Williams: Joe Burrow says Bengals 'not that far' from title. Really?

The Cincinnati Bengals have officially returned to NFL laughingstock status and changes need to start happening immediately.

Three straight seasons of missing the playoffs gets people fired in this league. Mailing it in and getting shut out at home against your bitter rival when you’re supposed to be playing to keep postseason hopes alive calls for pinks slips to be handed out.

Everyone has seen enough after the 24-0 loss to Baltimore on a miserably cold Sunday afternoon at Paycor Stadium. And everyone has had enough of the status quo, evidenced by the empty seats and booing from those who braved the 10-degree day.

Well, almost everyone. All that matters is what the Bengals owner thinks. So what’ll it be, Mike Brown?

We all know the answer. Nothing is going to change.

We have Joe Burrow. We’re always close as long as he’s our quarterback. Even he said after Sunday’s debacle we’re “not that far” away from winning a championship.

No, Joe! Don’t say that! It was the worse thing Burrow could’ve said after the Bengals fell to 4-10, because he’s the one player in franchise history that ownership somewhat listens to. Every Bengals fan should fear that ownership and the player personnel department is going to look at the Baltimore game and dismiss it as Burrow having a bad day.

This is the problem in Bengaldom. Ownership always chalks up each loss as a bad performance by one player or a key contributor was out with an injury or the Bengals were a few plays away from victory.

Ownership will likely write off this lost season to Burrow and star defensive end Trey Hendrickson missing several games with injuries. It'll see the Bengals’ historically awful defense as having played a few decent games in the second half of the season and make it believe those defensive players are competent and capable and just need more time.

It’s that losing mentality that keeps Brown and his family in a perpetual state of status quo.

The NFL business model guarantees the Bengals ownership makes hundreds of millions of dollars a year no matter how good or bad the team is. Meanwhile, ownership clings to a run-it-back mentality. Remember, the Bengals still have the same quarterback and star wide receivers who led them on the Super Bowl run in the 2022 season. Just a play here and there, and they’re going back to the Super Bowl!

There’s no accountability in a system like that.

So, logical Bengals fans should stop kidding themselves into thinking someone is getting fired this week.

The Bengals can’t fire Brown and his daughter, Katie Blackburn, who’s No. 2 in charge. They could at least remove themselves completely from football personnel decisions. But we all know that’s not going to happen.

That leaves player personnel director Duke Tobin, who is responsible for not improving the roster since the Bengals lost the AFC Championship game in Kansas City on Jan. 29, 2023. It’s time for the Bengals to part ways with Tobin.

The player evaluation department needs a fresh start. It needs an outsider who isn’t attached to the Brown family to come in and give an honest and objective assessment of what needs to be fixed.

It’d help to have a player evaluator who knows how to draft and sign players that can tackle, rush the quarterback and cover a tight end. Is that too much to ask? For the Bengals, of course it is.

But pay no attention to the few truth tellers in the local and national media. Just trust that Mike, Katie and Duke have all the answers and are going to turn things around in 2026. The message remains the same:

Dear fans,

Why fret when we have Joey Franchise?

Pay no attention to Joe being in a bad mood last week, when he said he wasn’t having fun. He was just upset about losing to Buffalo. He’s perfectly happy here.

Pay no attention to the critics who say he’ll end up like Carson Palmer. Joe’s a good Ohio guy. He’s one of us. He’d never demand a trade.

You should be perfectly happy, too. You have an NFL franchise in your city. Do you know how many millions of Americans don’t have an NFL team in their city to cheer on?

As our head coach Zac Taylor said after a tough, hard-fought loss to the Ravens, when one of those reporters asked about whether changes need to be made: “I believe in everybody we got.”

I do, too. We’re close.

Go Bengals!

Mike Brown

Team President

P.S. Thanks for cleaning the snow off your own seat on Sunday. It helped us save money, and you know how important that is to keeping the NFL in Cincinnati.

Contact columnist Jason Williams at [email protected]

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Bengals 'not that far' from title, Joe Burrow says. Yes, they are