The beauty of last year’s Bengals Super Bowl run was that it refreshed our optimism a bit. Here was a franchise supposedly adrift, with a quarterback we weren’t sure was healthy or sustainably protectable. Here was a ho-hum collection of free agents on defense. And, amazingly, they caught a wave and rode it all the way to the postseason. Joe Burrow was the perfect antidote to the rise of two-high-shell defenses. Lou Anarumo’s rendition of a blitz-averse defense that empowered his edge rushers was the perfect antidote to Patrick Mahomes. A few well-timed interceptions here, a few made field goals there: Voila.
While their run is likely a once-in-a-decade type heater, it opened our eyes to the idea that teams can rise and fall more quickly than maybe we expected. Here’s my list from going through this exercise last year, for reference, which notably left off those Bengals. This year, I’ll stick with 12 teams, but I want to add a wildcard section to spotlight one team on the periphery of our collective betting interest. Call it the Bengals effect if you will, but in an effort to look less silly (I didn’t have the Buccaneers on my 2020 list, either), we’ll try anything.
Before we get into it, a few notes:
