11-04-2017, 03:31 PM
(11-04-2017, 03:04 PM)Bengalholic Wrote: Here's why - at least in my opinion - it's not comparable: The Falcons beat the Packers and Seahawks in the playoffs, and lost to the Pats/Belichick in the Super Bowl. While certainly a devastating ending, they still achieved a lot...taking their 'position to make a run' and translating into an actual run.
The Colts won 3 playoff games between 2012 and 2014, including beating the Bengals, and made it to the AFC title game where they lost to the Pats. Again, a team that translated being in 'position to make a run' into actually making some noise and winning some games in the postseason.
The Bengals have had 7 opportunities to win a single playoff game, and have failed on every occasion, including 5 consecutive...a feat so improbable that it had never been done before in the entire history of the NFL. At some point, if you've accomplished absolutely nothing with repeated opportunities to do so...it has to be considered a failure.
Again, and this is just my opinion...I can't consider a franchise to be top tier when they have haven't won a playoff game in 26 years and is 0-7 over the last 13 years...not to mention the prime time record, being dominated by the Steelers and so on.
Not trying to be negative or not give them any credit, they have enjoyed a nice run of regular season success before 2016, but if it never leads to the desired result - winning at least one playoff game - then, at some point, what you're doing just isn't working effectively.
I agree. If we were going to make Tiers for the NFL. What would they look like?
The Top Tier would be something like Perennial Super Bowl Contenders.
2nd Tier would be like Perennial Playoff Team with a team that generally makes the playoffs but is no threat to win the Super Bowl.
3rd Tier would be Occasional Playoff Maker/Generally competitive team.
4th Tier would be Perennial Team that doesn't make the playoffs.
5th Tier would be Rebuilding Team.
6th Tier would be the Browns. :-)
Under Marvin we've made it to the bottom of that 2nd Tier at our peak.
