Team History: The Bengals are still in search of their first championship
Team History: The Bengals are still in search of their first championship
Entering their 52nd season, the Cincinnati Bengals are still looking for a taste of championship success. The franchise has made the playoffs 14 times, including two Super Bowls, but the Lombardi Trophy has never been lifted by a player in a black and orange tiger-striped jersey.
Football in Cincinnati started long before the current squad began to play. The Celts began as a semi pro team in 1910 and joined the American Professional Football Association in 1921 (the year before it became the NFL). The traveling team did not fare well before financial issues caused them to withdraw from the league. The Celts went 1-3 and were outscored 117-14, with their only victory a 14-0 shutout of the Muncie Flyers.
Cincinnati’s second attempt at a professional franchise did not fare much better. The Reds, like their baseball counterparts, played in Crosley Field. The team scored just 38 points in 10 games and went 3-6-1 in 1933. The following season, the Reds went 0-8 and scored only 10 points before failing to pay their league dues and being replaced by the St. Louis Gunners for the final three games.
A team called the Bengals was a part of two earlier versions of the American Football League from 1937-41 with little success (a 10-18-4 record) before the third AFL disbanded after the United States entered World War II.
The new Bengals were named the modern American Football League’s 10th franchise in 1967, the year after plans for the NFL-AFL merger was announced. Paul Brown led a group of Cincinnati investors who paid $10 million in franchise rights (compared to the $25,000 each of the original eight AFL owners paid for teams in 1960).
Brown was also the team’s first head coach, a role he relished no matter what level of play. He followed future Colts and Jets coach Weeb Ewbank as starting quarterback at Ohio State and coached teams in Maryland and Ohio to state championships (and also won a High School Football National Championship with his hometown team in Massillon, Ohio).
After his high school career, Brown led his alma mater for three seasons, helping the Buckeyes win the National Championship in 1942. He was commissioned a lieutenant in the U. S. Navy before focusing on coaching at the professional level. Brown joined Cleveland in the newly formed All-American Football Conference in 1946 and led the Browns to all four championships before the league merged with the NFL in 1950.
The Browns dominated their new league under Brown’s leadership, reaching the championship game the first six seasons and winning three times. However, a falling out between Brown and owner Art Modell (with Brown’s trading for Syracuse star running back Ernie Davis without Modell’s permission being the last straw) led to his dismissal following the 1962 season.
After a five-year absence, Brown wanted to run a franchise in the NFL himself but decided to join the AFL after New Orleans was granted a team first. The Bengals missed the playoffs in four of their first five seasons, with their lone appearance coming after an 8-6 season in 1970. Despite winning the final seven games to qualify for the postseason, Cincinnati was overmatched in a 17-0 loss to the eventual Super Bowl champion Baltimore Colts.
Early Bengals stars such as center Bob Johnson, linebacker Bill Bergey and tight end Bob Trumpy would soon make it back to the playoffs alongside a new crop of young players. The combination of quarterback Ken Anderson and wide receiver Isaac Curtis kept opponents on their heels, and Bergey was joined on a formidable Cincinnati defense by fellow linebackers Al Beauchamp and Jim LeClair, along with cornerbacks Lemar Parrish and Ken Riley and safety Tommy Casanova.
The Bengals would make it back to the postseason in 1973, again losing to the Super Bowl champions, this time the Miami Dolphins. Two years later, Cincinnati made a run in the fourth quarter but fell just short in a 31-28 playoff loss to the Oakland Raiders. The game was Brown’s last, and he retired after 45 years of coaching.
Cincinnati did not make it back to the playoffs until the 1981 season when the team went 12-4 under Forrest Gregg, an eight-time champion as a player with the Packers and Cowboys.
The season turned out to be the best in franchise history. Anderson was named the NFL’s Most Valuable Player after throwing for 3,754 yards and 29 touchdowns, Pete Johnson had more than 1,000 yards rushing and Cris Collinsworth did the same receiving.
The Bengals defeated the Bills in the Division round, then shut down the Chargers, 17-7, in an AFC Championship Game that was dubbed the “Freezer Bowl” due to a minus-9 degree temperature with a minus-59 wind chill at Riverfront Stadium.
From there, Cincinnati played in its first Super Bowl, facing Joe Montana and the 49ers in Super Bowl XVI. Montana threw for a touchdown and ran for another as San Francisco took a 20-0 lead at halftime. Anderson threw two touchdowns to tight end Dan Ross and ran for another score, but the clock ran out soon after on a 26-21 defeat.
The team returned to the playoffs the following year after going 7-2 in the strike-shortened 1982 season, but the Jets trounced the Bengals, 44-17. Anderson was sacked four times and threw three interceptions.
Cincinnati missed the playoffs the following season and Gregg left to coach in Green Bay. He was replaced by Sam Wyche, who was a quarterback on the expansion Bengals and also coached against them as an offensive assistant for the 49ers in Super Bowl XVI.
The Bengals failed to make the postseason in Wyche’s first four years as coach, including 1986, when the team went 10-6 (one of four AFC teams with that mark) and were edged out on a tiebreaker. Two years later, the club matched its 1981 record of 12-4.
Anderson’s replacement at quarterback, Norman “Boomer” Esiason, benefited from Wyche’s use of the no-huddle offense. He threw for 3,572 yards and 28 touchdowns and was named league MVP.
After defeating the defending champion Redskins in overtime in the final regular season game to secure the AFC’s top seed, Cincinnati won two home games in the playoffs, beating the Seahawks in the Division round and the Bills in the AFC Championship Game to set up another chance at a title against the 49ers.
Throughout the first three-quarters of Super Bowl XXIII, the teams traded field goals. After San Francisco’s Mike Cofer tied the score at 6-6, Stanford Jennings returned the ensuing kickoff 93 yards for a touchdown to give Cincinnati the lead.
Early in the fourth, the 49ers struck back, with Montana hitting Jerry Rice to knot the score once again. After Jim Breech kicked a field goal, the Bengals went back on top with 3:44 left. Starting from his own 8, Montana completed 8 of 9 passes on the 11-play drive, including a 10-yard strike to John Taylor in the back of the end zone with 34 seconds left that gave San Francisco a 20-16 win and their third championship.
The Bengals returned to the playoffs in 1990 and defeated the Oilers in the Wild Card round before falling to the Raiders the following week. After one final losing season in 1991, Wyche was fired by Mike Brown, who had taken over running the franchise after his father passed away in August.
Cincinnati failed to make the playoffs again for 14 seasons, languishing through the coaching tenures of David Shula, Bruce Coslet and Dick LeBeau before hiring Marvin Lewis, the coordinator of the Baltimore Ravens and their record-setting defense.
The club made the playoffs only twice in Lewis’ first eight seasons before a run of five straight postseason appearances began in 2011. However, Cincinnati lost their first game all seven times.
After 2018, Lewis and the Bengals mutually agreed to part ways after 16 seasons. Cincinnati is going younger with its next head coach after hiring 35-year-old Zac Taylor, who was the quarterback coach in 2018 with the NFC Champion Los Angeles Rams.
The Bengals hope Taylor can work his Rams magic on a talented offensive bunch that includes quarterback Andy Dalton, running backs Giovani Bernard and Joe Mixon, and a receiving corps with one star in A. J. Green and other talented players such as Tyler Boyd, John Ross, and Alex Erickson.
-By: Kevin Rakas