Leaderboard

Is the POS field at Allegiant eligible? If so, that's my first ever SB nomination

Hendrickson has been worth every penny

Since it hasn't been started. Fuck that whole organization.

Just needs Bengals to win, that's all that matters. Everything will fall into place if you win, winning is all you can put hope into, not other teams especially.

KK played hard too, but like Dalton he sucked. No one crumbled under lights and pressure more than old Andy. He did his best, he was a good guy in the lockerrrom and in the community but he was simply not a winner. Team should have moved on well before they did.

I hope the entire Stealers team gets a scorching case of syphilis. Beating these dirty fucks to go 7-4 would be a thing of beauty.

You two shower together?

Fixed

What are you talking about? I actually am quite fond of Andy... you won't find me bashing him anywhere on here. That was my observation from watching the game, so I get lumped in as 'hating him'?

Nagy....."Im getting fired soon".. Dalton...."Best news since Ive been here"..

Tks for sharing.. Memories....everlasting..

I had a friend back in the later ‘60’s, whose dad roomed with Dick LeBeau at OSU. LeBeau gave him tickets for a game, and he took my friend and I along. It was at Tiger Stadium, and they played the Eagles. The place was a dreary dump, the weather awful, and even though I was hardly a pro football expert at that young age, a totally wretched game. The only player I knew was LeBeau (Karras I think was too). The Lions…as one might figure…lost. All these years later, and it’s still fresh in my memory banks.

Joe is a fucking boss!!!!!

I will toss thoughts but don't usually do the GBE format - but feel free to use the traditional on y'alls own... ---Not sure they win that game if Bullock or Seibert are still this team's kicker. McPherson bombing figgies from 54, 53 and 51 - with each being needed points was a massive difference in this game. That guy totally changes the dynamic. ---I alluded to this in the game thread, but I generally hate pushing the run game - but ZT had the right plan today. Easier to live with the time it takes to establish the run and wear teams down late (like they did today) when you have a kicker who can cash in drives when they inevitably run out of steam with that approach. Ravens for years use Tucker to bail them out in these kind of games - we got bailed out today w/ a good kicker. Nice. ---Sure wish they used Evans more - Perine is...fine. Evans has a whole different gear. ---Line stabalized as game went on after a roughish feeling 1st quarter. Allowing just one sack to Crosby/Ngokwe was good work in final analysis. ---Nice bounce-back for the defense - good gameplan and other than the one drive - really excellent from them today. Good discipline to choke down on the short passing game too. ---Good work from Burrow to be patient and not force things. Has to be hard to throttle back, but he managed things well today. ---Still wish Higgins would find his mojo on contested catches. ---I could not believe we waited two weeks for them to to run a TE screen to Sample for play one. Much cussing from me. ---That said, Sample does block well. And...Stanley Morgan blocks like a madman. ---Great game from Mixon - put the team on his back and got stronger as game went on. Nice to have that on film. ---Wish they could find more consistency with the run blocking early in games - not sure what the issue is there. It gets better as game goes on. ---vintage game from Boyd - glad they found him again to help move the sticks. ZT can't forget to do that going forward.

Only team in the NFL with out one, til today. Not that this award means anything, but still. Not GMFB's YT channel, the title is total click bait.

We ought not get caught up in what happens in other games like that right now. We just need to win our games, particularly the division ones. Actually I'm glad to see our rivals face off w/i the division. It seems like we've been the only team forced to do that to this point. Let's start hanging some losses on our opponents.

Article in the Athletic on Taylor: ' ‘Zac’s a sponge’: What Bengals coach Zac Taylor learned along the way to build a winner in Cincinnati Dan Pompei 2h ago 4 CINCINNATI — The air horn blows at the end of Rams practice at 5:30 p.m. on Jan. 3, 2019. Zac Taylor sprints across the field on the campus of Cal Lutheran and through a gate leading to a neighborhood. After running about two-thirds of a mile, he is at his house in Thousand Oaks, Calif. He could have driven, but that would have taken as long as three minutes if he caught a red light. And he didn’t want to bring his car keys to practice. Taylor spends 10 minutes showering and putting on the suit he had laid out. Then he drives to the Four Seasons Westlake. He walks into a meeting room 30 minutes after running off the field, on time for an interview with Broncos general manager John Elway and other team executives. Twelve hours later, he is back in the same room interviewing with Bengals owner Mike Brown, general manager Duke Tobin, and others from the team’s front office. And 24 hours after that, he is in a suite in the same hotel interviewing with Cardinals owner Michael Bidwill and general manager Steve Keim. Just a year earlier, he was an assistant wide receivers coach. The year before that, he was in charge of the 123rd-ranked scoring offense in the NCAA as the offensive coordinator for the Cincinnati Bearcats. Becoming a head coach in 2019 at the age of 36 didn’t seem like a realistic possibility for Taylor. But here he was interviewing three times in 40 hours. One day after the Rams lost to the Patriots in the Super Bowl, the Bengals officially made Taylor their head coach. The convenient narrative was Taylor was fast-tracked because he had been touched by Sean McVay, Coaching Midas. To some, everything about the process seemed so rushed, so fast — forced even. But it didn’t seem that way to McVay, who hired Taylor in 2017 and promoted him to quarterbacks coach in 2018. “When we sat down and talked a little about some of the opportunities, and you could hear his plan, I knew I was going to lose him,” McVay said. “He had such a great, comforting grasp of how he wanted to lead and what he wanted it to look like, his staff. I was so impressed with the organizational structure and the plan he had in place that he was going to present when he had a chance to interview. I thought it would be really difficult for me to envision him not getting one of the jobs if those teams were truly open-minded and weren’t going to allow the (lack of) experience or the age to deter them from making the decision.” McVay knew it wasn’t that sprint that brought Taylor to this point. It was a long, steady run. Well before anyone imagined Taylor could become the head coach of the Cincinnati Bengals, he was the son of a coach. Sherwood Taylor is 64 years old now and sells letter jackets to high schools. In the 1970s, he was a captain on Barry Switzer’s Oklahoma football team along with Billy Sims. After six years as a volunteer coach at Oklahoma, he spent another four years as the defensive backs coach for his alma mater, and then another two as defensive backs coach for Kansas State. He gave up his coaching dreams to spend more time with two sons and two daughters — Zac, Press, a special assistant with the Colts, Quincy, the special projects director for the Oklahoma City National Memorial, and Kathryn, a gold medal-winning swimmer in the Special Olympics who has Down syndrome. After Sherwood changed careers, he stayed involved in sports through his children. He coached Zac’s football and basketball teams when Zac was in junior high school. Sherwood saw that his son understood the strategic part of the game on a level other kids did not. His competitive personality also was different. “You never knew if there was a good play or bad play with Zac,” Sherwood says. “He never showed emotion.” A father can gift a child many things. Sherwood gifted Zac with direction. It was through Sherwood’s example that Zac learned what leadership is. It wasn’t telling people what to do, which is how some who have never been at the front of a line imagine leadership to be. It was about living selflessly. It was about giving credit to others. It was about being first in and last out. It was about steadiness and consistency. And it was about popping back up after taking a hit. It is one day after Taylor has lost his eighth straight game to begin his head coaching career. Andy Dalton has been a productive starter for the previous eight years and is a respected team leader, but Taylor has a hard decision to make. Thoroughly, patiently and respectfully, Taylor explains to Dalton why he is changing quarterbacks. After three more losses, Taylor goes back to Dalton — which is possible because Taylor never lost him. “That was a really tricky thing to navigate with a first-year head coach and an established veteran quarterback,” Bengals offensive coordinator Brian Callahan says. “He was trying to keep guys bought into the program. The way he handled that leadership was really impressive, maintaining the relationship with Andy and communicating so professionally with him and the team. The way he managed that is what enabled him to go back to Andy.” Leading is easy when it’s 72 and sunny, the ovations are long, the players with the big paychecks make big plays, and the elder statesmen who hold sway over the locker room carry no agendas. It’s easy to lead when there are victories, and then there are confirmations — see, the way we did this was right. Taylor didn’t have a victory on the road until his 16th try. The Bengals were 6-25-1 in his first two seasons. The trust Rams coach Sean McVay, left, placed in Zac Taylor was key to Taylor’s rise to NFL head coach. (Kirby Lee / USA Today) “We knew it was going to be difficult,” says Callahan, the son of Bill Callahan, Taylor’s head coach at Nebraska. “We didn’t know it was going to be that difficult.” During those long days of 2019 and 2020, Taylor thought back on lessons from his father and emphasized the value of treating teammates well, the importance of being ready for anything, and the power of a resilient mindset. “He did such a good job staying steady,” Callahan says. “He never changed, not once. His demeanor was the same all the time. He never gets too high, never gets too low. He communicates even difficult things with a very straightforward delivery. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him raise his voice at anybody for any reason.” McVay, who has remained Taylor’s confidant, was impressed. “He doesn’t flinch even when there are a couple of moments that aren’t ideal,” McVay says. “He’s got this steady, quiet confidence where he’s very self-assured. That’s very comforting for people around him.” One of the underrated responsibilities of a head coach is maintaining hope always, even when hope is a lie. “I gave a lot of speeches in locker rooms (after losses) asking guys to stay the course,” Taylor says. “‘We have to remember this, build on this.’” Well before anyone imagined Taylor could become the head coach of the Cincinnati Bengals, he was the starting quarterback at Norman High School. At one point during his junior year, he was struggling. Taylor worried about being benched, which led to more stressing and pressing. His coach, Butch Peters, saw clearly what was happening. During one practice, he told him, “You are our starter the rest of the season. You have earned it. You need to let go of the fear that every mistake is going to cost you.” Taylor listened and started playing freely. He threw touchdown passes, won games and, more importantly, came to understand the consequences of fear and self-assurance. At Butler Community College, Taylor led a team that was playing Coffeyville Community College for a spot in the 2004 NJCAA national championship game. Taylor threw a pick-six at the end of the first half. At halftime, offensive coordinator Aaron Flores took the blame for the play, saying a bad play call was responsible. Early in the third quarter, Taylor threw a touchdown pass that was the launching point for a 37-26 victory. But the long-term victory was a realization about human nature. “I never had anybody tell me an interception wasn’t my fault,” Taylor said. “It’s important to take that off the quarterback sometimes. I never forgot that.” Taylor transferred to Nebraska and beat out seven scholarship quarterbacks to win the starting job in spring practice. But he had a lot to learn about playing in the West Coast offense being installed by Bill Callahan. Taylor learned a lot playing quarterback at Nebraska under coach Bill Callahan. (Dave Weaver / Associated Press) When Taylor made mistakes, he needed to be corrected. Callahan taught him the subtle art of making sure a quarterback knows he screwed up without diminishing him in front of teammates. On the sideline or at practice, Taylor said, Callahan would put the play sheet over his face and “whisper-cuss” him. During team meetings, Callahan would praise Taylor but nail him when he had him one-on-one. Callahan taught Taylor how to ensure a quarterback was all in. On the day before games, Callahan handed Taylor two different colored highlight pens and asked him to mark his favorite two plays in every situation, as well as his least favorite. Taylor’s preferences then were reflected in Callahan’s play calls. “I always felt I was a part of the plan,” Taylor said. “I thought, ‘He cares about what I think.’” It is the day before the Bengals and Jets play in October. Taylor asks Joe Burrow to show him his favorite plays — just like Bill Callahan used to do with him. The next day, the Bengals and Jets are tied at 17 in the third quarter when Burrow tells his coach he wants to run one of those favorite plays — a fan route attacking the far numbers. It goes for a 54-yard gain and sets up a touchdown. “It might not have been the next play on my call sheet,” Taylor says. “But he asked me for it, I called it, and he hit it. He knows what responsibility comes with asking for a play.” The coming of age of Burrow has lifted the Bengals this season. And Taylor, unquestionably, has lifted the quarterback. Taylor was voted the 2006 Big 12 offensive player of the year and led an 11-play, 75-yard touchdown drive to clinch the Big 12 North that they still lift frosted mugs to in Nebraska. He could never drop dimes like Burrow, but he could understand what Burrow feels. Burrow does not need to be “whisper-cussed.” But he needs bluntness, and Taylor gives it to him. Burrow gives it back. “He’s willing to say, ‘I really like this,’ or ‘I don’t like this,’” Taylor says. “Some quarterbacks might feel they need to please the coordinator or head coach and give the illusion they are good with everything. I don’t like that. I like feedback.” The day after the Bengals’ 20-17 loss to the Bears in September, Burrow was being publicly disparaged. He had been intercepted three times in the game. In the Monday meetings, in front of Burrow’s teammates, Taylor told him, “I wouldn’t have expected you to do anything differently. You threw two routes on time the way we practiced it versus looks we talked about. (Bears defenders) Jaylon Johnson and Roquan Smith are two really good players in this league, and they made great plays. The third interception was thrown as you get hit and the ball fluttered up.” Taylor treated Burrow like Callahan had treated him. The following week, Burrow threw three touchdown passes in a victory against the Stealers. Well before anyone imagined Taylor could become the head coach of the Cincinnati Bengals, he needed someone who believed in him enough to give him his first coaching job. In early 2008, Mike Sherman had just been hired as the head coach of Texas A&M and was looking for a graduate assistant. Taylor was Sherman’s son-in-law, having recently married Sherman’s daughter Sarah, and the only real choice for the job. Sherman didn’t want to give the appearance that he was favoring his daughter’s husband, so he started Taylor as an off-the-field coach, meaning he was assigned research projects. Red zone offense struggling? Have Taylor figure out why, then have him make a presentation to the team. After a year, Taylor was promoted to an on-field graduate assistant. That season, Taylor was instrumental in helping Sherman incorporate spread and no-huddle elements in the offense, Sherman said. The more Taylor showed he could handle, the more Sherman empowered him. Sherman was the play-caller, and he assigned Taylor to signal the plays in, which forced Taylor to know every nuance of the playbook. The night before games, Sherman met with Taylor and explained why he planned to call the plays he would call the next day. Taylor was contributing. And he was learning. “Zac’s a sponge,” Sherman said. “He sucks up everything he can around him. He blends what he knows and what he’s learned.” It is a Friday in the Bengals offices in early November, and 29-year-old assistant wide receivers coach Brad Kragthorpe stands in front of the offense. Defensive quality control coach Jordan Kovacs, 31, addresses the defense. Both make presentations that Taylor calls “Situational Masters,” focusing on unusual plays and calls from other games the previous week. The discussion is about what the Bengals can learn from the situations. As Sherman had asked Taylor and other young assistants to make presentations to the team, Taylor asks his young assistants. Taylor, left, and offensive coordinator Brian Callahan almost have “the same brain.” (Stephen Brashear / Associated Press) During those weeks when being both a head coach and the offensive game planner have proved challenging, Taylor has given more responsibility to Brian Callahan, who almost has “the same brain,” Taylor says. Initially, Taylor did all the offensive installations. This year, Taylor had Callahan do the offseason installs. Callahan also is now responsible for weekly red zone installs, as well as some of the first- and second-down installs. When Taylor took over, he retained offensive assistant Dan Pitcher from Marvin Lewis’ staff and made him the assistant quarterbacks coach. Last year, Pitcher was promoted to quarterbacks coach. And despite Taylor’s background with quarterbacks, he wants Pitcher to be Burrow’s primary teacher and point of contact. Taylor, like Sherman, wants to develop coaches as well as players. Well before anyone imagined Taylor could become the head coach of the Cincinnati Bengals, he had to learn a new offense for the first time in nine years. After four seasons at A&M, Taylor followed Sherman to the Dolphins as an assistant quarterbacks coach. When Sherman was fired in 2014, new offensive coordinator Bill Lazor retained Taylor as quarterbacks coach. Taylor always had been a note-taker. He kept track of his thoughts on legal pads. He had dozens of legal pads, but they weren’t organized. Trying to find a specific note was like searching for an old keepsake — maybe it was in a bin under the bed, maybe in the crawl space. Or could it be a locker in the self-storage facility? Once he started working for Lazor, everything changed. For the previous eight years, going back to his time as a quarterback at Nebraska, Taylor was more or less operating the same offense that used the same language. The difference between Lazor’s offense and Sherman’s offense was like the difference between Mandarin and morse code. To be sure of himself, Taylor had to write down everything Lazor said. And then he needed to be able to access what he had written so he could review it. With more notes than ever, and with the information being more important to him than ever, Taylor started a new note-taking system. It is Taylor’s first week as the head coach of the Bengals. He and Callahan are talking ball in a meeting room at the hotel that is their temporary home, The Phelps, when Taylor announces he needs to go to CVS to get a notebook. “Bro, a notebook?” Callahan says. “We’ve got notebooks, a bunch of them.” But the notebooks the Bengals had weren’t the notebooks Taylor uses. Since his days with Lazor, Taylor has used only hard-bound Moleskine notebooks. They sit nicely on his shelf. He likes the high-quality, cream-colored paper and the elastic ribbon that keeps his place. Taylor has one Moleskine notebook for every season and one for every offseason. Most of them are filled from the first line of the first page to the last line of the final page. Taylor also is particular about the pens he uses to write in them. Before every game, he uses a Pilot .07 millimeter — it has to be a Pilot .07 millimeter — to write his expectations of how the game will unfold. After every game — before leaving the stadium if it’s a home game — he notes what happened and how it was similar to or different from what he anticipated. Taylor argues with an official during a loss to the Jets and likely took a lot of notes after the game. (Vincent Carchietta / USA Today) He takes notes on everything. What were the implications of calling a timeout at a certain point? How he cut a player, and how he could do it better. Did a roster decision play out the way he hoped? What Mike Brown told him about the history of the taxi squad. Were players engaged or drifting during a presentation? Every team employee’s name, responsibility and family information. In Taylor’s first preseason game with the Bengals, he called for a Hail Mary on a fourth-and-23 on the last play of the first half. The Chiefs intercepted the pass and nearly ran it back for a touchdown. There’s a note about that — never put the team in that situation again. In the second quarter of his first game against the Stealers, the Bengals were trailing 7-3. They had a first down on the Pittsburgh 18 when he called for a deep drop and didn’t give his offensive tackles help against Bud Dupree and T.J. Watt. The result was a Dupree strip-sack and a Watt fumble recovery that led to the Bengals’ unraveling. There’s a note about that — you have to manage games differently against the physical defenses in the AFC North. Before every season, Taylor reviews his notebooks. And he references individual notes often. “Every so often, we’ll sit in his office, taking a break from a game plan meeting, and he’ll open one of the notebooks from the first year,” Callahan says. “Look what I wrote down Nov. 11 about the state of the roster, where I think we’re headed. He reflects back on it often. He’s adamant about not making the same mistake.” Well before anyone imagined Taylor could become the head coach of the Cincinnati Bengals, he listened to McVay preach about culture. McVay, in his first year as a head coach, was adamant that everyone who wore his colors should think like he thought regarding the team. He told his coaches and his players they needed to commit to being a part of something bigger than themselves. He talked about building relationships and then maintaining them. Communication had to be clear not only verbally but visually. Listening should be valued more than speaking. Transparency and honesty were foundational. Accountability? Non-negotiable. Everyone had to be open to being coachable — including coaches. McVay talked about these things over and over. He even quizzed the coaches in OTA meetings. Hey, Zac, what did I mean when I said we need to have a clear-cut rhythm with our hourly, daily and weekly approaches? Taylor believed all of it — probably practiced all of it — before McVay ever presented it. Why? Taylor’s center of gravity is the same as McVay’s center of gravity. “We have a lot of the same core philosophies and values that guided our way of dealing with players, really the way that you live,” McVay said. “We were very much in alignment.” It is just after the Bengals’ victory over the Jaguars in September. Instead of running off the field, as a head coach usually does, Taylor positions himself in the path his players take to get to the locker room. As each player comes by, Taylor embraces him. A video of the scene makes the internet’s heart race. It is celebrating a win, but it is more than that. “I love seeing all 70 of these guys,” Taylor says. “Man, I walk through that locker room and you’re not trying to avoid eye contact with a guy. They’re all about the right stuff. They are all here for a reason. They all fit what we’re looking for. It feels like every one of them likes coming in the building every day. That’s what that moment was, enjoying every player that’s part of this team, enjoying it together.” Taylor’s relationship with quarterback Joe Burrow is the key to the Bengals’ resurgence. (Emilee Chinn / Associated Press) When he was named head coach, Taylor asked Mike Brown to make some changes that he thought could lead to moments like these. Brown, whom Taylor says has supported him in every way possible, signed off on a remodel of the coaching wing at Paul Brown Stadium. Taylor wanted to add rooms where players could watch tape — they previously had to watch in their position coaches’ offices. He also wanted to group some offices that had been separate and move the break room. It was important to Taylor to create an environment that told his team all that matters is what happens inside these walls. New mottos went up in the hallways, and video boards were installed with photographs and videos of players. “The No. 1 thing I wanted was the players to walk in the door excited to come into work every day,” he says. For that to happen, some weeds had to be uprooted. There was no place for veterans who wanted to do things the way they always had done them. Those trying to turn minor injuries into rail passes on the gravy train were told to keep moving. He didn’t need big names who thought they — and their Louis Vuitton carry-ons — belonged in first class on road trips. Taylor wanted players who feel the same hunger in the center of the chest that he does. “Sometimes, I love seeing Joe’s urgency in practice at the line of scrimmage, the volume of his cadence,” Taylor says of his quarterback. After two years, the team that once was Lewis’ has become Taylor’s completely. He has done to the Bengals what McVay did to the Rams, and he did it the way McVay did it, by making changes not just with two-by-fours and a bucket of paint but with a vision. It is the night before the Bengals’ 10th game of the season. It has been four weeks since their last victory. Neither the team nor the coach is flustered or feeling desperation. They are feeling confident and grateful for another opportunity. The Taylors: Emma Claire, from left, Zac, Brooks, Luke, Sarah and Milly. (Courtesy of Sarah Taylor) Taylor loves working for the family-owned Bengals and living in his house on a cul-de-sac in hilly Mount Lookout. He and Sarah and their four children — Brooks, 10, Luke, 8, Emma Claire, 5, and Milly, 3 — are surrounded by houses filled with families like theirs. He’s a 12-minute drive from Paul Brown Stadium and three blocks away from the house he lived in for one year when he was the offensive coordinator at the University of Cincinnati. Taylor is intent on proving he belongs there a long time. In a Nevada hotel ballroom, he tells his team what to expect against the Raiders the next day. “It’s going to be ugly in the first half,” he says. “It will be low scoring. And then, in the second half, the dam will break. We’re going to get the lead by running the football and our defense is going to finish it off by getting sacks and turnovers.” His players do not question, look down, or grumble. Then, they make it happen just like Taylor told them they would. Now at 6-4, the Bengals are a legitimate playoff contender for the first time since 2015. The Bengals are where they are because Taylor has been where he’s been.

Somewhere on this board you can find a quote from me before the season started that went something like, “This team is going to surprise a lot of people.” I was very optimistic, but also knew that there was a chance that I would be among the “surprised”…in a bad way. My reply saying that “some might say…” was purely conjecture, and I do not count myself as among those “some”.

He sprained his wrist signing his paycheck. Back to IR.

I doubt that he would ever utter these words, but if it was within him to do so, I think he just said “Fuck you” to some of you guys.

Wow, that picture of Hines Wards mother is nasty

I don’t know that I’d go so far as to call him a warrior but he definitely always gives it his all….for whatever that’s worth.

Sternberger? He was a fantastic TE at A&M (I have a kid that's in the band there, so watch all the games). Obviously not that great in the pros, I guess. Oh well, he's the enemy now. Fuck him.

Of course. I was hoping he would come in for Fields and kick ass, but he looked rough. I don't get the hate for him. Yeah he didn't do well in the playoffs, neither did the team around him. Or the coach, for that matter. But at least he never quit on the team.

Hilarious, Doctor.

some reason? yeah I can’t believe a guy who sucked for multiple playoff games and threw a total of 1 TD pass in those games wouldn’t be worshipped by a fan base imagine if he had that track record playing for an East Coast team? One of the worst playoff QBs in NFL history

Carman has shown serious potential as a mauler, I have no idea how anyone could see some of his blocks and think otherwise. Where I agree with you is that he needs to get smarter about the game and be more consistent, that is something that can only come with reps. No way around that.

Every year, almost all fans, on Thanksgiving, are thankful their team is not the Lions.

McPherson is the AFC special teams player of the week and ironically, Jake Elliot is the same on the NFC.

I haven`t been too impressed by Jonah Williams either but hold out hope he is still getting better and can grow into an above average if not pro bowl tackle like Whit did. Whit was the same age as Jonah is right now when he was drafted. Jonah just turned 24 and Whit was drafted at 24. Whit has over an inch longer arm length 2 1/2 inches taller and 30 pounds heavier than Jonah by combine measurements. Going by that maybe Jonah deserves to be cut some slack as it took Whit time to become a great left tackle. Don`t think he is going to be the big brawler that Whits size helped him to be, but hope his athleticism and smarts more than make up for it.

I know there is so much that can go wrong from here - but just wanted to pause and say that, relative my expectations at least - being 6-4 at this juncture is an unexpected and pleasant surprise. That they are going to play at least some meaningful games in December is a massive step forward from the uncertainty of the off-season and Burrow's recovery and the coming off of 2 and 4 win seasons. Happy to have a reason to watch games this late in the year for something other than hoping for losses to improve draft position at any rate.

Where did anyone say 100%? Not sure why you're straw-manning it, but I responded because this guy said "fixed", which is really big statement considering they actually missed so many tackles. The Raiders only ran 47 plays and only 18 of them were runs with 19 completed passes, so the sample size was rather small. More than once multiple guys all missed at the same time at the same point on the field. Is that one missed tackle or three, four? As I kept saying in the game thread and in this one, the Bengals were not playing their best on D but the Raiders made their own mistakes, thus not taking advantage. Saying it's "fixed" or the "lowest" tackling-mistake game of the season is simply laughable, just go watch one of the early, dominant games and tell me they were tackling better in this one. Nobody could run on the Bengals early in the season, yet the Raiders averaged 4 yards a carry on them? The announcers told us during the game that the Raiders were ranked 28th in rushing going in. They also told us they had their longest run of the season against us. Is that an improvement? We won't know anything until we play a team that isn't in total disarray like the Raiders are right now.

Being that he is basically playing his 2nd year, he's been pretty good.

It's almost like the other side gets paid too, huh?

GOOD Win-A win and moving in to a playoff spot. 5 of the last 7 games are at home. Joe Mixon-The straw that stirred the drink Sam Hubbard-Another solid game Trey Hendrickson-Has any Bengal assembled 9.5 sacks in 10 games so quietly?!? Mike Hilton-Great job against Renfrow in the slot Evan McPherson-As someone else mentioned, guy is VERY underrated. Anyone who still believes using a draft pick on a kicker was a bad idea is an idiot. Quinton Spain-Solid in every game. He's my hands down re-signing priority in 2022. Needs to happen. Not doing so sets them back. BAD Joe Burrow-In general, especially the fumble. He was mildly passable. UGLY Pass Blocking-I can't keep watching Joe Burrow get destroyed back there. It's fucking brutal.

this is the biggest reason I hate this fucking team

TE’s are a nightmare matchup for ANY team in the league today. They’re all 6’5 250 and can run like DB’s…too big for safeties and corners and too fast for LB’s.

This is good…

Collinsworth got so excited when Pittsburg got back in the game. Too bad, assface.

Watching Ben get pummeled right now is the cherry on top of today's football.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOBODY!

Dereck Carr seems like one of those dudes that stalks his ex-gf after she dumped him for being too clingy.

Id like to see them go to Uzomah and Boyd more today.. Alttention on Chase and Higgins should leave them open alot... First downs baby!!!!

It’s _ichigan week, Go Buckeyes!

Pass that shit...don't hog it all for yourself.

Great clip on Joe... Speed, wiggle, power.. Runs angry...