Albert Breer Gives Bengals A Brutal Reality Check
Syndication: The Columbus Dispatch
Since 2003, the Bengals have had exactly two head coaches: Marvin Lewis and Zac Taylor. Marvin Lewis was the coach for sixteen seasons despite an 0-7 record in the playoffs during his tenure. After yet another recent stretch of failure, a frustrated fan base wants big changes in a season full of Super Bowl expectations.
After a fan wrote to Sports Illustrated’s NFL insider Albert Breer asking if he thought the Bengals would move on from Zac Taylor, Breer didn’t mince words.
“I’m gonna come pretty hard on this one.” Breer responded. ”I think the Bengals would be insane to move on from Zac Taylor. Based on what he’s accomplished there, based on the fit he is for their franchise. The Bengals also don’t have a lot of history of being herky jerky with their head coaches. They gave Marvin Lewis a ton of time. They were patient before that with guys like Mike Shula and Dick LeBeau. It’s not their way to be over-reactionary towards single years, towards stretches of games. It’s just not who they are. So I’d be surprised if Zac Taylor isn’t the head coach there in 2025.”
I also don’t think coaching has been the problem… I think the Bengals need at the highest level to reinvest and really start to go all in. I’m not just talking about player spending… You know I think that so much of this is going to come back to their ability to draft and develop…can they take the next step if they start to invest in a more complete scouting Department? In going and making sure they are beating the bushes on the pro side and going and finding guys who can step in for them right away and fill holes? I think this season should be a bit of a wakeup call for the Bengals in that their quarterback is playing at an MVP level and they need to invest around him and they need to take advantage of the opportunity they have. Again, I do not think that getting rid of Zac Taylor would do much to fix what the problem is in Cincinnati right now.”
It’s a brutal reality check for Bengals fans, especially those on the anti-Zac Taylor bandwagon. Breer is likely right, but that doesn’t make his answer any easier to deal with. No one wats to hear the criticism that their favorite franchise needs to better invest in a part of the game that has no salary cap or limitations. It’s essentially sorry your franchise is broken, hopefully your cheap owner will totally redo the whole scouting department. Sorry, your coach and GM are probably good, but the team is poisoned from the top down.
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