New Coach and New Expectations

[wolfkaosaun]

(01-15-2019, 03:02 PM)bengalfan74 Wrote: Fred we caught the Colts well before Luck got his sea legs and still had to have a defensive score to win it. The offense scored what 10 points thru 50 minutes in Miami and the world's worst defense saved our bacon with a pick 6 and scoop 6.

We ran into an interception Machine in TB and were damn lucky to win that game. Did we even score any points in the 2nd half vs. Ravens in the first one ? 3 maybe ?

Let's not act like we were kicking ass and taking names on the way to those 4 early wins.

We could so very easily have been 4-12 or 3-13 !

True. But we could have very easily been 7-3 before the first Browns game if the defense didn't collapse against the Steelers and Cody Core doesn't drop his 4th down pass against the Ravens.
Throw in the Bengals could have possibly beaten the Raiders, Broncos, Chargers, and Steelers with a healthy Andy Dalton, and we're talking about the team possibly going 11-5.

You can play the "what if" game either way.
Almost every team can do that.
Look at the Steelers: few plays away from being anywhere between 5-11 or 13-3.
Chargers could be 6-10 easily as well. Say they botch that 2 pt against the Chiefs, or those TDs don't count against the Steelers, or play the Bengals with an actual QB, or the Titans get their 2 point conversion instead of fail, or they don't intercept the 49ers at the end of the game.
Eagles as well.

Very rarely do teams "kick ass and take names" throughout an entire year. There's going to be clutch plays a team makes to edge out competition. And the Bengals did accomplish some of those moments, but also failed some as well.