We’ve Set the Bar WAY Too Low!

[CJD]

This is my perspective of this team, from the past (recent history, I'm not going all the way back to the 60s) all the way through this season:

What I would consider "this generation's Bengals" beginning is when Mike Brown took over, so we're looking at the 90s, 00s, 10s and now.

In the 90s, we were a historically bad team. Bad coaches, bad draft picks and the players who were good wanted to get out as soon as possible. This culminated in the early 00s with an embarrassing (and franchise record) 2-14 record. It led to the firing of the head coach, the #1 overall pick (which was used to pick Carson Palmer) and the hiring of Marvin Lewis.

2003 through 2005 were genuinely great seasons where we got to see Marvin Lewis, who was a very good coach especially early on in his career, craft his team to the best he could given the restrictions from above him. Carson Palmer looked like a legitimately elite QB with an MVP-like season in 2005. Unfortunately, his injury in the playoffs had a huge effect on the following seasons.

In 2006 through 2009, we got to the playoffs once, we got close multiple other times but Carson didn't quite look the same. In 2010, we were a mess. We brought in TO which created a bit of a circus feel to the team and it just spiraled out of control as our elite guys like Chad Johnson aged out of their elite status. Following this season, Carson had had enough and wanted out.

In 2011, we drafted AJ Green and Andy Dalton. We were projected to be the worst team in the NFL and were in line to draft Andrew Luck. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on how you view it) we exceeded expectations and made the playoffs. This was the beginning of 5 straight playoff seasons.

While this may have felt great for the fans who had not had a great season to root for in recent seasons, I think this period of time was where we really...began to sink into irrelevance. Don't get me wrong, making the playoffs was great for 5 seasons but each time we were viewed as the easy out. Fans of other teams loved seeing that they were playing against us in the playoffs. Why?

Because of Andy Dalton.

We had tied our cart to a horse that was never going to be truly successful in the NFL. He was good enough to win games, good enough to make the playoffs, but he was never (and is never going to be) good enough to lead a team to the Super Bowl.

Say what you will about the 90s, but we never stopped looking for our franchise QB in those years. We drafted David Klingler, Akili Smith and, in 2003, Carson Palmer. I think we were fortunate that Klingler and Smith were total busts rather than an Andy Dalton level talent because if they were, we may have stopped looking and settled for an average QB. But that's what happened with Dalton. We passed on so many franchise QBs from 2011 to 2019 because we had Andy.

This, in my opinion, was the period in which we set the bar too low. We weren't trying to win in the playoffs, we were trying to make the playoffs.

This all was highlighted by us passing on Patrick Mahomes and Deshaun Watson in 2017, Lamar Jackson in 2018 and Dwayne Haskins in 2019.

Now, don't get me wrong, passing on Haskins ended up being the right move. But we had no idea in 2019 that we'd have the #1 pick in 2020 to take Joe Burrow.

My point is, for nearly a decade, we settled for Dalton and didn't even try to upgrade him. We settled for maybe squeaking into the playoffs rather than barreling into the playoffs with the intention of winning the Super Bowl.

With the selection of Joe Burrow, I think we have FINALLY exited this period of limbo that had been created by the 2011 second round selection of Andy Dalton, the player good enough to start but not good enough to win; the player that draft pundits literally used as the line between good QBs and bad QBs (the Dalton Line).

We are finally in a time frame where it doesn't feel like reaching the playoffs is our high end outcome. Given a few years and an upgraded Oline and defense, I foresee making the playoffs the low end outcome with Joe as our QB.

So, to summarize, do I see this time frame as a time when the bar is set too low?

No...

I think we're finally exiting that time frame and entering the time frame in which we are building towards the highest bar we've had in our team's history.

EDIT: To expand upon why I feel that way, Joe Burrow has played 7 games. In those 7 games, he led what should have been 4 4th Quarter comebacks against LAC, Philly, Indy, and Cleveland (arguably twice, but let's just use the 2nd time, since the first time it was close, but we were always behind). The defense 9or, in the LAC case, the refs and the kicker) screwed up all 4, but Joe did everything he needed to. It's gotten to the point where you can reasonably expect to be in every game in which Joe is our QB. We have been in every single game except the Baltimore game and that was just because no rookies do well against Baltimore's insane front 7 and blitz creativity. 

Now, at a certain point, losing every single close game you play in begins to make you question the coaching and I am very uncertain about whether or not ZT is the future of this team (and I think Lou definitely isn't), but coaches can be replaced. Joe is the answer to this franchise's problems. And we will see that in the next few years, even in spite of the coaching if necessary.

This past off season, we spent more money than I think we ever had in free agency, we're entering the 2021 free agency period where AJ Green's contract AND Carlos Dunlap's contract are coming off the books, mean we have a lot of operating capital to fix the Oline and Dline. We have a playmaker at LB for the first time in nearly 15 years (In Wilson). Everything is looking up, in my opinion. If they have an off season similar to last off season again, we could very well get 1 to 3 high quality starters onto this Oline before we even get to the draft.

I could be wrong (I hope I'm not), but I think by 2022 we're going to be one of the teams that people expect to make the playoffs each off season. And it's all because of Joe.