The Bengals? Even with Sunday’s hurts, they’re in good shape, given it’s Week 14. Even considering the depth-challenged offensive line. Their schedule is challenging, but no tougher than what B-more and Pittsburgh face. The issue is, they can’t have any more games like last Sunday.
Kansas City has its mojo back. Everyone else Cincinnati plays still thinks it’s in the playoff chase, including the 6-6 49ers, here Sunday.
Is asking a team to consistently play the way it’s capable asking too much?
Because that’s all the Bengals have to do the next five weeks, and they’re playing on the third Sunday in January.
Now, then. . .
THE PATS SCORE ONE FOR MASTODONS EVERYWHERE. . . Three passes last night. Three, out of 46 total plays, enough to win at windy Buffalo, where ESPN regularly ran a weather update across the bottom of our TV screens, a means to explain why the Belichicks were playing like OSU in 1956.
“I’ve been playing football since I was 6 years old,” said center David Andrews. “[At] 6 years old we threw the ball more than three times.”
It worked partly because Belichick has a way of finding and cultivating players who don’t mind sacrificing personal glory for communal victory. The Master noted the polar express running through godawful Highmark Stadium and decided the passing game was out and that he would win with running, defense and field position. And so he did.
BTW and FWIW, Buffalo has the only truly dreadful ballpark in the NFL. Oakland was the consensus No. 1, but now the Coliseum only hosts the A’s. That leaves the mess in Orchard Park, plopped in the middle of what John Mellencamp would call “little pink houses’’ out in the faceless ‘burbs.
There are other places that leave you wanting – Jacksonville comes to mind, so do KC, Landover, MD, (home of the Teamskins), Gillette, Philly, Detroit and whatever they’re calling that charmless pit in Jersey these days. But none tops the glorified high school place where the Bills play.
If any city deserves a new stadium, it’s Buffalo. Great fans, nice people, rust-belted and continually needing a boost. The current stadium was built in 1973 at a cost of, um, $23 million.
Last August, the Bills submitted a proposal for a $1.4 billion, 60,000-seat stadium in Orchard Park on set for completion by 2027. Here’s hoping it becomes reality. Fans there deserve better than playing at Orchard Park High.
CARS ARE BORING. . . From the NY Times:
With so much change going on in the car business, I’d been looking forward to visiting the Los Angeles Auto Show, one of the world’s largest. But it wasn’t long after arriving on the show floor last week that I began to feel — how to put this delicately? — bored out of my mind.
Cars are growing brains, and I’m glad for it. I just wish they weren’t also losing heart, soul and personality.
Spot on.
OGs among us recall the days when every year brought excitement from Detroit. The new-car shows were highly anticipated and they always delivered. GTOs, Barracudas, Camaros, Chevelles, Mustangs. Now?
Boxes on wheels. Your SUV looks like everyone else’s SUV.
Soooo. . .
What was the coolest street car ever? In my mind, it was the ’67 Camaro SS, just ahead of the 64 ½ Mustang, and I had one of those ‘Stangs.
Why can’t affordable cars be both smart and beautiful?
TUNE O’ THE DAY. . . Heard this one yesterday on Underground Garage on Sirius. Great tune. Johnny is aided and abetted by his two pals, Stevie and Bruce. All the Jersey guys sound the same.
