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[ I Am Bengal – Hear Me Roar (Page 7)
] A few questions from the floor... "What are your plans as far as your starting quarterback are concerned? Does Kitna retain the job? Perhaps a Free Agent with more experience like Randall Cunningham or Jeff George will fit the bill more appropriately. Or another scrambler like Michael Jenkins?" Well, let's see - thought I might see what Troy Aikman was doing next weekend... Juuuuuust kidding! No, realistically Jon's our man. He's done a solid job both times we've had to call him in to start, he's a level-headed guy and I'm sure he can make the plays we need to keep this team competitive. Besides, there's no way we could bring another quarterback into our setup at this late stage in the season, there's just not time for an new guy to pick up our system to an effective degree. What do you mean, "you don't need much time to learn 'Hand the ball off to Dillon'?" I've got to say that I'm absolutely gutted for Akili on a personal level. The kid was proving a lot of people wrong this year, and he deserved his chance to see how far he could take us. Guess that'll have to wait 'till next season... Alright, all of you that laughed can just get out of here right now! ... "How about the playoffs, coach? Are you guys still in contention?" "Still in contention"? Can you believe this joker? Steelers 12-2* Thanks to the Marine-Mammals getting turned over by the Raiders this weekend, as far as I can see we've the second wildcard spot locked up, and might even sneak up a seed if the Broncos go all to pieces in the last couple of games. Hilariously, the AFC South has not a single team with a winning record. Even more hilariously, that might well lead to the Fins getting shunted out of the playoffs despite having a better record than the division winner. All together now... hardy-har-har. ... "how many rushing yards does corey dillon have now?" The man that we've learned to call "Mr. Dillon" has racked up 1306 yards in 309 attempts to put him 3rd in the race for the NFL rushing title (Tomlinson 1394, The Lord Of Darkness 1338). His 18 rushing TDs leads the league, and at this moment he heads up the polls for MVP and Offensive Player Of The Year. On balance, if you'd offered those numbers to me before the season, I'd probably have taken them. ... "and who is in the pro-bowl?" The Bengals are contributing no less than three players to the AFC's offence in this year's Pro Bowl - Corey Dillon, fullback Lorenzo Neal (67 rushes for 234 yards, 6 TDs) and sensational rookie tight end Daniel Graham, whose 1007 yards from 63 catches make him the 7th most productive receiver in the NFL. He has averaged a league-leading 17 yards a grab and has weighed in with 7 scores. Akili Smith misses out due to injury after posting a quarterback rating of 99.3, second only to Kurt Warner. Smith went 150 from 250 (60%) for 2476 yards, with 17 scores and 10 picks - with another 325 yards and 2 touchdowns on the ground at an average of 7.7 a carry. His average of 9.5 yards per passing attempt is 2 full yards ahead of any other QB in the NFL. The Bengals are contributing no players on defence. Please try not to sound too amazed. ... "I'm fairly certain that the head coach is one of the leading candidates for "Coach of the Year." Well, is this correct, or am I mistaken?" The head coach damned well wants to be one of the leading candidates for Coach Of The Year, or Sam Adams is going to be sent round to league headquarters to ask why the hell not. ... "What Moves Do You Expect to make in the Off-Season?" I think it's way too early to start thinking about next year - we've two games of the regular season still to play, plus up to four playoff matchups... How do you think players are going to go in those matches if I sit here now and tell you that I'm going to be looking to kick them to the kerb? We've got great chemistry at the moment. I'll have to think long and hard before I drop -anyone- on this team, no matter how average they might look on paper. Statistics mean diddly-squat. This is a great team - and you can quote me on that. *Looks left and right, covers mike* But if I've got the same cornerbacks this time next year, you've my permission to shoot me square in the head. ... Last home game of the year, then, and when the Saints, oh when the Saints, oh when the Saints come marching into Bengalville, they'd better be ready for the game of their lives, and other such comments. Those of you with elephantine memories and/or too much free time on your hands may recall New Orleans giving us a thorough kicking in the pre-season, and may therefore fear somewhat for the fate of the tiger-striped lads, particularly given the loss of inspirational team leader Akili Smith (no, seriously). If there's one tiny ray of sunshine on an otherwise cloudy afternoon, it's that the Deuce, who made my life a living hell during that pre-season encounter, is sat at home with a partially torn ACL - which goes some way toward explaining why the Saints are coming into this matchup at 7-7. The delicate strains of the Rolling Stones' ageless masterpiece, "Paint It Black", rolls around the stadium, and out comes the team to a greeting that's just a little more enthusiastic than that which you'd expect to greet the Second Coming. Grown men weep, women swoon and gentlemen in Ohio now a-bed shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here, and hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks that... er... were here. And things of that nature. Eventually things settle down a bit, and the boys get ready to receive the opening kickoff while the modest tactical genius head coach tries his best to ignore the proposals of marriage that are being shouted from the crowd of Bengal-groupies clustered near the Cincinnati sideline. Success is hell, don't let anyone tell you different. Aaaaand... off we go! Aaaaand... straightaway we're into a 4th-and-1 situation on our 27. Four times out of five, I wouldn't hesitate, just put the ball straight in the hands of Lorenzo Neal, but some inner muse advises me to caution and on go the punting team instead. Up goes the ball, down comes the ball, and Donte Stallworth dances through pretty much our whole coverage team and takes it all the way back to our 31, for a net gain on the punt of 4 yards. Yeah. Nice one, inner muse. New Orleans are obviously having a game of Tease The Tigers... three times they let us stop them on 1st and 2nd down, three times they make third and long look an absolute doddle, including the last play, with backup RB Fred McAfee skipping through our line to dive into the endzone from 8 yards for a 7-0 lead. Yeah, well. Two can play at that game. On 3rd and 8 just inside our half, Corey Dillon runs inside, hits a big pile of fat-boys having a scuffle, bounces back out and takes off. The safety eventually gets over to cut him down from behind, but only after he's gotten inside the Saint 10 on a gain of 50. The next play sees both wideouts split left, and once they've cleaned out the zone Corey ambles into the space, takes the catch and strolls in to make it 7-7. Following an exchange of punts, New Orleans go back to their "Have A Two-Down Head Start, Bet You Still Can't Stop Us" shenanigans. On 3rd and 6 on the edge of field goal range Bernardo Harris, who's covered every blade of grass, knifes into the backfield and gets a clear shot at Fred McAfee on the sweep. McAfee proceeds to step out of the tackle and follow his blockers all the way to the 3. Nuts. But our defence comes up big, the Saint receivers are catching about as well as Long John Silver would, and they kick the field-goal from the 1 as time expires on the half. NO 10-7 CIN. The second half kicks off with a long, frustrating drive where we permanently seem on the verge of stopping them without ever quite doing it. Just outside field-goal range, it looks like Brian Simmons has stopped McAfee just short on 3rd-and-2, and the officials signal 4th down, but Jim Haslett throws his flag and the play gets overturned. Predictably, the Saints then go forward just far enough to let John Carney thump a 52-yard FG to make it 13-7 to New Orleans. There seem to have been a hell of a lot of 3rd downs in this game... on yet another, a 3rd and 6 on our own 40, every Saint on the field, every Saint on the bench and, indeed, anyone who's ever been a Saint bites hard on the play-action, leaving Daniel Graham so wide open he's getting agoraphobic. We just can't get anything going consistently, though, and can't build on that 22-yard gain, getting stopped at the New Orleans 12. This time, my inner muse whispers for me to throw caution to the wind, and we go for the fake-FG - but Kitna's barely done anything right all afternoon, and he doesn't start now, getting sacked all the way back at the 27. 0 for 2, inner muse, you plank. Yes, we get them to 3rd down. Yes, they then get a big play - we can't double-cover Horn AND Stallworth, and it's the latter who gets the short straw, the ball, and a 30-yard gain in that order. The defence, which has really picked up its game in the last few weeks, stiffens at our 30 and Carney slots his third field-goal of the day. 16-7, the game's slipping away from us and time's starting to get short. The crowd rouse themselves for one last effort, and so do the offence. We're finally getting a drive together, and Corey and Kitna together take us all the way to the Saint 30. We need two scores, though, and have to push the pace a bit... Chad Johnson nicks a yard of space crossing over the middle, Kitna lets the pass go... but by the time it gets there, the safety's stepped up for an easy pick, and right at the start of the 4th quarter, fans are already leaving the stadium. Dammit. And it's impossible not to think that Akili's stronger arm might well have managed to squeeze that ball in there. Off go New Orleans, with another long, time-consuming drive, killing the clock and grinding out the win. They get down to a 3rd and inches on our 35... McAffee comes up the middle and hits Sam Adams, the officials signal 4th down. Haslett throws his flag... stop me if you've heard this before. First down, Saints, three minutes to go, and two more runs take us to the 2 minute warning. God dammit, this is painful. 3rd down, hand off up the middle, ooh, there's a surprise... and there's Bernardo Harris, good old Bernardo, in for his 9th tackle on the day... and suddenly the ball's on the ground and there are bodies everywhere, and when the officials finally peel the pile, our LOLB Steve Foley's lying on top of it. 1:56 to go, ball on our 19, nine points down, Jon Kitna under centre. It's not much of a chance, but it's more of a chance than we had four seconds ago. First play, Kitna rolls right, the protection is absolutely brilliant and he's got time to wait for Chad Johnson to get free on his deep-in fifteen yards downfield. Johnson, our resident Mister Speedy, turns and burns to the tune of 69 yards-after-catch, all the way to the New Orleans 7. No time to mess around, we race to line and go again, Kitna hits Peter Warrick on the quick-slant and the Saint lead is down to 2, 79 ticks left on the clock. Damn that fake field goal... The crowd's back in the game. It's still a long shot, a hell of a long shot, but where there's life, there's hope, and we line up for the onside... Nick Harris drives the ball into the ground and... it hops straight up into the arms of a Saint. The crowd sag once more. That'll be game over then. In the spirit of sheer, dim-witted refusal to look the obvious in the face, we burn our 3 timeouts on the Saint's three runs, forcing them to the chore of kicking a 51 yard field-goal to close the game out. Clean snap. Good hold. Wide right. Good God, if we're not still in this! 70 seconds to play, no timeouts, ball at our 40. Okay. Deep breath. Here we go. Kitna takes the snap, drops back, waits, waits... waits too long, sacked at the 27. Time's ticking, and we're running out of it. Second down, Kitna rolls out just a little, Graham breaks for the sideline with no Saint anywhere near him... Kitna overthrows. God. Third down, and I get a bit sneaky, figuring we've got two downs, I decide to try and toss it short and pick up a chunk then finish the job on 4th down... Jesus, he can't even hit a running-back in the flat, for crying out loud. This is painful. 4th and 18. Neck or nothing. The Saints rush three and drop 8, and yet STILL manage to put no-one in particular on the tight-end... Daniel Graham sneaks up the seam and breaks out, Kitna puts it up... God, he's underthrown... and the crowd ERUPT as Graham makes a beautiful adjustment to make the catch with three defenders scrabbling back to try and get in on the play - gain of 26, 43 seconds and counting. We hustle to the line, and catch the Saints a little off-guard, Kitna to Warrick on the slant for 18 more to the New Orleans 22. Another hurry-up play, but Jon Kitna has a clause in his contract that stops him completing three passes in a row and he misses Dillon down the seam, stopping the clock with 12 seconds remaining. The wind is tricky, and we have one last attempt to close the range, but Kitna overthrows Willie Jackson on the sideline and with 9 ticks left, Gary Anderson comes on to try a 39-yarder from the left hash-mark to give us the win. Snap, set, kick, it's up... it's straight down the middle, it's GOOD, IT'S GOOD! 16-17 CIN, 5 seconds to play... Stallworth’s looked dangerous on kick-returns all day, but the fans are going mental and it’s more than our defenders’ lives are worth to let them down now – the rookie gets cut down at the 19 – Brooks has one play, and puts up a prayer... there’s a nasty moment when Horn takes the catch between two defenders at our 30, and looks for all the world like he’s about to spin through a tackle and race clear, but SS Aric Morris hangs on like grim death and time runs out... Final score NO 16-17 CIN, with hundreds of the Bengal faithful swearing they’ll never leave a game early again. Jon Kitna – he's great at getting you out of the sort of situations that only Jon Kitna would have gotten you into in the first place. ... Last game of the season, then, riding the back of a 4-game winning streak, but if there's a place that's likely to cool down any hot team, it's Buffalo in December. Mmmmmm. Sleeeeeeeet... The Bills might be riding a 4-10-1 record, but they've no significant injuries and gave us a damned good seeing-to in pre-season, Drew Bledsoe basically taking our secondary to school for two quarters, before putting his feet up and letting Alex Van Pelt finish the job. Much as it'd be nice to ride our momentum into the playoffs, my hopes aren't terribly high. With the icy rain coming down, it's a day for not taking chances and giving the ball to our surest-handed players. And yes, that -does- mean Corey Dillon. We glide effortlessly up the field, Buffalo's defence seemingly having decided to take the first series off. At the Buffalo 14, we set up with both wideouts split left, and once their cornerbacks have shifted over to cover, Dillon takes the ball on a toss-sweep right. The linebackers get sealed inside, and initially Corey pins his ears back and sprints for the corner, until he realises that the safeties are, in fact, going to get over in time to cut him off. Dillon throws out the anchors and stops dead about five yards out, giving his blockers a chance to catch up, waits for them to engage the defenders then slides between them for the opening score. Sweet. 7-0. It can't last, though, and the Bills, it seems, were watching our game against New Orleans last week, to judge by their identical "doing-nothing-for-two-downs-before-burning-us-on-third-and-long" antics. Twice Bledsoe finds Peerless Price for big gains when it looks like we have them stopped cold, then he gets bored with that and does it twice more to the opposite side of the field, the second being an 8-yard TD pass to Eric Moulds on 3rd and goal. Gawd's sake. 7-7. Anything Bledsoe can do, though, Jon Kitna can do better. Apart from, you know, passing the ball and stuff like that. Still, in the following drive we face on 3rd and 3 near halfway. The fake is to Dillon, Kitna rolls out and gets a bit overexcited as he sees an amazingly wide-open Daniel Graham making tracks downfield. The pass is rushed, and Graham has to turn and go down to scoop it up, giving the defence a chance to hustle over and stop him advancing any further. It's a 21-yard gain, but if Kitna had taken his time and put the ball in-stride, it was a stone-cold touchdown. Ah, well. We eschew the field-goal on a 4th and inches at the Bill 5, Kitna taking the ball all the way to the 1 on a quarterback-keeper, and the next play sees our 1-yard specialist, Lorenzo Neal, hammering over the line. Anderson hits the post on the extra point, and I cringe, getting the nagging feeling that that might come back to bite us a little way down the line... 13-7. Our defence has really stepped up in the last three or four games, and here it's MLB Brian Simmons inspiring the lesser mortals around him, flying about the field to keep Travis Henry bottled up and forcing Buffalo three-and-out, the punt giving us decent field position at our own 38 with a little under three minutes to play in the half. Nothing fancy is the plan, the first play called being a simple quick-slant by both wideouts and the tight-end. The pass protection is absolutely perfect, giving Kitna time to look downfield and realise that the Bills have a linebacker covering Dan Graham, time to wait for Graham to get open, and time to set his feet and hit the tight end on the run 20 yards downfield, with no defender within 5 yards. The linebacker, Keith Newman, eventually makes up the ground but then wishes he hadn't, a stiffarm putting the hapless defender flat on his back and allowing Graham to cut back inside for even more yardage, eventually getting dragged down just outside the Buffalo 22. Dillon smells blood, and slashes to the 3 on the next play, and with the entire Bill D looking for the inside run, Graham gets wide open AGAIN on a simple quick-out, and pulls it in to give us daylight. Dillon does get into the endzone, though, bulling players out of his way to slam in for the two-point conversion. So much for the missed extra point being costly. 21-7. There's 45 seconds to go to the half, so of COURSE Buffalo get into field-goal range, but wind and sleet are not ideal conditions to kick in, and Mike Hollis slices his kick wide right to make the score at half-time a very satisfying CIN 21-7 BUF. The rain is, if anything, coming down even harder in the second half. Think the night-game in the middle of Any Given Sunday and you're about there. Niiice. The defence are still fighting hard, and the Bills go three-and-out on their opening drive, RE Justin Smith delivering a wicked hit on Drew Bledsoe to force the incompletion on third down. Buffalo's D has come out stronger than before the break (admittedly, it's hard to see how they could have played worse), and yards are proving tougher to gain, but with a bit of luck and a lot of grit, we force our way to the 28 before hitting a brick wall. It's still not an ideal afternoon for kickers, though, and Gary Anderson shanks his field goal attempt to set the Bills up with decent field-position. But the conditions are making passing difficult, and our defence is making running impossible, and once again we force them into a punt, which Chad Johnson promptly coughs up at our 30. God. This is getting to be a very irritating habit that the boy's picked up... The defence hold them to a field-goal, though, and we're still 2 scores to the good at 21-10. Now it's their defence's turn to make life difficult, and a terrible Nick Harris punt gives the Bills the ball back at around halfway, setting them up to go 51 yards in 4 plays, with Peerless Price making the 29-yard scoring reception. They go for 2 to make it a 3-point game, but they can't run around, past or through Brian Simmons who makes yet another stop to keep the score at 21-16 with just under five minutes to play. The crowd, who'd been literally and metaphorically frozen out, are back in it, and it feels like the momentum's shifted and not in our favour... All the momentum in the world isn't going to help you when Corey Dillon is in one of his moods, though. Mister Reliable becomes the rock that breaks Buffalo's back, carrying the ball 11 times in a 15-play, 70-yard drive that grinds four minutes off the clock and ends with Dillon going in from 4 to make the score 28-10 and have me breathing an enormous sigh of relief. The Bills go through the motions with 49 seconds to play, but sacks on consecutive plays by LE Reinard Wilson cause the ball to be turned over on downs at the Buffalo 25, and just to rub it in I let Gary Anderson use the last three seconds on the clock to slot a field goal and make the final score CIN 31-16 BUF, and God damn, if this team isn't 12-4 and crashing the playoff party! [
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