Bengals and Marvin Lewis starting to talk extension

Whenever a head coach enters the final year of an existing contract, his lameduck status becomes an issue. Are the changes happening today a collection of tasks that will be reverted tomorrow? Will the players even listen, questioning more about the coach's long-term prognostication? Does it become a lockerroom distraction? Or just a distraction for the head coach (and how does that translate to the team during the final season of that existing contract?)

Head coach Marvin Lewis is entering the final year of an extension that kept him through 2014. It was proposed, mostly by all of us, that if the Bengals were unable to win that coveted playoff game in 2014, then the team should move on.

However, that's not necessarily the way that the Brown family thinks -- who'd rather keep a good thing together without the risk of falling backwards into an unknown prospect.

According to Joe Reedy with the Cincinnati Enquirer, the Bengals are talking about an extension for Lewis.

Lewis and Mike Brown have started discussing an extension but its in the way early stages right now #Bengals

— Joe Reedy (@joereedy) February 21, 2014

Lewis is 90-90-1 in 11 seasons with the Bengals -- 90-85-1 during the regular season.