Remember Halloween?
The year started and we were all excited for Joe Burrow to finally have a normal preseason that didn’t involve zoom meetings or rehab. The team could come out of the gate strong, mow through the front half of the schedule and have a cushion for the difficult slate of Nov. and Dec. games.
That’s what i thought anyway.
Burrow didn’t even make it to the first day of practice before an emergency appendectomy on the eve of training camp knocked him out for multiple weeks of team activities and all three preseason games. The rebuilt offensive line (also sidelined for much of the preseason) flopped coming out of the gate and the team dropped back to back losses to bad opposing QB’s to start the year.
They bounced back to get back to .500 only to drop another in-division game to Baltimore. They handled lesser competition to get to 4 wins. And then Halloween hit.
2022 felt like the year where fun went to die. Scoring was down. Parity was running amuck. And a week after the Bengals finally started flashing some of that tier 1 NFL contender potential, the roof caved in with them losing Chase and Awuzie to significant injuries and the team looking abysmal in the Cleveland prime time performance highlighted by a disheveled Cincy offense transforming the previously inept Browns D into a fierce unit.
The Chase injury had the most gravitational pull as analysts tried to break down Cincy’s brutal performance on that Monday night. That did explain some of the choppiness to the offense, but the rudder of the team for the first 2 months of the season had been second half defense. The more crushing blow was the in game injury to Awuzie.
When D.J. Reader went down, the defense weakened some, but the dam held and they were still able to elevate to a stout level of play in spurts. The run defense was understandably a shell of its former self, but having a top ten corner allowed for Laboratory Lou Anarumo to compensate. Logan Wilson, Mike Hilton, Von Bell, all of the role players took turns. Anarumo could mix and match, stay unpredictable, and the secondary was capable of holding. Pull Awuzie out of the mix and the cracks would be too wide. The water would come rushing through. Losing Awuzie meant the ceiling for this roster was lowered to below the level of the conference championship game.
..That’s what i thought anyway.
Instead the Bengals proceeded to rattle off 10 straight wins as they plowed through the meat of their schedule. They fought. They adapted. Young players stepped up. Carter, Ossai, Taylor-Britt. Everyone chipped in. Week 16, an o-line starter went down. They forged on and kept winning. Week 18, another O-line starter was lost. They still found a way. Trey Hendrickson broke his wrist. The wild card round claimed the left tackle. And they just kept winning.
It felt great. But in the end the bandaids didn’t hold. The defense played admirably, but just leaked a little too much. By the fourth quarter the offense was sucking wind . They had a chance to seize the moment but the season ended like it did last year, 23-20 with a backup caliber offensive lineman giving up quick pressure to kill their last drive. Sure, this time the defense had a chance to hold again and give yet another chance to the offense and i crossed my fingers hoping for the best, but in the pit of my stomach i knew it was too much to ask. It was the same way i felt last year when the Rams were driving for the go ahead score. The Logan Wilson penalty hadn’t happened yet. The Aaron Donald sack wasn’t a thing yet. But i moved on to the business of consoling my son who was watching painfully but dutifully as the ship began to sink.
“Did you look at what happens?” My wife asked referring to the stream we were watching not quite being in real time.
“No,” i replied. “I’ve just seen this before.”
I knew. And right then my inclination for how the next season would go started to form.
“We’ll be back,” was the mantra from players and Bengals faithful licking the wounds of narrow defeat.
“Regression! Regression! Regression,” touted the analytics honks. “They’ll be a better team with a worse record.” The real answer was in between. The growth of this roster would outweigh the regression. They would challenge hard, but all of the breaks they caught in 2021 would catch up to them and they would come up short.
At least that’s what i thought.
It kind of came true, but in a strange way it didn’t. The season turned from agonizing to fun to agonizing to fun over and over again. The injury bug tried to spoil the party, but then it didn’t, but then it did. Controversial injuries to opposing players in prime time in Cincinnati sparked national headlines twice. It was a winding road, but the team stuck together and continued to break through barriers they’ve never been through before: Back to back division titles. Playoff victories in consecutive years. Curve balls kept coming, but they kept the blinders on and delivered. I was proud of their resilience.
Sure, the AFC championship game was a painful loss but don’t forget to enjoy what they accomplished. Being the talk of the league is fun. Not combing the standings to figure out the updated draft order every week from November to January is fun. We can enjoy it for what it is now and buckle up for next year.
As pundits everywhere have been quick to point out, the Bengals missed an opportunity this year and now it gets harder. Bills are coming due and ripples from their success are about to assault one of their biggest and maybe most underrated assets: Continuity.
Other than the offensive line, the starting units have basically been together two or three years. The coaching staff has been together for five. Unfortunately, that is about to change. Basically the whole secondary could be different to start next season depending on how Awuzie’s injury recovery goes. Anarumo has a second interview with the Cardinals (c’mon Mike Brown, dust off that Assistant Head Coach title and give that man a raise! Give him an excuse to stick around one more year to finish some unfinished business!). Brian Callahan has a second interview with the Colts and the best in-house candidate to step up should there be an offensive coordinator void to fill, Dan Pitcher, is interviewing for Tampa’s OC position. Some of these guys might be back. But all of them won’t, and overcoming losing them will be too big of a hill to climb to get to the top of the mountain next year where we all want them to be.
.. At least that’s how i used to think.
But with this team, now i can’t be sure.
