Bengals Bytes (7/6): Future in booth

Duke Tobin Town Hall Meeting
Bengals Season Ticket Members enjoy a Q&A session with Director of Player Personnel Duke Tobin.

ESPN Fantasy Bengals Players
Think it’s too early to start preparing for the 2017 Fantasy season? Think again. ESPN’s Fantasy Football staff recently offered its picks for the upcoming season’s top sleepers, busts and breakouts for the main offensive positions, and at least one Bengals player made the cut for each category: Joe Mixon as a breakout and sleeper at running back, Andy Dalton as a sleeper at quarterback, Tyler Eifert as a bust at tight end, according to the ESPN panel.

What You Need To Know About Bengals Heading Into Camp
Even though the Cincinnati Bengals missed the playoffs in 2016, this is still a team that has talented players on all three levels on both sides of the ball, but they are starting to age and their lack of depth gives them little margin for error. They need to stay healthy, especially on offense, and Andy Dalton is a very productive QB when he has all of his weapons. They did lose some veterans in free agency who had declining skill sets but they gave this team a lot of locker room leadership. They are better than their 6-9-1 record of 2016 and the Bengal faithful are getting restless. This is a critical year for Cincinnati.

Bengals 50: Sam Wyche, the genius behind the no-huddle offense
The relationship between Sam Wyche and the Cincinnati Bengals began with a tryout at St. Xavier High School in the summer of 1968, when Paul Brown signed Wyche to play quarterback for his startup AFL franchise. "Paul Brown called me in and in those days you did not take an agent into the room with you. With Paul Brown anyway," Wyche recalled. "I don't know about other teams. But that was an absolute no-no. I sat down and Paul eventually went over the workout and he offered me a contract, a one-year, $11,000 contract in 1968 to come play quarterback."

The AFC North’s biggest weaknesses for the Bengals
The Cincinnati Bengals will have to beat up on their division rivals this season if they wish to get back to the playoffs. That means find out the weaknesses of each team in the AFC North and exploiting it six times in 16 weeks. But what are the biggest weaknesses for each team in the division? We take a look at each opponent and figure out what is the best way to attack them and win.

Vincent Rey is the Bengals’ best broadcast prospect
Nearly every team ends up having a player hit the broadcast circuit at some point. The Cincinnati Bengals already have Boomer Esiason and Chris Collinsworth in front of the camera. But they have a solid prospect to continue that broadcast lineage on the roster as well in linebacker Vincent Rey.

AFC North Bytes

Risk vs. reward of signing Le'Veon Bell to a long-term contract?
Brian Baldinger and Steve Wyche discuss the risk and reward regarding signing Pittsburgh Steelers running back Le'Veon Bell.

Robert Griffin III, Fiancee Grete Sadeiko Announce Birth of Baby Gloria
Robert Griffin III and his fiancee, Grete Sadeiko, announced the birth of their daughter, Gloria, on Tuesday. Sadeiko posted photos of her and Griffin in the hospital, with a caption that confirmed Gloria was born Sunday, July 2

Random Bytes

Don't Sleep on the 2017 Miami Dolphins
The Miami Dolphins are that other team in the AFC East. That may beat being the New York Jets, who haven't won the division since 2002, or the Buffalo Bills, who haven't done so since 1995, but the Dolphins have escaped from the New England Patriots' shadow just once since New England launched its dynasty a decade and a half ago.

NFL1000: Ranking the Best Offensive Schemes
When we talk about what makes great coaches valuable to their teams, we could be talking about any number of things. Some coaches are alpha motivators who can take their players and make them do things they didn't think possible through the sheer force of their will and the ability to get everyone around them to buy in.

Cowboys LB Damien Wilson Arrested on Aggravated Assault Charge
Dallas Cowboys linebacker Damien Wilson was arrested Tuesday at Toyota Stadium in Frisco, Texas, and charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. Lynnanne Nguyen of Fox 4 News first reported the arrest Wednesday morning and passed along Wilson's mugshot

Dak Prescott Accused of Using Machine to Sign Memorabilia
Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott has been "accused of using a machine to sign his autograph for memorabilia company selling to collectors instead of signing himself," according to Darren Rovell of ESPN.com. "They had a very machine-like feel," Steve Grad, the principal authenticator of Beckett Grading Services, said of five autographed Prescott cards from the Panini 2016 Prizm set. "You could see the starts and stops."