So was Lewis hoping just to shake things up, is he feeling the hot seat?  I see some method to his madness.  True, he told the reporters at the NFL Combine that, yeah, he was on the hot seat, et cetera, et cetera, yada, yada.  But Mark Curnutte makes an observation that's almost certainly true, that Lewis could go 8-8 or 9-7 every year and make his boss, Mike Brown, happy.  From what I've read about Mike Brown, I'll agree with that.  But, Curnutte adds:  "To his credit, Lewis is not pleased with 8-8 or 9-7. He wants to win 10 games every year."  No, I don't agree with that.  Lewis doesn't want 10 win seasons, he wants Super Bowl winning seasons.  Plural.  More than one.  What baseball people call crooked numbers, like 2, or 3, or 4.  

And he's going about it in a very interesting and exciting way.  Over the last few years, and probably over the majority of Super Bowls, the winning teams have had tough, veteran, experienced defenses.  That's been the model for the Patriots, Pittsburgh, the Buccaneers, to a lesser extent, the Colts.  Lewis is not following that model.  He's following the model of the 1981 49ers and (if my memory is right) Jimmy Johnson's teams that won back to back Super Bowls.  Those teams had young, fast, aggressive, but fairly inexperienced defenses.  That sort of defense combined with the Bengals offense could beat any team, win in any stadium.

In 1981, Bill Walsh drafted Ronnie Lott in the first round; Eric Wright in the second round; and Carlton Williamson in the third round: D-back, D-back, D-back.  Those three rookies, plus Dwight Hicks, who had a year in Canada and two in the NFL, comprised the defensive backfield that won the Super Bowl.  I don't know if Lewis plans to replace Deltha O'Neal and Dexter Jackson with rookies, but it wouldn't really surprise me if he did.  I think the starting linebackers next season will be Landon Johnson, Ahmad Brooks and Odell Thurman, and they will be great.  Geathers and Smith on the ends, Sam Adams going out "in a blaze of guns" and "all his eggs in this basket", Peko having a breakout season.  Maybe the missing ingredient is a stud defensive tackle in this year's draft, a kid who can center the switch in '08 to a 3 - 4 defense.  Or maybe Adalius Thomas.  Or--why not?--both.  If Thurman can keep dry and straighten his life out, he'll come back and be great.  I think Ahmad Brooks will be near great next year and just plain great for years after that.  Johnathan Joseph , if he can learn to catch the ball, will be great.  And if the defensive line can, by itself, generate a pass rush, Lewis would have his dream defense.

I think Lewis committed to this type of defense when he signed Jason Berryman.  With all the criticism and scorn swirling around the Bengals because of all the arrests, Lewis ignored all that to sign a kid who had served about 9 months in jail.  That signing, and then cutting Simmons this week, says to me he values youth over experience.  It's captured in Bengals transactions yesterday:  Simmons's contract was terminated, and Berryman was assigned to the Berlin Thunder.  Out with the old, in with the new. It's not madness, it's evidence of a plan.