All I Want for Christmas…

Marvin Lewis’ Christmas List had better have “A win against Kansas City” at the top so that the Bengals can have a week to “relax” and gear up for their first home playoff game since 2005 after the New Year. A first-round playoff bye is now out of the picture after their narrow defeat to the Chargers last Sunday so the Bengals focus now turns to wrapping up the playoff berth which has seemingly been a given since the beginning of December.

The AFC playoff picture is more confusing than a pile of Rubik’s Cubes but the Bengals can eliminate all of their confusion by doing what they have done all season, running the ball down the throats of the 31^st ranked run defense and walking out of Paul Brown Stadium with a victory.

Against the Chargers, the Bengals did step out of their 2009 character and throw the ball around the field as Carson Palmer amassed over 300 yards passing for the first time all season in the 27-24 loss. This is perhaps an encouraging sign to see that the Bengals still have this ability in what has become a run-first offense. Although tailoring their game plan to the opponent should cause Bob Bratkowski to put the ball back in the hands of Cedric Benson and Larry Johnson this coming Sunday. Johnson averaged a brisk 9 yards per carry against the Chargers, alas in only 4 carries. Although I’ve been wrong before, despite the impending return of Bernard Scott you can take it to the bank that this coming weekend LJ will get more than 4 carries against his former team and will find the end zone at some point in the afternoon.

Another encouraging sign is the fact that the Bengals have discovered the tight end section of the passing playbook. In San Diego, JP Foschi led the Bengals in receiving with 7 catches for 82 yards. When is the last game that a Bengal TE led in catches and yards? The Rodney Holman era? Maybe Bob Trumpy? While not comparable to the other TE’s in the AFC North, the Bengals utilizing this position in the passing game has to help Chad Ochocinco and the often invisible Laveraneus Coles get better looks.

Not to discount the Chiefs, but in looking forward to bigger and better games the Bengals still have two painfully obvious holes to plug before Wild Card weekend.

First and foremost…the yellow flags that seem to come flying out whenever the Bengals line up on offense. Cincinnati has the second most penalties in the league with 101 and from a fan’s perspective they lead the league in mind-numbing offensive penalties. They racked up another nine penalties against the Chargers, their 4^th game in a row with at least that many, and at one point faced a 1^st and 25! Ten yards is difficult enough to achieve in three downs and the Bengals have put themselves in positions to need more than that far too many times.

Watch an Indianapolis Colts game and you see a well oiled, disciplined machine. Seldom do you see illegal formations, false starts, and the omnipresent delay of game penalty that appears during Bengals games. This goes back to simple discipline and focus and is it a discouraging sign that there has been absolutely no improvement in this area for a month.

Secondly, despite Leon Hall’s shaky performance against the Chargers he and Johnathan Joseph have established themselves as a formidable tandem at the cornerback position. However, placing them on islands against the giant wide outs in San Diego was problematic at best. The Chargers boasted 4 receiving targets of 6’4” or taller and at last count there are only two top flight corners on this team. When the top four tacklers in a game are all defensive backs as was the case last Sunday, it is likely that the score is not going to be in your favor.

The losses of Chris Crocker, Roy Williams and Morgan Trent recently have proved to be significant in playing teams such as the Vikings and Chargers that have multiple receiving threats. The Bengals are suited for success in the WR deprived AFC North, but to play deeper into January they are going to need a little more secondary help.

The draining week of Chris Henry’s funeral and season of grief that the Bengals have endured should pay off this weekend in the form of a win, finalizing a trip to the postseason for only the 2^nd time in almost two decades. On the wings of the home crowd’s enthusiasm to see a playoff clinching win, the inevitable pre-game tribute to Chris Henry, and facing a team who’s weakness (stopping the run) plays into the season long strength of the Bengals, this looks to be a 27-7 type of win for the home team.

After the following week’s game against the Jets which should have more of a pre-season game type of atmosphere, the margin of error for the Cincinnati Bengals gets very slim. Maybe, in the season that they lost “Slim”, that will be enough.