The Kansas City Chiefs visit the Cincinnati Bengals Sunday as they look to finally pick up their 4th victory of the season. Meanwhile, the Bengals can clinch a division title with a victory and will be looking to honor fallen teammate Chris Henry in their first home game since he passed away. I sat down with Mike Norrod to get the low down on Cincinnati. Mike is the Bengals Fanball correspondent, giving you everything you need to know at Bengals Jaw.
Ryan Jones: From the minute Larry Johnson signed with the Bengals, he had this game circled. Has there been any indication from Marvin Lewis that LJ will get more than his normal handful of carries to try and get his revenge?
Mike Norrod: I haven’t heard anything coming from Marvin about LJ’s involvement in this game. I have heard from more than one Bengal that they can’t wait to see what Johnson does in this game, the feeling is that he will get more than his 4 carries a game, but that he won’t start, and once the game is in hand, he will get as many carries as he wants.
RJ: Earlier in the week the Bengals were offering tickets to any home playoff game to fans that bought tickets to this Sunday’s matchup. It’s rare to see a team about to clinch a playoff spot have to use incentives to sell out a game, what has the atmosphere at home games been like this season?
MN: The home games have been a tough sell ticket wise because the economics in the area are just tough right now, we have sold out every home game for several years now, and much to everyone’s surprise the Bengals are playing for the division and tickets aren’t selling. We have had some great companies like Kroger and Motorola (on behalf of Chad Ochocinco) buy tickets and give them away. So the Jungle is still alive, but it is definite oddity that we can’t sell out early on a possible division clinching home game.
RJ: Watching last week’s game I was struck by how things unraveled quickly for the Cincinnati offense during the third quarter with five penalties almost back-to-back. Is this offensive unit undisciplined or was that an anomaly?
MN: The offense is very undisciplined in my opinion, Bob Bratowski our offensive coordinator in my opinion is the worst in football, he gets credit for anything good that happens, and never takes credit for a bad game plan. We are only 1 of 2 teams in the NFL that runs more than it passes. We have so many penalties per game it makes us all ill, I believe we have 8 or more penalties in our last 7 games… so unfortunately it’s more normal than abnormal.
RJ: One of my favorite parts of gameday is doing a double take and say to myself “Who is that?” when being surprised by a player on the other team. Who will be that player for me on Sunday?
MN: The player you will probably be most surprised with is Tom Nelson, who was a star of Hard Knocks on HBO. He didn’t get a chance until Crocker went down, but the guy plays his tail off, and is always around the ball, I would be shocked if he doesn’t create a turnover this week (and he hits as hard as Roy Williams).
RJ: What’s your best guess at the final score?
MN: Score, I am going to call this one Bengals 31-13, as the Bengals are starting to open it up in the passing game, and will definitely attempt to run it a lot after seeing the Browns game plan last week, but the thing with the Bengals is, they have a tough time having a lead, so I wouldn’t be shocked if it ends up much much closer…. But that is my fearless prediction!!
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Tags: Cincinnati Bengals, Larry Johnson, Tom Nelson