LOL Cincinnati Bengals History

The Cincinnati Bungles are the other Ohio team which is actually worse than the Browns if you look to history. They made it to the Super Bowl in 2021. Yes. Really.

The birth of the second Ohio Team
The Cincinnati Bengals started as an AFL expansion team awarded to Paul Brown who was just run out of Cleveland by Art Modell. Paul would have to start from scratch, if he was able to build one football franchise, he sure as hell can build another.
 * The first three seasons would cough up a 15-27 record

Enter: The Bungles

 * August 5th, 1991 would mark a dark day for Cincy. Owner Paul Brown passed away, his successor being his son, Mike Brown. We could just end the article here to save your sorrow but you all came here to read
 * Mike Brown would immediately get in disagreements with coach Sam Wyche and fire him, but if you ask Mike, he says Wyche resigned.
 * The next coach Mike Brown just picked because their fathers knew each other, Dave Shula. He was completely unproven and would reach 50 losses faster than any NFL coach in history
 * His replacement, Bruce Coslet wound up doing better, so Mike decided just to stick with him and see where it goes. This would be a mirage as Bruce would post 4 losing seasons each getting worse.
 * It's worth noting neither Shula or Coslet were fired, both threw their hands up and quit. Mike Brown flat out did nothing instead of realizing he had to make organizational changes. His stubborness would become a big trend.
 * Bengals punter Lee Johnson, who was with the team during all this ensuing chaos, lost it in 1998 and completely shit on the franchise and management, he would be set free and go to the Patriots (but sadly be cut before their 2001 superbowl win, such bad luck for him)
 * The Bengals next coach following Coslet would be Dick LeBeau, from 2000 to 2002 he'd post a 12-33 season, in a rare non-stubborn act, Brown actually axed him.

Mediocrity under Marvin Lewis

 * Their next head coach would become a man of a love-hate relationship and a man who stuck around for way too long: Marvin Lewis
 * In the beginning however, Lewis was respectable and made the Bengals somewhat relevant.
 * In the 2005 season, Cincy would draft not one but two, off field idiots in Odell Thurman and Chris Henry. For some reason only using guys like this won them the AFC North.
 * Just one problem: they had to get through the first round of the playoffs against their arch enemy in the Steelers. As a testament there the football gods are cruel, Carson Palmer would suffer a horrific injury, the Bengals would lose to the Steelers as they would go on to win the Superbowl.
 * The Bungles wouldn't recover from the loss and regress back to mediocrity for the next 3 years, they literally did nothing.
 * 2009 however, would be another turn around year, once again clinching the AFC North! But. Like most successful seasons for the Bungles, it was bitter sweet.
 * In Week 14, Chris Henry, who was already having legal issues, died in a domestic dispute by falling out of truck.
 * While they were still able to clinch the division, the tragedy wouldn't get them past the first round as the Jets beat them at home.
 * The team would collapse again in the 2010 season.
 * In that following offseason, Carson Palmer had enough and demanded out of Cincy, Mike Brown of course would deny his request, so Palmer decided he was going to retire.
 * In later years Palmer would talk how awful it was there, from the food to how the Bungles were the only team not to have an indoor facility.
 * After that debacle, the Bengals had no choice but to rely on their new rookie QB Andy Dalton, along with their new first round pick in WR AJ Green. The 2011 season would yield positive 9-7 record and a 6th seed in the AFC, but of course if you have seen the trend in post-seasons, you know how this will end up.
 * Palmer, who was still holding out and didn't submit his retirement papers, was finally traded to the Raiders. The fact it takes threatening retirement to get out of Cincy is shocking.
 * Of course, the Bengals would lose in the first round of the playoffs, this time to Houston
 * The 2012 off season saw the Bengals acquire LB Vontaze Burfict, who wasn't drafted, more on him later.
 * The 2012 season saw an improvement to 10-6 and 5th seed, they would again lose in the first round to the Texans.
 * The 2013 season, the Bengals would become division favorites and clinch the AFC North.
 * In the week 3 game against the Packers (which they won), Vontaze would be fined $31k for hitting a receiver for no reason and kicking GB TE Ryan Taylor in the balls.
 * After a successful season, they'd still lose in the first round to the Chargers at home!
 * Obviously something has to change if Marvin Lewis can't get this team past the first round. Brown's solution? More Marvin Lewis, he was given complete control for the 2014 season.
 * In the week 6 game against the Panthers, Vontaze would attempt to twist QB Cam Newton and TE Greg Olsen's ankles, he was fined $25k
 * Unsurprising at this point, the Colts would knock them out in the first round.
 * The 2015 season is to date the latest playoff birth from Cincy, but it's outcome, while similar, is still way more miserably than the previous four.
 * The record: 12-4 and the AFC North, their best record under Lewis
 * The at home first round game against the Steelers will go down as probably the most painful moment for the franchise in decades.
 * With the game nearly won with 18 seconds left, Vontaze Burfict would knock Antonio Brown unconscious.
 * Adam Jones would then proceed to be a fucking idiot and get in an argument with a Steeler's Coach.
 * The outcome? A 30-yard penalty giving the Steelers the game winning field goal. Even when they have it in the bag they fuck it up.
 * You'd expect after five straight playoff losses Brown would consider a coaching change, he unsurprisingly just did nothing.
 * The Bengals would digress and have 2 losing seasons, Brown would extend Lewis' contract for 2 more years following them.
 * The Bengals started off the 2018 season strong with 4-1, but then Andy Dalton suffered a season ending injury as they would lose 9 of 11.
 * Finally, after 15 years and 7 first round playoff losses. Marvin Lewis was fired.

Still Bungling

 * After having Marvin Lewis for 15 years you'd expect his successor to be somebody who has experience at the head coaching job right? Wrong, Mike Brown just looked at the Rams and decided just to try out their young QB coach in Zac Taylor.
 * The Bungles would go on to lose their first 11 games of the 2019 season.
 * Their entire draft class was also a bust. Any rookie either got injured, just sucked, or was cut without even being given a chance.
 * Andy Dalton would get benched halfway through the year for the currently below average Ryan Finley, on his birthday.
 * Dalton would comment he wished the coaches could of made the decision earlier so he could of had more time to be traded, so he now wants to get the hell out of there.
 * Since Dalton was getting benched, a number of franchises began calling into the Bengals front office with last minute offers for him (he was benched on deadline day), but Mike Brown wasn't even in the country, he was out in Europe during the trade deadline!
 * AJ Green was also dealing with an injury, a few times he was expected to come back but he's still hurt. Consensus is he is just trying to stay injured for the rest of the season until his contract expires, however, he may be franchise tagged.
 * LB Preston Brown, was signed to a $16.5 million deal for three years in the postseason, he would proceed to be awful and was cut during the season.
 * Finley, who also couldn't lead the Bungles to a win, was benched for Dalton in Week 13. who still wants out. Dalton would lead them to a surprising win against the Jets (the Jets are pretty much cannon fodder when it comes to facing winless teams though)
 * The only other team they would beat is Cleveland, who pretty much just returned to Ohio lolcowdom. With all that and a 2-14 record, the 1st overall pick was theirs.
 * When the CBA talks happened between seasons, the owners were trying to agree on a requirement for indoor facilities, it was said not all owners agreed to this, we can assume Mike Brown was one of them.
 * The Bengals of course went for QB Joe Burrow, with the first overall pick, which the Brown family refused to trade after receiving numerous offers to trade up before the draft. Of course they didn't address any of the offensive line issues.
 * This season has yielded more wins but has been even worse somehow.
 * ...with a hilarious start in Week 1, Burrow threw a game winning touchdown pass to Green, but AJ was flagged for Offensive Pass Interference. Therefore, the Bungles decided to just tie it up with Randy Bullock going for a chip shot, who was doing very well at kicking.
 * He proceeded to hurt himself on the kick and miss, so the Bungles start off 0-1.
 * One big problem was the fact the Bengals had no offensive line whatsoever, they didn't even bother thinking the QB was the only issue.
 * And it would get much worse due to that, Burrow would tear his ACL and MCL in Week 11. 
 * After this hell hole of a game, a story would break the next day on how the locker room was a "college-level" atmosphere with players and coaches not getting along.
 * After Burrow went down, players also claimed how they "saw right through" Zac Taylor in his failed attempt to rally the team.
 * A 4-11-1 record, a top five pick in the draft, it's like they didn't fix anything, hopefully Zac Taylor gets fired (or Mike Brown fucks off...)
 * But how do the Bengals respond to a shit 2020 season? MAKE THE SUPERBOWL THE NEXT YEAR WHAT THE HELL