Disclaimer: The intent of this post is not for you to hijack it and use it as a springboard to promote your political ideology. The intent is to look at the upcoming elections from a silly perspective – how they affect the Bengals. Please try to be mature enough to keep your comments football oriented.

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With the upcoming presidential election nearing, and the coming of ads that will soon flood us in the battleground state known as Ohio, I thought I’d take a look at the election in terms of:

How have the Bengals done under different presidents?

And based on that, who is the best president to help the Bengals win?

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I thought this would be an interesting way to view the election since we are going to be inundated with ads during the preseason and first half of the season. The ads get old and boring, but they aren’t going to go away until November. So until then, why not have some fun with the whole election? Anyway we’re in that dead time before camp begins.

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From 1968 to 2011 the Bengals have played 44 seasons under 9 different presidents – 4 Democrats (Johnson, Carter, Clinton & Obama) and 5 Republicans (Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush & Bush 2.0).

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Some interesting stats from those seasons:

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For whatever reason, the Bengals have had their 3 best seasons under Republicans, and their 3 worst seasons under Democrats. Also, the Bengals only had winning %’s higher than 50% during 2 presidential terms, both of which were Republican. The Bengals posted a whopping 67% winning percentage under an ex-college football player in Gerald Ford, who was the only president to never sit in office during a Bengals’ losing season.

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The Bengals are under 50% winning with either party overall, but overall have performed much better under Republicans.

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The Bengals have made 8 playoff appearances in the 28 years they’ve been under a Republican presidency (29%) but have only made 2 playoff appearances in the 16 years they’ve been under a Democratic president (13%) – both under Obama.

The Bengals have made at least 1 playoff appearance under every Republican president while they have made playoff appearances in only 1 of the 4 Democratic presidencies.

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The Bengals have had 11 winning seasons & 11 losing seasons under a Republican president, but only 3 winning seasons and 12 losing seasons under a Democratic president.

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Oh, and of course the big one...both of the Bengals’ Super Bowl appearances came in seasons when a Republican was in office – Reagan’s first year and Reagan’s last year.

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I wasn’t sure what to expect when I started looking into this. I was expecting some sort of mix, but was quite surprised when I saw how overwhelmingly better the Bengals have done when a Republican was in the White House. I don’t know why this is, but I found it quite interesting and unexpected.