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The Bengals’ pulse is still detectable, but the post-mortems have already begun. Cincinnati (8-7) remains alive in the playoff picture. The Bengals, however, do not have complete control of their destiny. Cincinnati must beat the Pittsburgh Steelers, which it hasn’t done in Paul Brown Stadium in their past five meetings, to have any chance. In addition, the Bengals must hope the Oakland Raiders upset the New York Jets or San Francisco wins in Denver while Kansas City defeats Jacksonville. For a team that had every reason to believe it was a Super Bowl contender, it is a discouraging situation. "I think personally that we have underachieved," Bengals right tackle Willie Anderson told reporters. "We keep using words like ‘talented.’ Those words come out of our mouths, they come out of you guys’ mouths and you hear some guys saying we’re a good football team. But for seven games we weren’t. That’s caused us to be in the position we’re in right now." The Bengals have had to overcome a difficult schedule and several key injuries. Not much could be done about that. But they’ve also been their own worst enemies at times, such as Sunday in a 24-23 loss at Denver. "There’s some big fixes (needed) and small fixes," quarterback Carson Palmer said. Asked to elaborate, Palmer declined. "I’m not going to go into that," he said. "But there’s definitely some things that need to change." Bengals coach Marvin Lewis said his players must continue to mesh short-term individual goals with long-term team goals. "Don’t let your contract status get in the way of our football team," Lewis said. "Don’t let how much you play, how much you throw, how much you catch, how much you run, how much you tackle get in the way of our football team. "Those are the maturity things that have to happen. Some guys have that because they’ve already been on the team. Some guys are just getting to that point, and they don’t understand that. For some guys, just winning a championship is now the greatest thing ever. And then for other guys, it’s just having an opportunity to get out there and play and beat my chest. But ultimately, that can’t get in the way of the football team." For now, Lewis prefers to focus on the here and now. That does not include indulging in speculation about the postseason. "We don’t worry about the playoffs," Lewis said. "We’re playing the Steelers. You want to talk about the Steelers? We’ll talk about the Steelers." The Steelers (7-8) have been eliminated from the playoff picture, but the defending Super Bowl champions have won five of their past seven games, with the only losses coming to AFC North champion Baltimore. With speculation that this could be Bill Cowher’s last game as Pittsburgh coach, the Bengals know the Steelers are unlikely to mail it in. "We’ll get everything they’ve got," Lewis said. "So we’ve got to go be ready. It’s going to be a big game." Unfortunately for the Bengals, a victory might not extend their season. "All we can do is worry about Pittsburgh," receiver T.J. Houshmandzadeh said. "When we had control, we didn’t take care of it. We play Pittsburgh as hard as we can, and whatever happens after Pittsburgh happens." Columbus Dispatch http://columbusdispatch.com/bengals/bengals.php?story=dispatch/2006/12/28/20061228-F1-04.html |
