I have a confession to make. I stand before you to reveal myself to all of you loyal GBSB readers. I’m not proud of this, but the truth cannot be denied.

I think I’m in love with the Baltimore Ravens.

Rest assured that my wondering gaze has not simply turned from our beloved Bengals. Over the past two weeks however, the Ravens have managed to send my heart aflutter. For it has been over these past two Sundays that Baltimore has done all of us in Bengalsland two incredible favors.

You can’t call it cheatin’, cause they remind me of you.

The first favor, and the most obvious, is that two Sundays ago they sent a Roethlisbergerless Steelers team down to defeat. Now that the juggernaut that is the Colts have beaten Pittsburgh, Cincinnati now has a full game lead in the AFC North. Not only was this win by Baltimore a simple defeat for Pittsburgh, but it was also a division loss. That fact makes the road to a division title much easier to get to for all of us.

What hasn’t changed is the need for a win on Sunday at Heinz Field. Should the Bengals lose on Sunday the outside chance at still winning the division got a little better because of Baltimore’s win, but the Bengals best bet to take the AFC North is still to beat the Steelers this week. Doing so not only gives us a full two game lead on Pittsburgh, but also does something else: it gives Cincinnati a two game lead in division records.

If you’ve been following the standings with my handy AFC Playoff Sheet (now updated through Week 12), then you already know about both leads. Play with the possible wins and losses for the rest of the year, and a happy fact will jump out at you. Namely, as long as Cincinnati defeats Pittsburgh on Sunday, and then beats up on the Cleveland Browns the week after that, the Bengals are virtually assured the division title. In fact, as long as Cincinnati wins this week and next, they could drop two out of their last three games against Detroit, Buffalo, or Kansas City, and still win the AFC North–regardless of what Pittsburgh manages to do.

If and when the Bengals dump the Steelers and Browns, their division record will be 5-1, while Pittsburgh’s could only be, at best, 4-2. Even if the Bengals dropped two of those final three games, and the Steelers won out after losing to us, the Bengals would still win the division with the second tiebreaker, division records. The AFC North is now Cincinnati’s to lose.

Given the wonderful circumstance we find our team in thanks to the Baltimore Ravens, my newfound affection for this team should come as no surprise. As if beating our biggest rival this year wasn’t enough however, the Ravens also managed to win my heart thanks to a second favor they gave to all of us in Bengalsland. Unlike the first one however, this second example is little harder to take, but like that nasty cough medicine you gulp down when you have a cold, we’ll be better for it in the end.

The second favor that we as a member of Bengalfandom should thank Baltimore for is for finally putting everyone on notice that the Bengals defense is terrible. You could argue that the previous game against the Colts was a much better example than this past Sunday against Kyle Boller & Co., and in a way you would be correct. However, after watching that barn burner versus Indianapolis, and then listening to all of the postgame shows and programs discussing what transpired, the talk afterwards was all about how great the Colts offense was. Sure, there was the occasional commentator pointing out the obvious, that defense took a holiday for that game, but by in large all I read, heard, and watched gushed endlessly about the Colts and their unstoppable offense.

The Baltimore Ravens, on the other hand, currently rank 26^th in total offense. Kyle Boller’s QB rating for 2005 sits at 60.5, and that was after playing 20 points or so higher against the Bengals where he reached 81.6. Going in to Sunday, Jamal Lewis had amassed only 508 yards on the year. Against Cincinnati he…well, I’ll let The Rushing Table tell the story:

Game	Top RB	Carries	Yards	Average	@Cleveland	R. Droughns	12	78	6.5
Minnesota	M. Bennett	3	36	12.0
@Chicago	T. Jones	27	106	3.9
Houston	D. Davis	19	81	4.3
@Jacksonville	F. Taylor	24	132	5.5
@Tennessee	C. Brown	18	84	4.7
Pittsburgh	W. Parker	18	131	7.3
Green Bay	T. Fisher	17	51	3.0
@Baltimore	J. Lewis	15	49	3.3
Indianapolis	E. James	24	89	3.7
Baltimore	J. Lewis	23	113	4.9
	Total	200	950	4.8

Unlike the Colts, no one is going to call the Ravens offense “unstoppable,” but that didn’t stop Baltimore from scoring their highest point total of the year against Cincinnati.As an initial reaction, this inept defensive play should make you angry. That’s understandable. However, it is now obvious to everyone around the NFL and in the Bengals organization that the defense will need serious upgrades during the offseason. No one who enjoys retaining a Bengals paycheck is going to fret over modifying the offense at the expense of the defense. Consider this lesson now learned.

That, my friends, is the second favor that Baltimore has done for us. The Colts needed to learn this lesson two years ago, and look at them now. So must we understand that our defense, for all its turnover producing ability, needs serious work if it is to help justify the URL of this very website.

It’s called tough love, and we all needed just a little bit. Nowcome here Brian Billick, and give us a hug…

Last Sunday proved one thing, at least: no one can stop the Indianapolis Colts. Not even the Bengals defense.

Okay, that’s being disingenuous. We already knew the defense couldn’t stop the Colts. At this point, the Bengals defense might even have a difficult time stopping David “please don’t sack me” Carr and the Texans.

But that’s old news. Here at GBSB we’ve continuously harped on the Bengals defense all season long. We get it, and now it’s probably too late to hope for a miraculous turn-around this year. Defensive strength will come over time, but it will be a product of smart drafting and a lot of hard off-season work by some key players, rather than wishful thinking.

Last time we reinforced what all of us already knew, that Cincinnati must beat Pittsburgh on December 4. That game is essentially for the AFC North title to us Bengals fans. Losing that game will make it virtually impossible to be Division Champion.

We’ve looked at what the Bengals are facing should they beat Pittsburgh, but what if we lose in three weeks and have to play for a Wild Card birth? Can we make it? The answer is: Probably.

The problem is that one Wild Card slot is already taken. Both Indianapolis and Jacksonville are going to make the Playoffs. One will win the Division, and the other will be a Wild Card. For either of them not to make it at this point would be astonishing. Let’s look at Indianapolis first.

To give you an idea of how bad it has to get for the 9-0 Colts to be left out of the January fun, consider the following: If the Colts never beat a team with a winning record the rest of the 2005 season, they will still finish 11-5. They would lose to, in order, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Jacksonville, San Diego, and Seattle. For their record to go any lower, either the 2-7 Tennessee Titans or the 2-7 Arizona Cardinals have to beat them as well.

Starting the year 9-0 has its advantages.

Jacksonville on the other hand, has a cakewalk through the bottom feeders of the NFL remaining on their schedule. Their only tough game is the Week 14 match up against the Colts. Other than that their schedule goes like this: Tennessee (2-7), Arizona (2-7), Cleveland (3-6), San Francisco (2-7), Houston (1-8), and then Tennessee again. Do the math and those teams have a combined record of 10-35. Losing to Indy still leaves the Jags at 12-4, which will make the postseason.

Turning our attention to the AFC East, there is no team there that is a threat for the Wild Card. With New England the only club above .500 in that division, they’ll walk away with the crown easily. Buffalo and Miami meanwhile will likely hover at even keel or worse for the rest of the season. No Wild Card threat here, so let’s move along.

What we want as Bengals fans should the thinkable happen at Heinz Field is for the carnage to continue for the AFC West also-rans. Sitting pretty at 7-2, Denver is in the driver’s seat. The Broncos have three division games left against Kansas City, Oakland, and San Diego. The Oakland game at Mile High is pretty much a gimmie, so even if they drop the other two games they still finish at least 12-4. If Dallas kicks them around that week Denver still ends the year at 11-5, which just might win the Division outright.

Both Kansas City and San Diego have a tough road ahead of them. Kansas City still has left on its schedule a game against the Patriots, Broncos, Cowboys, Giants, Chargers, and our Bengals. Managing a .500 record against that lineup leaves them at 9-7, at least two games behind the Broncos should Denver’s worst case scenario come true. Kansas City has to beat Denver and win three out of the other four contests with the teams listed above to have a chance. That will prove be difficult, if not impossible. I give them at best a record of 9-7 at best, but my money is on 8-8.

For San Diego things aren’t that much easier. They have to go to Washington, Indianapolis, Kansas City, and then play Denver at home. If they split those games they will likely end up 10-6, unless they stumble against Miami or Oakland. I however, have a hard time believing that they can win three out of those first four games I mentioned, especially when three of the ones on that list are away games. 11-5 would be their record should they pull it off, but I think that, like Kansas City, 9-7 is where they’ll land.

So, unless Kansas City or San Diego go on a run, and given what we’ve just gone over that isn’t likely, the Bengals can lock up a Wild Card birth provided they lose no more than two of their remaining games. That would leave them at 12-4, which should put them comfortable ahead of any AFC West Wild Card challenger, probably by two games. Barring a collapse that will go down in Bengals history as one of the most painful ever, Cincinnati should make the postseason.

The drought of no Playoffs since 1990 is coming to an end in 2005.

You’ve had access to the sheet for a little bit now, so now it’s time to figure some things out. First and foremost, are the Bengals going to make the Playoffs? And if Cincinnati does get in to the postseason, will it be as Division Champion or via the Wild Card?

Allow me to spoil the ending with something you already know: It all depends on beating the Steelers on December 4.

Looking at the rest of the Bengals schedule we see three tough games against winning opponents. Indianapolis comes to Paul Brown this Sunday, and of course there is the showdown with Pittsburgh at Pittsburgh two weeks after that. The only other remaining tough game is the last week of the season versus Kansas City in Arrowhead. Should the Bengals not beat an opponent with a winning record all year they’ll go 11-5. This would mean that they’ll be swept by Pittsburgh and have no chance at the AFC North crown.

The problem for all of us Bengals fans is that the Steelers remaining schedule is very weak. The only truly tough games are against us and Indy. You could argue that the Week 14 game with Chicago might be one they could lose, but personally I have no faith in the Bears 6-3 record.

Besides, even if Pittsburgh loses to both Indy and Chicago, but wins the rest of their games, they’ll finish 12-4 and have the first tiebreaker against Cincinnati. Should that happen, Cincinnati won’t be able to win the Division even if they beat every other team besides Indy and Pittsburgh. We’ll tie the Steelers at 12-4, but as I said Pittsburgh will have the first tiebreaker having swept us.

So let’s assume for right now that we’re going to beat Pittsburgh in three weeks. How then do we take the Division? In truth, that may not be a question we can answer, even if things work out as we think they might.

The game this Sunday versus the Colts matters if Pittsburgh manages to go to Indianapolis and beat them the week after we play the Colts. Even if the Bengals run the table after losing next Sunday, and Pittsburgh wins all of its other games, the Steelers would beat the Bengals in the third tiebreaker, Common Opponents. Cincinnati and Pittsburgh would be 13-3, 1-1 head to head, and 5-1 in the Division, but the Steelers would be 7-1 against Common Opponents while the Bengals are 6-2. If Cincinnati loses on Sunday but wins all of their remaining games, Pittsburgh needs to lose at least one more game during the rest of the year for Cincinnati to pull ahead. Pittsburgh’s own showdown with Indy on December 11 would do nicely for that second loss.

But again, for this to come true Cincinnati has to run the table from Week 12 on out, and that Kansas City game has me a little worried. First, it’s at Kansas City. Second, it’s entirely possible that KC could be battling for their own division title that week against Denver.

So in summation, to have any chance at winning the AFC North, Cincinnati must beat the Steelers on December 4 at Heinz Field. While the scenarios are there for the Bengals to take the title should Pittsburgh slip, the odds are not in our favor. The Bengals must beat the Steelers, or else they’ll have to try their luck with the Wild Card.

Next update: The Wild Card Outlook

2005_AFC_Playoffs.xls

Above is the link to my custom Excel spreadsheet that outlines the AFC Playoff outlook for the chosen few who might make it. Download it to play with various Playoff scenarios. Before we get into the possibilities however, I’ll outline how to use the sheet which is easy to mess aroung with.

The spreadsheet outlines the Playoff hopes for 10 AFC teams: Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, New England, Miami, Buffalo, Indianapolis, Jacksonville, Denver, Kansas City, and San Diego. The first thing that should have jumped out at you from that list is that Miami and Buffalo are on it. No, I don’t think either of those teams have a shot at the Playoffs, but allow me to explain why they remain.

When I first began to put this sheet together a couple of weeks ago, Miami still had a viable chance–on paper at least. Now however, they’ve dropped two straight to slip to 3-6, and Buffalo has moved ahead of them in the standings. My plan was leave Miami to show just how much trouble average, or slightly below average, teams are in. Once the Bills moved ahead of the Dolphins though, I didn’t feel as though I could leave Buffalo out. So, I added them in at the last minute.

In the our favorite conference, the AFC North, Cincinnati and Pittsburgh are the only teams that have a serious chance at the division crown. In the East, New England and the afore mentioned Miami and Buffalo make the sheet, although only New England has a real chance at the Playoffs. In the South, Indy and Jacksonville get listed, and in the West, Denver, Kansas City, and San Diego are on. Every other team in the AFC is effectively out of it, so they were left off.

Each team has two columns underneath them. On the left is their schedule, and on the right is whether they Won or Lost the game. Games in italics haven’t happened yet.

Below the schedule are four sections. The first counts the number of “Won” and “Lost” entries to give the current record and winning percentage. Below that is the same thing for their Division. Third is the record against the Common Opponents to other teams on the list in their division, and the last column is against the two AFC teams that are not common opponents.

Why the overall record is there is obvious. Why then, did I add the other three columns? Easy: Tie breakers.

Read that link and you’ll see that if two teams have the same record, the first tie breaker is head to head. I didn’t add that because it’s easy to calculate in your head. The second tie breaker is the division record, followed by the record against common opponents, then against conference opponents. After that it’s strength of victory, which is where the math starts to get annoying. You can calculate that yourself (and if things go right for Cincinnati, you might have to).

Download the sheet and play with it for a bit, and then we’ll talk what-ifs.

We’re halfway through the regular season and it’s the off week for the Bengals, a time for rest and reflection.

I’ll preface this short post by saying that I probably wouldn’t ever classify myself as a “true” Bengals fan. I’m not from Cincinnati and I have no deep, emotional connection with the team. I’ve always pulled for the underdog, though, and I have always thought that it would be great if the Bengals won the Super Bowl. That being said, my interest in the Bengals is mostly that of an outsider and the only real impact their performance has for me is how well they perform for my fantasy team (although I suppose if they go to the Super Bowl this site will get substantially more traffic which is good.

This year I selected Carson Palmer as my quarterback in my fantasy league. I nabbed him in the third round, which has been proven thus far to be a very wise decision. While he’s yet to break 30 FFPts/G, Palmer has been very consistent in his weekly performances. His fantasy performance has consistently been better than Peyton Manning (our league’s first pick) and it’s definitely been on par with Donovan McNabb.

Only Donovan McNabb and Tom Brady have compiled more passing yards than Palmer (with far more attempts at that), and his QB rating blows them out of the water. More importantly, Palmer is surrounded by a better offense environment that McNabb and Brady. The Eagles have their own hilariously distracting problems to deal with and the Pats have been struggling with injuries all over the place. Who knew, intangibles really do count for something. All this adds up to one conclusion: Carson Palmer is currently the most valuable fantasy quarterback. Amazing!

Back in September, in my first post here I speculated on the fantasy value of the Bengals and came to the conclusion that “Carson Palmer is the lynchpin for the entire Bengals offense; all the fantasy stats of the other players will directly depend on how he progresses as a QB.” I was pretty dour as to the outcome at the time. I’m willing to admit now that I was dead wrong. Palmer is proving himself to be a very capable quarterback and I’m glad he’s on my team.

I’m sorry true Bengals fans. I don’t think Bengals are really going to make it to the Super Bowl this year; in the years to come, yes, but not now. That’s a fact. At the very least, with Carson Palmer leading my team, I stand a chance of making it to the fantasy Super Bowl this year.

Game	Top RB	Carries	Yards	Average	@Cleveland	R. Droughns	12	78	6.5
Minnesota	M. Bennett	3	36	12.0
@Chicago	T. Jones	27	106	3.9
Houston	D. Davis	19	81	4.3
@Jacksonville	F. Taylor	24	132	5.5
@Tennessee	C. Brown	18	84	4.7
Pittsburgh	W. Parker	18	131	7.3
Green Bay	T. Fisher	17	51	3.0
@Baltimore	J. Lewis	15	49	3.3
	Total	153	748	4.9

Here is the latest rushing table for your viewing pleasure. The Bengals are doing better in the run defense department, but perhaps that has more to do with Jamal Lewis than with the Bengals defensive line. Call it a hunch.I was beginning to wonder what happened to my fellow posters here at GBSB when neither of them had posted in a while. Then of course, I read the Forum and found that one is very sick and the other in the hospital. Note to self: Read the forum more often.

Get well soon, guys. It’s getting lonely up here on the front page.

No, I haven’t forgotten about my assurance last update that we’re going to figure out the Bengals Playoff chances, either. The Excel spreadsheet is done and all that is left is to play with wins and losses. Rest assured that I’ll make the spreadsheet available so youcan have fun with the AFC this year, as well.

Hospitals suck. I should know, I’ve been in one for the past couple of weeks. The food is bland, the concept of comfort is non-existent, and (worst of all, of course) I’m not allowed to watch Bengals games on the TV in my room. What. The. Hell. Talk about depressing. At least I am allowed my laptop, which I use to keep as up to date as possible (basically I refresh the yahoo sports page over and over again).

About the only thing that makes me smile these days is the thought of Tommy Maddox in as QB for the Steelers. That’s something, at least because you know he’s doing his part to help the Bengals win the division. Go get ‘em, Tommy.

That’s all I have the energy for now. I’ll have a more up to date review of this cocktease of a season when I get out of here (or if the nurses, aka the bitches with needles, let me sneak in a game).

Game	Top RB	Carries	Yards	Average	@Cleveland	R. Droughns	12	78	6.5
Minnesota	M. Bennett	3	36	12.0
@Chicago	T. Jones	27	106	3.9
Houston	D. Davis	19	81	4.3
@Jacksonville	F. Taylor	24	132	5.5
@Tennessee	C. Brown	18	84	4.7
Pittsburgh	W. Parker	18	131	7.3
Green Bay	T. Fisher	17	51	3.0
	Total	138	699	5.1

Above is the latest update to the rushing table I’ve been going over for the past few weeks. The Bengals did improve this week in their rush defense, and I would be trumpeting that fact if it were against a team other than Green Bay. The Packers running offense is completely inept and ranked 30th in the NFL.

What bothered me this week was the inability of the Bengals own offense to capitalize on the five turnovers Favre gave away (six if you count the fan stripping the ball). When your defense can grab five picks from the opposing quarterback, but your offense can only turn those picks into just seven points, that’s terrible. I’m hoping this was just a fluke, and the Bengals O will be back to its old self again against a Ray Lewis-less Ravens D.

Cincinnati has now reached the halfway point of the season after playing eight games. Normally, this would be a good place to stop and reflect on the season so far, and to look ahead to the back half of the year to see where our team is headed. However, I’m going to save that large update for next time, since that will be our bye week.

Next week we’re going to figure out just who from the AFC is going to make the Playoffs, and whether our Bengals are in that group. If we think Cincinnati is going to make it, we’ll decide if it’s as a Division Champion, or if they’ll get a Wild Card berth. We’re also going to play with some scenarios to figure out what has to happen for either case to come true.

For right now though, let’s all just hope that Jamal Lewis continues to suck as bad as he has this year, and doesn’t rip Cincinnati for huge yardage as he’s been known to do in the past.

I hope eight in the box is enough….