A Rock

Watching Jeremy Hill score a touchdown in the preseason for the Patriots, and I wonder if I'll ever get the thought out of my head. How much, if at all, did Marvin Lewis stress ball security before the infamous wild card fumble? The 30 yard penalty against us at the end was, of course, bullshit, but the team held their own fate in their own hands after the Burfict pick. 1st and 10. Ball on the 26. 96 seconds left. Pittsburgh with all 3 of their timeouts. As an admitted novice football fan I remember instantly doing the math. Worst case scenario, (I thought), we run 3 plays without getting a 1st down and miss the ensuing field goal attempt. In this scenario Pittsburgh has no time outs, lost the time ticked off by the field goal attempt, and has significant ground to cover against an extremely fired up Burfict and company. If we make the field goal the ground for them to cover is even more since they'd need a touchdown. If we get a first down, time to take a knee, game over. Even the worst case scenario heavily favored the Bengals to win that game, AS LONG AS THEY DIDN'T LOSE THE FRICKING FOOTBALL. For Hill to go immediately screaming into the secondary alone and lose the football will make me wonder till I die, did he defy Marvin, or did Lewis even bring the subject up? That was the moment we went from being a perennial playoff threat, about to FINALLY get over the hump against the absolute dregs of the universe the Stealers, to a team with nothing to show for a strong era except a horrendous choke job.

Hard to know the carry over of who's gonna be easy to beat next year, but our Marvin Lewis Groundhog Day will probably continue. Stomp the shit out of bad teams, maybe the Dolphins or Colts. Split the difference, win some, lose some, with good teams. Then definitely lose the big ones, i.e. The Stealers or any game with true playoff implications. I hope I'm wrong.

No, I can't. Even more significant was the 4th and 1 from midfield with somewhere in the neighborhood of 5 minutes left. Sometimes you're just not gonna have a chance if you don't take a chance, and you have to know and even feel when that is.

Fournette for 1 yard on first down every time down the stretch was the downfall. Playing not to lose guarantees that you will. Oh well. I hate the Patriots.

The last four minutes of that game took about four fucking hours. Good Lord do I hate the Stealers. They are clearly pure evil and putting them away is about as easy as putting Jason Vorhees away. They just won't die. Didn't it seem as though dark forces just wouldn't let that game end? The Jags finished em off literally five times in the last four minutes, and it just wasn't over till literally the last second. Great job Jacksonville.

and what is the purpose of playing soft zone defense ever? Never understood when a db is shutting a guy down, then suddenly starts lining up 12 yards off him. Unless you're up big with a minute left and trying to avoid injury, it seems pointless.

My bad, we also led and beat the Browns, LOL.

We only led 5 games at halftime this year, so losing 2 of them isn't good. Call it "adjustments", or make accurately lack thereof, it's not a myth. Marvin Lewis coached teams suck in the second half. The three games we won after leading at the half were the Colts, Broncos, and Ravens. Two terrible teams and a late miracle to avert what was otherwise a typical give it all back second half. The two we lost? The Packers and the Stealers. Pittsburgh was a 17-3 lead at home at the half.

He's the worst playoff coach in NFL history..... and it's his fault.

First off, no gray area for racism in my book. Intellectually, I understand the argument that the perpetrator's motives are technically unknown, i.e., they just hate the football player, but c'mon. Many people, of many races, may have been hung in effigy because they were hated for many things, but black Americans were hung FOR REAL not terribly long ago. Anyone who hangs a black person in effigy is automatically given racist status and rightfully so. Ignorance is no excuse. As for the football element, didn't all of this start when Bell was injured playing the Bengals? Vontaze made a football tackle then instantly ran back towards his sideline in excitement. I don't think he had time to know if LeVeon was hurt, but the Stealers took it as an intentional act, followed by a celebration. Stealers players issued threats of intentionally injuring Bengal players before their next matchup, and Mike Mitchell made good by spearing Tyler Eifert in the head. That hit was so blatantly for the purpose of injury, but as far as what it actually cost Pittsburgh on the field, fifteen yards. Mitchell then said to A.J. Green, "you're next." The wild card game was their third meeting that year, and I won't even get into all of that. I've honestly been a "blame Marvin" guy since the San Diego wildcard loss, but SOMEBODY in the Bengal hierarchy should have addressed this crap the second Mitchell hit Eifert. Besides the obvious need to physically protect the players, we always got the shaft from the purely football side as well. Who gives a shit if Mitchell had to dig change out of his couch to pay a fine off the field, when he was allowed to intentionally sideline our star tight end and the price was only fifteen yards?

He bungled first and 10 at the Steeler 26 with only 96 ticks left on the clock and a 1 point lead. Bungling a message is child's play.

Meh you just like to argue. He never seemed too calm or fiery to me. He was quite even keeled in demeanor. He just had a propensity to choke when it mattered most. I already, in great detail, described the problem was the play itself. As a head coach, it was absolutely his job to make sure his team ran three consecutive plays without losing possession. Worst case scenario has got to be a field goal attempt. If Hill, or anyone else in our backfield could've gotten 10 yards pushing forward behind linemen, great. Game over. Hill burst through the right side like it was 3rd and 7 in the first quarter. The Stealers must've been ecstatic as stripping the ball was their only chance. This, and Marvin's asinine comment about it after the game is what I was talking about. In fact, the team was blocking like it was 3rd and 7 as I look at the video of it. Just not situational football at all. The team's been tanking for two years since this debacle, but apparently some people will not complain no matter what.

The Bengals had a two minute drill?

This is true, but it wasn't the first quarter against the Dolphins in September. It definitely was his job to asses the situation and make sure his team knew the dynamics and priorities of the final 90 seconds. The promised land of a playoff victory against the dreaded Stealers was at hand. The air was electric and the crowd in a frenzy. Yes, you need to remind your back that looking after the ball is now more than #1, #2, and #3. It is everything because of the situation. That play certainly didn't look like it was run by a team that had been calmed down and focused despite the adrenaline of the moment. Quite the opposite after Burfict, et al, finally finished running up and down the tunnel gloriously, if not somewhat stupidly, prematurely celebrating what should have been the game winning pick.

This had to happen. Despite whatever else has gone down, Marvin lost me forever with the Pittsburgh wild card loss, and more specifically the Jeremy Hill fumble. His, "I shouldn't have to", response when asked if he stressed ball security to the team on that play was my final nail. Honestly, I was VERY over him before that, but after that loss, and that comment, I went from being fairly rabid in my support of the team, to kinda just checking in to see if anything had changed. That game was essentially over. The 0-6 playoff curse was finally gonna be lifted from him, in dramatic late game fashion, and against a team we all despise more than evil itself. After the Burfict pick any novice football fan could calculate that a turnover was the Stealers only chance. A first down and we could start taking knees. A touchdown would've been a dagger through their heart. But in no way can you risk losing the ball to do it. It sure didn't look to me like all eleven men on our side of the ball we're on that page, especially Hill. He should've been pushing for yards behind a wall of beef, not screaming into the Steeler secondary alone with the football. They didn't even have to burn a timeout to get the ball back. I was very curious wether Marvin even told Jeremy to protect the ball or wether Hill defied him trying to be a hero. Marvin's "I shouldn't have to" response made it pretty clear. Now we've been fairly lackluster for two years and we've progressed to "It's not my responsibility to motivate my players." Time to go.