So I dodged the “already drunks” and “soon to be drunks”, clad in orange and black tiger stripped jersey's baring names like Palmer and Johnson and even Graham, on my way home from work tonight (I live downtown). The air here in the Queen City is buzzing. Bengals host their first Monday Night Football game in 15 years. Let me tell you, it's obvious on the faces of those around me that it's been along time. The Blimp and the planes with banners blazing a trail behind them fill the early evening sky. As a longtime Bengals fan, I can't help but be filled with the excitement myself. I will, during this game, step out on to my deck, which overlooks the city, just so I can see the bright white glow coming from our stadium. I am a proud man tonight. I am a proud Bengals fan tonight. It is for those reasons that I can not, no, I will not write an analysis of this game. I'm going to enjoy this moment. I'm going to sit in my living room with the sliding glass doors wide open and breath that excitement in, letting it wash over me, just as it has the tens of thousands of fans around me and my city.
I will leave you with this to read before you place your wagers or simply sit down to watch the game. Thanks for dropping my my little blip on the blog radar...
Bengals, history line up
BY GEOFF HOBSON
A night of NFL history at Paul Brown Stadium caps a week of national sports history that Bengals head coach Marvin Lewis has tried do draw on. But Monday night’s matchup with the Broncos also has some of the Bengals thinking of some recent history.
“I hate to say it, but we’re in a win-win position,” said linebacker Kevin Hardy. “Everybody thinks Denver is going to come in here and run all over us. We expect that we can go out there and stop them. I think the defense can set the tempo if we can go out there, get some three-and-outs, and if we can stop them, we can shock the world like we did against Kansas City.”
That happened at PBS nearly a year ago, when the Bengals knocked off the 9-0 Chiefs, 24-19, while bottling up Kansas City’s top-ranked offense and holding running back Priest Holmes to 62 yards rushing.
But if that was less than a year ago, it might as well be 15 years ago as ABC’s Monday Night Football makes its first appearance ever at PBS and first in Cincinnati since Sept. 25, 1989.
When the Bengals wrapped up Holmes, little did anyone know it would be one of the last times Cincinnati’s last-ranked run defense would play stoutly. Not only does Denver come to town with the NFL’s top-ranked running game, but the Broncos also serve up the league’s No. 1 defense to a first-year quarterback that has already been buffeted by units ranked Nos. 3, 5, 6, 11 and 13.
Spotlight on Cincinnati
Frankly, a straw poll of the locker room reveals that while the Bengals appreciate this rare chance on Monday Night, the 1-4 record has their minds on other things.
“I’m excited for the city. The city’s been looking forward to this,” said right tackle Willie Anderson, who finally appears on Monday night after 131 games. “I play in the NFL. We’re on TV every week. That’s big for y’all. We've just got to get down in our stance and block somebody. I don’t know what camera is on me. If it’s ABC, NBC, ESPN. I know what channel we’re going to be on, (but) a kid in college and high school might be more geeked up.
“No, we don’t want to look bad on national TV,” Anderson said. “That’s every week. You don’t want to look bad every week. You want to win, too. If we win and it’s ugly, we’re happy. It’s a win. It’s like in college. The rivalry is more for the fans.”
Left tackle Levi Jones has a chance to show he’s as good as his press clippings from last season but for him, what else is knew?
“You’re doing that every week,” Jones said. “You’re trying to show that every week. It is nice that people back home (in Arizona) who can’t afford the satellite can watch you play and see the hometown guy. I’ve been getting a lot of calls. But you’re trying to prove yourself every week.”
ABC’s John Madden says Monday Night is the closest you can get to the playoffs for teams that haven’t been there. For a team that hasn’t been on a Monday Night broadcast of any kind since 1992, the Bengals have plenty of guys who have been in the playoffs.
“Really, I don’t like playing on Monday Night all that much," said defensive tackle John Thornton, one of 13 playoff veterans on the roster. “I really like that routine of playing at 1:00 on Sunday instead of waiting around all day on Sunday and Monday.”
Hardy has also done both playoffs and Monday nights, and while he approaches it like another game, he knows the atmosphere and the scrutiny is not.
“Everybody is watching you. It’s the premier game. The guys know they’re playing in front of a national audience,” Hardy said.
Prime motivation
Carson Palmer, that first-year quarterback, says he feeds off the attention and it’s nothing different than the focus he has received all season.
“I enjoy it,” Palmer said. “First Monday Night game since ’92, a struggling offense playing the No. 1 defense in the league. A win could get us going in the other direction, a win would give us confidence, give our fans confidence in us. It would just get us going.”
Al Michaels, ABC’s play-by-play man, has seen plenty of instances where a team used a Monday Night to “springboard” to a good season. He thinks an upset against Denver could do it.
“They were 1-4 last year, too,” Michaels said. “The greatest bit of nonsense on television today is guys picking stocks and guys picking football games. As simple as that. It’s these games where what we think is going to happen doesn’t happen.”
Of course, the big fear is a bad outing on MNF matched with a bad season can get you off the cameras for a few more years. Michaels doesn’t have to be reminded that during the last Bengals’ playoff season in 1990, they were on prime time three times that October.
“That’s what happens when you have good players and good teams,” Michaels said. “They were thought of as one of the best franchises as the '80s ended. Then you go through a decade like the '90s were, and people forget about you. They always see you down at the bottom. Then after the resurrection last year, you have to validate it, and they just haven’t done it at this point.”
What curse?
Times have been tough, and Lewis turned to baseball to make some points during the past few weeks. After Yankees closer Mariano Rivera returned from a family tragedy to save Game 1 of the American League Championship Series, Lewis used that as an example of overcoming the worst of adversities.
Then, when the Red Sox became the first team ever to force a Game 7 after being down 3-0, Lewis pointed out how they had flourished despite the crushing majority of people saying they couldn’t. He figured he didn’t have to say a word after the Sox won it.
“We’ve been trying to find things like that all year,” Hardy said. “Does it help? I think it’s good to make the point. If you hear guys talking about it after, then obviously it made a point, and you hear guys talking about it.”
But, like Thornton said, “Baseball is so much different than football. You play every day. Play against the same team.”
Overcoming adversity
Lewis especially knows history of his own team. In drawing a comparison to the early-game emotion of a Monday Night, he invoked both the win against the Chiefs and the loss to the Broncos from last season.
“We had it a couple of times last year we were able to get over it,” Lewis said of the early-game jitters. “Against the Chiefs, there was adversity all over the spot. We were able to overcome it. We were very anxious. Denver made us very anxious last year in the first game of the year. I hope we’ve grown from that and matured from that.
“Every year somebody writes history. Somebody does something that no one has done before,” Lewis said. “That’s why we play the game. Otherwise, it’s no fun. We wouldn’t have jobs.”
His job will be a lot easier if the Bengals make history, and don’t repeat it Monday night.
