What do y'all predict will be the offensive stats for the Raiders game?

I predict that good Dalton shows up and that he throws for 275 yards and 2 touchdowns. Out of those 275 yards, Green gets 120 and a td while the other yards are spread more evenly between Eifert, Jones, and Sanu. I think Hill has about 20 carries for 90 yards and 1 td.

Quick question. Is a false start reviewable in the NFL? In the Tenn OU game there was a blatant false start that was not called and no challenge flag came out even though it was a critical down. So I guess it's not challengable. I don't think I've ever seen a false start challenged I just assumed you could review it. Is this true in the NFL too.

Also, (and this is directed at Fred lol) what the hell happened to the Vols? They came out like a race car and then broke down like another not well maintained race car.

It's finally arrived!  

The long-awaited, much anticipated thread to post anything and everything about the most polarizing QB in the NFL.

It was discussed many times on the old board and a few times here...sometimes in jest, and sometimes for real. Then I saw it brought up again in Fred's thread...so what the hell, let's actually do it.

With the season starting tomorrow, there's no better time to give it a try and see how it goes. Hopefully, instead of starting thread, after thread, after thread about AD...members can contain (at least the majority of) their love, hate, praise, criticism and analysis in this one official, super-duper, thread to end all threads!

Will it work? Maybe not, but what the hell...it should at least be interesting.   

It's never too early to start thinking about the Steelers, so figured I'd make some notes on how they looked in relation to how we'll play them while it's relatively fresh in my mind.

1.) Their pass protection looked horrible. Pats only rushed four most of the game and still seemed to get pressure. Atkins should kill their line on his own, but MJ, Dunlap, and company should cause them a lot of problems. I wouldn't even be opposed to bringing a 5th guy just to make sure that we can bring Ben down.

2.) Pats corners are garbage, so Brown had his way, but we need to get pressure on Ben, double Brown, and not let him get open, especially not deep, which pressure on Ben should help prevent that.

3.) We need Eifert and Kroft on the field at the same time and we need to go there way a lot. Steelers looked horrible covering the Pats' tight ends up the seams (and even out wide).

4.) We need to give Hill the ball early and often. Lewis was a shifty runner and dominated, so I think that Hill's downhill style dominates even more.

5.) Need to hit Hill out of the backfield in the passing game and even Gio if we use him on passing downs. They seemed to struggle there.

6.) Steelers run game looked solid, we need to sell-out to stop Bell, who will be even better than Williams. Attack on our opening drives and make them count, forcing them to play from behind and not being able to run the ball because we'll control the clock with Hill is very important. I don't want to try and go blow-for-blow with them and win that way because their offense looks like they'll be too good. Attack early and then grind them out (but don't be so predictable that it's Hill on a dive every play).

7.) Need to limit turnovers, especially fumbles. When Hill gets to the second level, he needs to wrap up because Mike Mitchell, who's a punk, seems to love stripping the ball and seems pretty good at it.

I'm sure I'll think of more and I might even re-watch the game just to re-fresh my memory, but does anyone have any other notes?

If seen a ton of "experts" pick the raiders to win sunday. I love the national perception of this team. It's the old and dalton sucks so I'm gonna predict them to lose. It's really annoying.

Also Chris Berman is probably the worst. He probably won't get a single game right this week

Season is here. I am super psyched about the Tennessee/Oklahoma game tonight, but still here getting my Bengal buzz going.

By tomorrow night we will have all sorts of stuff to over react to. Whether good or bad there will be knee-jerk assumptions. But at least we will have new and exciting information. Every game is so big in football because they play so few. NBA plays 82 games and MLB 162, but every single NFL game gets analysed and broken down for a full week before we get another one.

This Bengal team is a lot like the past few. I could see them winning anywhere from 13 to 8 games. I see them at 11-5 (Losses at Baltimore, at Pittsburgh, at Denver, at Arizona plus an additional random loss from among SD, KC, Hou, Buff, StL).

If everyone stays healthy this will be the first time ever that we have had a good running game with healthy receivers, so I don't see any reason we should not match the top 10 offense of '13.

Don't know if our defense will be top 10 again, but it should be much better than last year. Burfict makes all the difference in the world. He and Atkins are our only truly elite defensive players. It looks like Geno is much improved over last year, but we have no idea if Burfict will be worth anything this year. Michael Johnson is not a super star, but he is definitely an upgrade to our D-line rotation. The only starter we lost we Newman, and I feel that with Dennard and Kirkpatrick we can replace him.

So if we have an offense ranked 8-10, and a defense ranked 8-15 that puts us right back in the same range of 8th-15th best team in the league that can beat good teams but also loose to average teams.

Of course I predict our run game really takes off and leads to a top 5 overall offense. Then Burfict comes back close to his old form and Atkins dominates again. With Kirkpatrick and Dennard looking solid the defense ends up ranked in the top 7. Our balance of offense and defense takes us to the Super Bowl.

I was just thinking about why we all keep getting involved in the same debates regarding Marvin Lewis and Andy Dalton. We all know both sides of the debate There isn't anything new that is going to pop up. My theory is that the debate is so strong because there really are valid points on both sides.

I'll bet I can find a fan of almost every NFL team who thinks their QB needs to be replaced. In some cases the QB clearly stinks and every one agrees. In other cases The QB is pretty good and the fan is not being reasonable. With the Bengals we have a QB who was used to define the line between these two groups. There is probably no guy in the league who has more good points on both sides of the argument than Andy Dalton. On one hand he has failed miserably every year in the playoffs, but on the other hand he has shown that he can produce with the best QBs in the league when he has healthy receivers.

Same goes for Marvin Lewis. Overall he has a winning record and is on a hot streak with 5 playoffs in the past 6 years. But he has never been able to win a playoff game either. It is very, very rare for a guy who is consistently making the playoffs to be fired. And history shows that it is not always the best move. But how much longer do you give Lewis? There has to be an end of the rope somewhere.


By posting this thread I did not mean to restart another Dalton/Lewis debate. I just wanted to point out that we are in a unique position as the fans of the Bengals. Both the "haters" and the "homers" have valid points on their side.

We are not an elite team, but we are much better than some give us credit for. And BOTH sides want us to be an elite team. We just disagree on what is the best plan to get us there.

The season will be upon us in a flash. I know there will be huge "over reaction" threads after every game both good and bad. But at least we will have something new and exciting to discuss every week.

I understand that the Bengals have Jeremy Hill and Giovanni Bernard, but I am looking at this stat from Hobson's most recent article:  14 - Career starts for Raiders starting CBs D.J. Hayden and T.J. Carrie  and I can't help but think the Bengals should first attack their secondary with quick, short passes.  Put AJ, MLJ, Sanu, and Eifert out there.  Maybe rotate in Burkhead as well in place of Sanu.  Spread them out and attack them.  Once their secondary starts creeping in to try and shut them down, burn them with a double move.

Pass first, to open up the run game.  If the Bengals can build an early two score lead (and stay aggressive on offense, Marv) they can turn the front four loose rushing the passer and the secondary might also generate some turnovers.

If their strength is their pass rush, don't give them time to get there.  It should look a lot like what New England was doing to pittsburgh before stretching the field with Gronk. 

Every game this preseason was at 7 pm or later. Do you think that will help get the Bengals players used to the night games in the upcoming season? We have 4 prime time games this season. Do you think all of these night games will help the Bengals players in the playoffs? Or do you think it will be irrelevant? Personally I think it might help this team a lot more than what some people think.

Marvin Lewis doesn't like practicing at night. He has even said that he wishes all the games could be played at 1 pm. I think getting all this practice at night will help us when we make the playoffs this season.

Watched "Million Dollar Arm" last night.  Good movie.  Was that Rey M playing Poo Poo or whatever his name was?  

Got a kick out of the agent introducing him as the best LB in the league.

I'm sure this is common knowledge and further evidence of how far out of the loop I usually am.