WhoDeyRevolution

E-Harmony says Enquirer and Internet not a love match

  The Enquirer, Cincinnati's average at best newspaper, is apparently skeptical of this whole internet thing everyone keeps talking about. A couple weeks ago, the Enquirer made a bold move by changing their web site's format. And by bold I mean they decided to make their site so infuriating and hard to wander around on that people would be forced to get their local news from the actual paper version. Hah, and next we'll all be wearing powdered wigs and going to a good ole friday night barn raising.

Let's start at the beginning. When I type in the URL for the enquirer site, my internet turns into 56K and I have to wait an interminable amount of time until the site loads. Maybe if this was 1996 that would be normal, but it isn't. Mark Twain would nod his head in agreement.

Once the site reluctantly loads, you are faced with half a photo of the front page story and a few headlines squeezed into the margins on the left side. I'm not sure who designed their site, but it won't be winning any awards for accessibility and navigational ease. It makes you wonder just what they were thinking when they decided to change the format.

I would tell you about the sports section on the site but I can't seem to find it. Oh there it is, you only have to scroll three quarters of the way down a very long home page to find it buried between the Community Press & Recorders and Business sections. That's a good way to ensure that the people who likely go to the site will never come back.

If I was a betting man I would say that Mike Brown won the contract to overhaul the site but then in a cost saving move, found someone in their first year of graphic design who has character issues in class to do it for $20 and a free preseason ticket.

The 5 Worst Bengal QB's of the Mike Brown Era

Some of you might have seen this already but pro-football reference recently put out a list on the worst QB’s of all time. I’m sure everybody out there in Bengaldom will be shocked to learn that some of our very own hometown heroes made the list. Unlike the folks over at pro-football reference, I didn’t use some fancy mathematical formula to create my list of the five worst Bengal QB’s of the Mike Brown era. I just used my substantial and ever expanding gut.

For my rankings I wanted guys the Bengals played because the organization thought this player provided the team with its best chance to win. I didn’t want guys who started out of necessity because injuries ahead of them on the depth chart forced them into action. Sadly this meant I had to cut Paul Justin, (you may remember Paul for having one of the best buckstaches of all time - even though he wasn’t from the Buckeye State - he deserves an honorary exemption for that magnificent thing) Erik Wilhelm, Scott Covington, Eric Kresser, and Don Hollis from the list.

So without further ado here is the five worst starting QB’s Mike Brown ever signed a pay check for:

Bengal Hero: Harold Green

Part three of Bengal Heroes takes us back to near the beginning of the disastrous Mike Brown era when everything started to go wrong in Bengladom. The year was 1992, Dave Shula was coaching the Bengals to a 5-11 record, Anthony Munoz would play his last NFL game, and Boomer (he played terrible with a 57.0 QB rating that was the worst of his career) was replaced as the starting quarterback by David Klingler (the rookie showed just how bright his future would be sporting a 66.3 QB Rating). Amidst all the doom and gloom the Bengals lone ray of sunshine that year was running back, Harold Green. 

The Superbowl Champion Cincinnati Bengals. Why Not?

Here's why the Bengals are going to win the Superbowl next season.  This is my story and I’m sticking to it at least until they lose week 1 to the Ravens.

-2008 is the year where everything is going to go right just once (yes i've now sunk to the "we are due" theory it's really all I have left so be nice).

-The offensive line will stay healthy (there is no doubt in my mind that the season hinges on the O-line being great which is why I’ve deluded myself into liking franchising Stacey Andrews) and provide stability for Carson so that he can throw for 4,000yds and 30tds. 

-The offense will be a top-5 offense that finishes games off behind a strong running game anchored by the reappearance of a healthy fresh Chris Perry (that we ever thought of signing the undead corpse of Shaun Alexander will be a distant afterthought). 

-Chad will be dancing in endzones across America while T.J. and Ben Utecht convert key third downs all season long. 

-The rookie receivers will replace most of Henry's production, and Rudi might even decide that he wants to break tackles again (Geoff Hobson tells me its going to happen so why not just pretend, it's easier trust me).

Bengal Hero: Tremain Mack

Chris Henry, Odell, Frostee Rucker, etc. are not the first character risks the Bengals have taken.  The Bengals have been taking huge character risks in the draft for quite some time now.  Obviously Mike Brown loves the draft value of a guy who’s slipped a round or four because of their giant red character flags.  Tremain Mack was the epitome of this.  Mike must have loved him some T-Mack because how else can a quote like this be explained.

Tremain's a very likable guy," said Mike Brown, Bengals owner/general manager. "But to read the media accounts a year ago, you would think he and John Dillinger were cellmates.  (What??? John Dillinger???  Who the hell is that???  Ohhhh, a famous bank robber from the Great Depression, what a hip reference for the end of the 20th century.  Now if Mike had said T-Mack would have been a great getaway driver then I would have loved it)

Tremain Mack was drafted out of the U by the Bengals in the 4th round of the 1997 NFL draft (Another paragon of morals values Corey Dillon was also taken by the Bengals in this draft). This Hurricane was rated as a first round talent at the time but somehow T-Mack slipped to the 111th pick of the draft.  While the rest of the NFL seemingly took him off their draft boards the Bengals apparently saw a talent that just couldn’t be ignored. Now you might be wondering why the rest of the NFL didn’t want to draft T-Mack.  After all he was 1st team All Big East and a special teams dynamo at Miami. Well I’m going to go out on a limb and say the answer probably had something to do with T-Mack’s SIX alcoholic related arrests in his 4 years as a Hurricane and that even BUTCH DAVIS suspended him because of a DUI.  Now in all fairness to the Bengals they apparently claimed they didn’t know the severity of T-Mack’s problems.  I guess the Bengals three scouts not related to the Brown family missed that little nugget. 

But just for now I’m going to ignore all the Bengals idiocy and mismanagement because quite simply T-Mack was the best Bengals kick returner of my lifetime. His best season was 1999 when T-Mack led the AFC in kick returning average and set a Bengal club-record averaging 27.1 yards per return.  This season was made even more amazing because T-Mack didn’t play in the first four games of the season after shockingly being suspended by Commissioner Tagliabue after another DUI arrest.  T-Mack’s off-season conditioning program consisted of spending his summer locked up in the Hamilton County Jail (Jamal Lewis has nothing on T-Mack).  So when he came out for the 5th game of the 1999 season he came out blazing.  Personally I loved Tremain Mack because on every kick off (and there were lots of kicks to return in 1999 as the Bengals started 1-10 on their way to another 4-12 season while they closed Riverfront Stadium in style) I imagined special teams coach Al Roberts telling him to just pretend like he was running from the law.  It must have worked because T-Mack ran so well from the law in 1999 that he was chosen as the AFC’s kick returner in the Pro-Bowl. From county jail to Honolulu all in span of one season. Simply amazing!!!

Sadly as you may have heard T-Mack didn’t have a happy ending with the Bengals.  T-Mack could only run from the law for so long.  He continued to rack up DUI’s at a record pace including one that would have made Bob Huggins proud when the Cincinnati police arrested Mack after finding him sleeping behind the wheel of a car at 3:45 a.m. Surprisingly the cops got suspicious after Mack's vehicle had been parked in the middle of a Clifton intersection for at least an hour.  This Huggins style arrest came two years after WLWT-TV (Channel 5) caught Mack on tape driving to and from Paul Brown Stadium with a suspended license, from the two DUI charges he’d already picked up in Hamilton County. That was great piece of Cheaters style investigative journalism, but the Bengals front office was not pleased with the report referring to the report as a sting operation (more importantly where was channel 5 when we needed them to follow Chris Henry around? you know you would have watched it).  After some more jail time T-Mack was done with the NFL but on the Brightside seems to have cleaned up his life eventually suiting up for the Arena Football San Jose SaberCats. 

But I’ll always remember T-Mack as a bald headed demon who ran like the he heard police sirens blaring behind him.  For T-Mack was running from the law and into the hearts of Bengal fans everywhere. Tremain Mack a Bengal Hero.

T-Mack is the second in what hopes to be a long series of Bengal Hero profiles.  (If you missed part one you can read all about Jeff Query’s glorious 1993 season right here.) 

Join the revolution here

Happy 41st Birthday JEFF QUERY

The man, the myth, the legend, Jeff Lee Query was born March 7, 2007, and is the first of hopefully many profiles of amazing Bengal Single Season Hero Performances.

 

Query looks like he wants to punch Klinger in the head

Jeff Query played parts of 4 glorious seasons as a Cincinnati Bengal, and contrary to popular belief he was more than just the proud owner of the greatest Kentucky Waterfall this side of Andre Agassi. (One can only imagine how big a heartthrob Query was around the greater Cincitucky area)  People forget but for one amazing season Jeff Query was a damn fine NFL wide receiver.  The year was 1993 and rumor has it that his wallowing around in the toxic waste that surrounded Spinney Field gave him superhuman abilities. Nothing else could explain these new found powers that led Jeff Query to flat-out dominante opponents during the Bengals fall 1993 campaign. That the Bengals went 3-13 that year is but a minor side note to Query's virtuso performance. In 1993 Jeff Query was unstoppable as he amassed 56 catches for 654 yards at 11.7ypc to go along with 4 big TD grabs.

Just take a look at his game log from the season:

Regular Season Games Receiving Rushing Fumbles WK Game Date Opp Result G GS Rec Yds Avg Long TD Att Yds Avg Lng TD FUM Lost 1 09/05 @ CLE L   14-27 1 1 3 80 26.7 51 0 -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 2 09/12 IND L   6-9 1 1 4 44 11.0 13 0 -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 3 09/19 @ PIT L   7-34 1 1 -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 4 09/26 SEA L   10-19 1 1 6 59 9.8 17 0 -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 5 Bye -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 6 10/10 @ KC L   15-17 1 1 3 69 23.0 25 0 -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 7 10/17 CLE L   17-28 1 1 4 32 8.0 11T 1 -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 8 10/24 @ HOU L   12-28 1 1 5 45 9.0 18 1 1 5 5.0 5 0 -- -- 9 Bye -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 10 11/07 PIT L   16-24 1 1 6 48 8.0 12 1 1 8 8.0 8 0 -- -- 11 11/14 HOU L   3-38 1 1 2 30 15.0 24 0 -- -- -- -- -- -- --