Why Mike Brown? Why?

If you came to this blog hoping for some fry reviews, I apologize.  Go to my recent review of Winchell's, or even better - read all of my prior blog posts.  I'd be glad to have you find out what fries should be consumed as fast as possible.  Now you will just have to humor me. 

I am a Bengals Fan

I would have capitalized Fan even if I wasn't using that as a title break here.  I have been a Bengals Fan for as long as I have enjoyed professional football.  I watched football a lot with my dad growing up.  He was a Cowboys fan during their Tom Landry days.  I was slightly rebellious (not shocking to some, but possibly shocking to high school acquaintances), and I wanted to cheer against his team.  We always cheered against the other's favorite teams.  Kind of like picking on each other for the fun of it.  I really didn't have a true team that I cheered for until 1988.  In 1988 the Greater Cincinnati area was caught up in a giant wave of Who Dey!  It was the year of Super Bowl XXIII where it took an amazing effort by Joe Montana to hold the Bengals back from what I was sure they would surely earn in the future - a Super Bowl championship.  

In the years closely following, it wasn't the most fun to follow the Bengals.  They became known as one of the cheapest teams in the league.  They made the playoffs again in 1990, but they hit a 15 year drought after that.  In that time period my father laughed whenever I said it would be the Bengals' year.  As a Fan, I was sure it would happen every year.  Things got better when Marvin Lewis came along.  

Marvin took a team that was known as a joke, and he started to turn it around.  They returned to the playoffs in 2005.  That was the year that Kimo Von Oelhoffen stole the Super Bowl from the Bengals.  They would have surely beat the Steelers on that day in January of 2006.  Instead as we all know, Von Oelhoffen committed a serious crime against Carson Palmer.  Palmer would come back though right?  Nope.  Things were rough until 2009.  Then in 2009, I went to an incredibly cold playoff game where the Bengals seemed completely clueless.  That was just due to injuries right?  Marvin would make something happen with some better players.

Those players came in 2011.  Andy Dalton and AJ Green came in bringing the promise of greatness.  Red to Green was an unbelievable combo that had Super Bowl written all over them.  They went to the playoffs that year.  Loss.  Understandable though. They were rookies.  The next year, playoffs, loss.  Same in '13 and '14.  Injuries, excuses, etc.  It all made sense.  Especially when 2015 started.

Oh that team was something to behold.  Dalton was a magician with the ball, and he was considered an early MVP favorite.  You don't believe me?  Watch some old clips from around the 4th or 5th game of the season.  Dalton had a grin on his face every time he waited for a snap.  The game was easy for him, and it showed.  The defense was dominant.  This was the year.  Then in a game against the hated Steelers, who had taken so many players, games, and seasons away from the Bengals, Andy went down.  He'd be back surely by the 2nd round of the playoffs, but until then AJ McCarron had to carry the team.  He did just fine, but the team really needed Andy to win it all.  They just had to get past the Steelers in the first round.  

If you don't know what happened, I'm not going to tell you.  Sorry to that wise rabbi that I met last week.  The pain can't come up with any funny jokes here.  I guess stand up comedy is not for long suffering fans of NFL teams.  

Since then, the Bengals were hurt by injuries and free agency losses.  I understood the losing seasons of 2016 and 2017.  2017 ended on a high note, so 2018 was it right?  Yeah?  YEAH!

Nope.  More of the same.  Injuries have decimated this team.  It all started when Tyler Eifert went down.  Then injuries to Gio Bernard, Joe Mixon, Vontaze Burfict, etc, etc, etc.  Week 12's injury report (not counting those on IR) was 12 deep!  That leads us to this past Sunday.  The Bengals lost to the Browns.  I don't care how much people are excited about the Browns.  This is still a team that won 4 games in the past 3 seasons.  They tied that this season.  Still it was more due to the Bengals injuries AND their lack of preparation that they won.  I don't give the Browns any credit.  

This leads me to this painful revelation.  I'm done with Marvin Lewis.  He turned around my favorite team from the lost decade of the 1990's.  He brought the team to levels of excitement not seen since 1998.  Now it is 30 years later, and I have not seen the Bengals get close to returning to the Super Bowl.  It is time for things to change in a big way for the Bengals.  I am calling for Marvin to be gone, and I want Hue Jackson to leave with him as well.  Bring in some new coaching that will lead this team back to greatness.  

See I am still a Bengals Fan.  No matter how much they get injured, no matter how many close games they lose, I still have hope.  I will always hope that this will be the drive, the game, the season that it all turns around.  Once they finally win, vengeance will be that much sweeter.  Until then, I will have to deal with answering questions as the guy who vocalized his theory that this would be the year for the Bengals.  I also have to put up with comments from friends who support teams who have won more recently than my favorite team (most teams).  

I have the privilege of being acquainted with two Steelers fans who I hold in very high regard.  Oddly enough they both don't fit the stereotype of the typical Steelers fan.  Both of them are incredibly nice people who always have a smile on their face.  These are the type of guys who you will NEVER hear a bad word about, as 99.9% of people who encounter these guys love them.  An old friend and past co-worker named Chad, and my father in law Ted.

Chad and I used to take part in the same kind of trash talk that my father and I took part in years ago.  It was fun until one year I got so upset about the Bengals combined with a personal emotional time that I took the trash talk way too personally.  That's something you never do.  Sorry about that Chad.  Knowing that I broke the guy code of taking trash talk personally, here's how Chad responds to the Bengals losing to the Browns.  "I honestly feel bad for Bengals fans.  They are so dedicated, but the Brown family doesn't do anything."  Hmmmm.

I married into a family that loves the NFL.  My wife knows far more about the game than I do, and I have averaged ownership of 4 fantasy teams for the past 15 years.  She knows players who are on practice squads that deserve playing time.  Her sister is a die hard Packers fan, and that's a respectable team that has done some winning.  The heart breaker is that her father is a Steelers fan.  When asked for a quote he said, "Talk radio just couldn't say anything good about a coach that needed to see the door at the end of last year.  A Steeler fan actually shows sympathy."  I believe he was saying that he's surprised that he's sympathetic.  I'm not sure that he can help himself here.  He's too nice.  

Are these guys showing me that maybe I'm wrong about Steelers fans?  Are they all not awful?  Nope.  Just these two.  The rest of you stink!  

WHO DEY!

Thank you for reading this far.  Be on the lookout for another review soon.  Here's a pic below of what will be reviewed next.  If you are the first one to guess the restaurant, I will buy you a lunch at said restaurant.