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The one constant, in 50 years of sucking, has been the Owners. Scientifically speaking, we have changed all of the other variables. Are some of you still chalking that up to some kind of luck?? Someone convinced you that Katie was the milkman's kid? That she's not an acorn that didn't fall far from Mike Brown's saggy nutsack? Have I ever told you the definition of insanity?? If you've been a long time fan, I can't believe that you're not thinking "One year we'll get lucky". C'mon. You don't really think that the Bengals ownership has a cohesive plan for long term success. I mean, they pretty openly tell us that they have an excellent plan for long term mediocrity by the way they pursue FA's and do contracts. Saving up their pennies for a rainy day. Joe Burrow has a sperm that looks promising, so we're saving for 2056 when we have to extend him. Sorry... Got to look for those second tier free agents that are a value again this year. We don't want to be foolish and spend too much for top caliber proven talent. Here's a former first round bust who looks promising!!! We are a team run by bean counters. They'd rather do things their way than be one of those successful owners who back loads contracts to keep talent when you have two generational talents on their rookie contracts. They'd hate to eat any dead money when the window is closed. Can't give up those draft picks. They hire discount coaches, and their personalities are enough of a turn off to deter most guys with better prospects. How long did it take for Carson to go from being mentioned in the same breath as Peyton to realizing he was never going to win here?? How many of the Andy/AJ years could have been a little more productive? Do I need to go back in time to the dumbest decision ever made by a football GM? Drafting Akili Smith. Do you know that GM still has his job to this very day?? I mean, crap, you'd think something like that would get a guy fired. Well, other than Dick LeBeau. Crazy bro. The Bengals ceased to be a Drama back in the 90's. This show is a "Carter Country"/"Tommy Boy" type Comedy. Mike Brown is WKRP's Arthur Carlson. Only... In the real world, the evil billionaires do win. The guys who break rules they haven't written yet. Way too effin' much for my liking. So, I root for my underdog Bengals to finally roll enough 20's to one day critical hit their way to glory... But I am under no illusion that this ship is helmed by a competent captain. They are blind squirrels who are still trying to find a nut, and they've been handed dozens of them. It's so cute. The NFL keeps going "OK, here's a #1 QB, go ahead and hold onto that..." and Mike Brown keep letting it slip through his fingers. And I keep rooting for him to finally hold on to the nut. Go blind squirrel! Hear them Bengals growling, fiscally responsible We don't have dead money, it's unconscionable On contracts we're tough, we don't pay enough And our practice dome's a High School's Cincinnati Bengals, give a cheer for their solvency Frugal Bengals, keep that cap space that you hoard To pay some guy in 20 33!!!

With the Evil Empire losing yesterday, the world is once again safe from a Yinzerpocalypse so I can safely take down my Bengal Tree today. Thought I'd snap a few photos before it all gets boxed until next season. I'm posting from my phone so if these photos are YUGE I'll fix it from my laptop later today. Tree (nighttime/ daylight): . Closeup of some ornaments: After getting engaged in '04, my future ex wife signed me up to get the annual Danbury Mint Bengals ornaments. 2004 was the first and I currently have all 21 in the series. Here they are arranged chronologically, oldest in the upper left, newest in the lower right: Zooming in, in case anyone else is a collector and want to see the one or two they may not have: Gonna stop adding photos now, in case I run afoul of a MB limit.....

What a bunch of virtue-signaling horseshit. How many of you have watched the grainy video of him running to the locker room after that Tennessee game? Actually watched it? How many of you watched Joe Mixon knock out a woman in a fast food restaurant, was it? How many of you wretched about Joe Mixon joining this team, and then became his fans and defenders once he was a Bengal and (mostly) kept himself out of trouble (despite the odd backyard shootout)? No, that wasn't you? You hated Joe Mixon outwardly, vocally, verbally this last many years no matter how many touchdowns he scored, no matter how many games he helped us win? Child please. In one video, a KID who just lost a game is running through a mob back to his locker room and some overzealous fan (a female), runs in front of him, stops, squats in his face, and clearly says some shit as she passes, and the throws out an arm as she passes. Slap is probably the right word. Swipe might work. Punch? Are you fucking kidding me? Want to see a punch? Watch what Joe Mixon did to some young woman in a fast food restaurant. That's a punch. Neither are commendable. Both are objectionable . One is clearly different than the other, and I would argue that one is reprehensible, the other simply condemnable. But are we in the place in the world now where, because of one grainy God's-eye camera angle (that would never have existed previously), some brush up with someone in an extremely heightened moment when someone did in fact aggressively put herself in the face of another human being, and that person reacts, however inappropriately, is now cause for all of this high and mighty moral bullshit? Really? We have had hotheads on this team who have cost us in big games. You know the last hot-headed play that cost us a major game, even a birth to the Super Bowl? It was Joseph Ossai, arguably one of the most high-character, level-headed players on the team, who, in a highly emotional moment made a bad decision. So yeah, don't talk to me about Vontaze Burfict. Football is a violent game full of highly competitive MF's who put their health and well-being on the line every play for our gratification. It's a brutal sport that results in MANY of these guys having jello for brains - and turning into socio/psychopaths as s result = for YOUR enjoyment. And you want to sit around and moralize about how they should be model citizens and reflect back onto you some kind of picture of how you want to see yourselves? Child please. Especially for the 80th pick in the draft, count me in with Zac, who, in the few words he said to this kid when he called to draft him, said "we believe in you." Maybe I'm old fashioned. Maybe I'm so Old fashioned you can lump me in with the Browns who believe in second chances. But I'm definitely old enough that I cannot support this idea of writing someone off forever because of some dumb shit they did as a kid. When you create a team, it's not all angels. It can't be. You need redemption songs. You need the old and washed out guys who weren't given a chance but found new life here. You need other players who were never given a chance, respect...whatever. It's called a family. And it's what Zac has created here.

I'm sure many of you knew who Onyx was on here, some may not. His real name was Jason Holland. He and I became really close friends through this website. I would go so far as saying he was like a brother. At 1pm (ish) he was lost to Post-Covid Sepsis. He got Covid a few weeks ago but in he hospital as of last Saturday he tested negative but got Sepsis from it. He didn't make it. It was like he knew, one of the last things he said to me was that he wasn't gonna get to see Joe Burrow play, he was so exited for him, he believed he was gonna take us the playoffs this year. I am going to miss him every single day for the rest of my life. Nobody could be silly and have a quick witted sense of humor like he did. I told him in tribute that he was one of the friends that I was going to ask to be a groomsman if I ever got married. Rest in Power my friend Onyx, Jason, my brother. I love you and will miss you every single day.

Herbert really deserves a lot of credit. He easily could've wet the bed and ruined the whole game. And no one here would've been surprised. Only the second game in his career with a significant amount of PT. This game he played every snap. I did see one play where he caught the ball and kinda looked scared and got tackled just short of a first down. He just didn't cut up the field quick enough. He kinda skidder bobbed around like 'oh shit I got the ball" He deserves a ton of credit for not only avoiding catastrophe but actually playing a dam good game. He was interviewed on Bengals radio before the game. Very down to Earth young man. Pretty cool guy. When he played for the Bears he was still working part time to make extra money. So I thought that was really cool.

You're right, it's no one's fault and we are wrong to think anything should change. 100% bad luck. 🙄

Lookit, you don't know shit about shit. I'm gonna say it plainly: You Are A Fascist. Not in the doctrinal sense, but in the fawning, illiterate, and immoral sense. You are not the guy who thought up the SS, you are the type of bestial excuse for a human that joins the SS. You think your voice matters. It does not. You are an enemy of the human species.

I want to give a shout out to the players who played today with injuries. Orlando Brown’s been playing on a bad leg. Tee Higgins has been playing on a bad ankle. Cody Ford played on a bad ankle and came back after a chest injury. Amarius Mims came in for a spell with a broken hand. These players all knew how important this game was and stepped up. Kudos to them.

It's a good chance to get some younger guys into the lineup. Just... Who?? Burton? Everyone else who shows promise is injured or already playing. Honestly, the next few weeks should involve some serious soul searching for Zac and Katie. I have a feeling Katie is still more focused on the special glazed ham she ordered for Christmas. It's not she has to worry about losing her job. Carson, Andy, now Joe. Different coaches. What else needs to change? Is the "plan" you've been following for 50 years to ensure sustained success leading to sustained success? Is your old school management of the cap avoiding the boom and bust cycle - wasn't that the point?? Their major achievement has been to be bad enough to get the consensus #1 QB, and the consensus #1 WR two years in a row... By sucking. To be in a position to draft Carson, Joe... Granted, I'm not feeling generous right now... But what plan has been articulated other than keep the status quo and hope our luck changes? Anyone?? Did I miss a press conference? Sit 'em, start 'em. IDGAF. Hell, you might as well start 'em, because when their playing days are done the only thing they'll have is their stats. The Titanic is sinking, and the band plays on. It was just a few bad calls, a bad hold here or there. We picked the wrong leftovers out of the FA fridge and got food poisoning... Claiming the Bengals have a plan is as bonkers as claiming you have a strategy for lottery scratch offs. Even Moses was only lost in the desert for 40 years. This isn't a coach problem, this isn't a player problem... The fish rots from the head down. Mike Brown was always Mike Brown no matter who the coach was, and we now have a large enough sample size to know that Katie is cut from the same cloth. The hope that someday Mike Brown would turn the team over to a competent heir is dead. My honest hope now is that the rising financial obligations of being an NFL owner will force the Browns to seek external funding - and external accountability. As long as the Bengals function as their own insular fiefdom, the Brown/Blackburn autocracy will be free to Farquad it up as much as they like. I will cheer the day they sell the team. I will kiss strangers. Until then... Who knows, maybe we'll get lucky again. Let's pray some prominent DC gets a DUI over Christmas and needs a place to redeem himself. Maybe we can blind squirrel a few good FA's this time around.

Burton, this is not what the team had in mind when they said you'd "play the slot"