During this time in which I’ve neglected this space, I joined a gym. Figuring it was time to try and offset *some* of the ballpark food, Skyline Chili, and Taco Bell that I regularly consume, my wife dragged me to (no free ads) gym. We sat down with a trainer, came up with these things called “goals”, and found out its going to take awhile to attain said “goals.” Not going to lie to you, that period of time that is said to take awhile is taking awhile.
Which got me thinking about my favorite football team and their offseason. The Cincinnati Bengals began this offseason with the promise of new horizons. They didn’t necessarily promise better horizons, but after having spent my entire football-comprehending life with the same Bengals head coach, new sounded awesome. Here’s the rub, with the promise of new horizons comes the promise that positive horizons may take awhile.
Much like pacing in place on a treadmill or moving parts of weighted machines, the various decisions and machinations of the Bengals during this offseason have been a bit laborious.
They’ve all but signed a contract extension with Andy Dalton, when it comes to committing to who is the definition of an average QB. They passed on multiple chances to acquire the franchise’s future QB and instead settling for a kid (Ryan Finley) who figures to be the next AJ McCarron. They used the free agent period to bring back everyone from last year’s team who managed to lose more games than they won and even when they brought in a new face, it was a guy who’s name sounds almost fake (John Miller). Their biggest acquisition to fill their most underachieving position (linebacker) was a third round pick (Germaine Pratt). All the while pushing the hashtag “New Dey” and promising things will be different.
Now, believe me, they had to do this. Paul Brown Stadium was barren, fans had moved past the upset phase into apathy, and the franchise’s most popular player (AJ Green) even seemed disenchanted. But how much did they really change? Again, the bulk of this evaluation will take awhile, because we have to see what it’s like during game day.
They’re profiling as a run-heavy, control the clock, keep our defense off the field-type team, but that has been the offseason mantra before. I’m inclined to believe it may be closer to this with a new coaching staff, so we’ll see, but they aren’t preaching any new offseason sermon, here. A historically bad defense added new talent whose grades were no better than third round draft choices, and all are rookies. All of that leads back to what the scheme will be like which, again, will take awhile to understand.
So, with a promise of new comes, instead of positive vibes and feeling of excitement, a feeling of uneasiness and uncertainty as to the direction of the team. As it sits on paper, this team is going to have to be REALLY good on offense to make up for its defense. With an offensive-minded coach, who knows? Maybe that happens. However, Zac Taylor has never held the clipboard for an entire season and with the well-publicized selectiveness of who his defensive coordinator would be, he’s also put a lot of pressure on himself before his horse is even at the starting gate. So as for my optimism about the Bengals, much like my current feeling towards the gym, it’s going to take awhile.
