Why did Boomer Esiasons career go south?

[Murdock2420]

(02-20-2021, 01:24 PM)Jhowdy54 Wrote: Was too young to remember the Boomer Esiason era with the Bengals and just wondering why his career took a big dip.  Had those 2 pro bowl seasons with a trip to the Super Bowl.  After those years of course the Bengals struggled obviously and his numbers just went terrible for any starting QB.  You older guys were thinking we have a great young QB to build around and never happened.

Combination of things happened.

Paul Brown died, that was the first big issue. The entire way the franchise was run changed... and as we all now know, not for the better. That started the 91 season.

After that, was the firing of Sam Wyche at the end of the 91 season who had been with Boomer since he was drafted in 84.

In 92, the team was needing an infusion of talent, and they used their fist pick on a new QB since, Shula came in and wanted his own guy. He took Klingler who was super talented, but just not ready for the NFL yet. They tossed him to the wolves mid 92 season and it really divided the locker room.

Boomer then was traded to the Jets for the 93 season and was actually a Pro Bowl player for them under Bruce Coslet and went 8-8. The Jets weren't happy with 8-8 fired Coslet and hired Pete Carroll (yes, that Pete Carroll) who was actually doing okay until the nosedive to end the season. They went from 6-5 to 6-10. 

1995, third new coach, Rich Kottie. The team was terrible and won 3 games. Traded Boomer and added Neil O'Donnell. The Jets won 1 game the next season lol.

As for Boomer, he spent a 7-9 season in Arizona before coming back to Cincy in 1997. He came in at the halfway point of the season to win 6 of the last 8 games and took the team to... 7-9. Kind of showing he never should have been let go in the first place.

So, he went from being on some good teams, to being on just absolutely dysfunctional teams with bad owners, revolving door of coaches and through all of it, he was still posting solid numbers.

At his retirement in 1997 Esiason was among the most successful quarterbacks in NFL history, finishing in the top 10 in many statistical categories