The Cincinnati Bengals have quite a few doubters heading into the 2022 season, which is something the locker room itself tends to love.
Fully the underdog, the Bengals and their fans don’t have to look far to find suggestions of last year being a fluke or the chances it happens again downright tiny.
It would appear former pro wideout Keyshawn Johnson is one of those guys. Appearing on ESPN’s “Keyshawn, JWill & Max” this week, Keyshawn said a lot of things went right for the Bengals last year that won’t happen again:
“I think they are a good football team, there is no question about it, but I don’t think they are at the top of the class of the AFC…Every now and then you have a sneak-up type team…I don’t mean to poo-poo on their success, but I would be very cautious to think that they’re going to be back in the same sort of situation…the ball bounced perfectly for them, let’s be honest with each other. There was probably four to five games throughout the regular season that could have swung either way for them and it swung on their side.
Of course, some of those points seem strange to fans — the Bengals had a few losses throughout the season where things could have swung their way. Winning close games isn’t always a bad thing, either, by any means. And the mentioned game against the Raiders wasn’t really that close.
Still, these are some of the things a team that went to the Super Bowl simply has to deal with going into the next season. This will go up on the board as motivation as the team looks to prove doubters wrong in 2022.
— Ace Boogie (@NewStripeCity) May 25, 2022
