fantasy opponent had Barkley so it saved me some points. :)
OKOK fair enough. Points are almost always good, especially if you're losing. But the go-ahead points were a 98% given as a 4th down FG, and all 3 losses directly ensued after giving the ball back to the other team with time left. Giving the ball back has been a recipe for disaster for the Bengals. We can't argue that. Granted the opponents only needed FGs in the past instead of a TD, but clearly giving the ball back to the other team has blown up every dang time, till yesterday. I say change it up; sit on the clock and bleed it. Take a knee for 3 downs. Burn that clock. Yeah. I agree about Barkley.
And with this team, despite a new long snapper, a blocked / misplayed FG is always a possibility. If Chase had gone down on the two, and a FG was somehow missed, and the Bengals drop to 2-4, of which all of 10% of 2-4 teams have gotten into the playoffs... how ya feelin’ then?
Oh c'mon....they fixed the snapper problem weeks ago. MacPherson has been golden. He just hit a 50+ yarder earlier in the final Q, and now you got the roof falling in on a chip shot. If that happened again, you and the Bengals got no business suggesting they're a playoff team, not because they're 2-4 but because they're complete chokes. I have way more faith in MacPherson and the FG unit than you do, apparently. Sounds like you don't believe in both the D and the FG unit. Such a conundrum. Go to church next Sunday; they teach all about having a little faith.
The Bengals offense cannot impose it's will without a decent running game. That's what is going to change the opponents scheme. If the Bengals can't run, the defense just sits back in the cover 2 and never gives away anything deep. If the Bengals can run, now the defense needs to put some bodies up front, leaving man-to-man. That's when they can impose their will.
They should draft a RB this year. It’s time…
NFL. MLB. Make the playoffs, and anything can happen, if you're fairly healthy and hot. Another 10-7 could get the Bengals there. The Reds? Well...
I got to see Santana open for Clapton many years ago. Guess who wowed me the most. CARLOS!!!
This could be a season-defining win for the Men. The offense definitely got some swagger back in the second half.
I was hoping the Dalton we’d see at the end of yesterday’s game was not the Dalton we saw at the end of the 2015 Seattle game. Of course, it would have been Cincy luck to get that Dalton instead and watch him drive down the field for a game-winning score. Thankfully, we got the more pedestrian Dalton on the last Saints possession.
Not a bad weekend for Cincy squads … FC doing its thing and playing the role of “Little Engine that Could” in winning their first playoff game. They knock off Philly next, they might have a shot at it all … and they’ve played Philly well this year.
Hope the Guardians pull it out tonight. Would love to see an Astros-Guardians ALCS to go with the Phillies-Padres NLCS. No Dodgers, Yankees, Red Sox, etc. playing for it all. That’s a great baseball season right there!
What??? No comment about the amazing Tennessee Volunteer win over Alabama??
Boom! On every front.
I agree pretty much with what you're seeing NFL wise, Doc. However, regarding the Chiefs, their defense is porous and makes me question their SB credentials. Makes for a fun TV game to watch from Arrowhead though...
You say “poor tackling”. I say a #1 WR who can make his man miss and then “get rubber in all four gears”. That’s why he was a #1 pick. He rarely loses one-on-one battles. So, that’s due to poor technique by the DBs?
Must win? Yes! Losing to a backup QB missing three starting receivers, who then had to rely on only a rushing attack - which was almost enough - to fall to 2-4 while facing the aforementioned gauntlet of “real” QBs later in the season, could have been soul-crushing. Certainly could have led to some vocal questioning by players. (Like last year.)
Chase broke a poor tackle, eluded the next guy because the man took a poor angle. And I say 10-7 wins the North. That would be 8-3 the rest of the way, had the Bengals lost Sunday. Lotsa teams have 8-3 stretches. So, no, not a must win.
I'm betting Chase will have that "bad angle" evasion (which to me looked like a split second freeze when expecting the stiff arm but instead getting the gas) mounted seeing as it was five-time Pro Bowl and Super Bowl winning Honey Badger he left in his wake.
Chase makes for poor tacklers. Chase’s speed makes for poor angles. Glass half-full vs half- empty “analysis”. (I’m usually glass half-empty, but I can recognize Burrow and Chase are special players.) 8-3 a lot tougher knowing you can’t even beat a very hobbled Saints team. As for only 3 more losses, if you can’t beat Andy Dalton playing with no receivers, which of Allen, Mahomes, Brady, or Jackson DO you beat?
The Bengals have much to clean up, but they got the job done. That run defense looked rough and with the injuries on that side of the ball mounting, the run defense may be looking rough for several weeks.
One of the best guitar solos ever:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPki6mUDzOw
One of the best covers of a Beatles tune ever, as well.
Duane Allman + Wilson Pickett = Fire
Funny: while mowing the lawn on Friday, I was listening to a Santana compilation album. I do not ever recall hearing “Europa” before. (Abraxas and Caravanserai were 2 favorites). Well, I played Europa 3 times in a row. No better way to make the lawn work fly by than playing great music. BTW, back in the early 70’s I went to an Emerson, Lake & Palmer concert. Santana was the opening act. The Woodstock performance was a big break for Carlos and his band.
Ever heard Santana's work with John McLaughlin and his Mahavishnu Orchestra? I didn't get it back in the day, but it grew on me over the years, and I play it now and then when I need a different sound. Jazz fusion went a lot of strange but intriguing places.
Not certain if I remember Carlos with Mahavishnu specifically, but I agree their sounds would be an obvious match. Caravanserai was an album that would compare.
We listened a fair amount to JMcL and the Mahavishnu’s music, but that was back in the day-back in the early 70’s. We thought it was mysterious and cool. Thanks for the reminder, I should seek out obtaining some of his music. Do you have any favorite albums to recommend?? We also saw King Crimson in concert, it was a rock/blues/jazz fusion band. I still have some of their music. It is definitely a little different too.
Inner Mounting Flame by the Mahavishnu Orchestra, Love Devotion Surrender by Santana and JMcL, Cosmic Messenger and Enigmatic Ocean by Jean Luc Ponty come to mind.
Album titles meant something to these guys, for sure.