Bengals (4/17): Preston Brown has real incentive to show up and work out

Bengals keeping a close eye on Alabama Rashaan Evans
Outside of the offensive line, analysts have been predicting the Cincinnati Bengals to take a top linebacker with their first-round selection in this year’s draft. One name that has been popping up in those mock drafts is Alabama linebacker, Rashaan Evans. With the linebacker groups poor play and number of injuries last season, it’s not a surprise the team wants to keep looking at the position.

Cincinnati Bengals return for workouts, embracing change in 2018
When the Cincinnati Bengals announced a two-year contract extension for head coach Marvin Lewis on Jan. 2, the sentiment from most of those outside of Paul Brown Stadium was “more of the same” and “nothing’s every going to change. But with the players reporting for the first day of voluntary offseason workouts Monday, the feeling inside the locker room was much different.

Draft countdown: Bengals 2009 first-round pick
There are nine days until the 2018 NFL Draft begins and we go back nine years to take a look at who the Cincinnati Bengals took in the first round of the 2009 draft. Cincinnati selected offensive tackle Andre Smith with their sixth overall pick of the draft.

Cincinnati Bengals NFL Draft strategy: Confounding linebacker trend
Six of 12. This ranking isn’t necessarily about need – the team could use some impact players at the position. It’s about how the club has viewed drafting the position since 2003. The two longest-tenured and best linebackers on the team were undrafted and they’ve signed starting veterans to one-year deals each of the last four seasons.

Cincinnati Bengals 2018 NFL Draft strategy: Edge rushers
Seventh of 12. The success the Bengals enjoyed loading the position last season pushes it slightly down the priority list. Early returns suggest Jordan Willis and Carl Lawson could be the next generation of this defense. With new blood, however, there is a gushing out the back end, though, with Michael Johnson into his 30s and in the last year of his deal as well as impactful addition Chris Smith now in Cleveland. There is always a need for more edge rushers, and the Bengals could use more.

Joe Mixon hoping for Ezekiel Elliott-type production behind Frank Pollack’s line
Count Joe Mixon among those hoping new Cincinnati Bengals offensive line coach Frank Pollack can get the offense moving like he did for the Dallas Cowboys. Mixon got to meet up with his new line coach Monday when the Bengals reported to Paul Brown Stadium. Pollack didn’t waste any time showing him film of a guy named Ezekiel Elliott.

Cincinnati Bengals LB Preston Brown has league-high $2M workout bonus
New Cincinnati Bengals linebacker Preston Brown has a league-high $2 million workout bonus, which is tied to his participation in the team's offseason workout program that is set to kick off on Monday. The $2 million is part of the one-year deal that Brown inked with the Bengals in March, which carries a maximum value of $5 million. It's a robust total for a workout bonus, as only one other player in the league, Eagles defensive tackle Haloti Ngata, has a bonus of this nature north of $1 million.

Offensive overhaul gives Andy Dalton, A.J. Green rookie feelings
There's a perception outside of the Cincinnati Bengals' locker room that not much has changed in the few months since the organization re-signed longtime coach Marvin Lewis to a new contract. Some of the players have heard it and they might even understand it. But they don't agree with it.

TDBH: Bengals prep for court as Bergey bolts for WFL
The transition of sleepy, clubby pro sports to Wall Street business with flowing money, byzantine lawsuits, high stakes and even higher-faluting debates of loyalty officially hits Cincinnati today. All-Pro middle linebacker Bill Bergey, one of the Bengals’ franchise players, appears at a press conference in Norfolk, Va., to announce he’s signed a three-year deal with something called the Washington Admirals of the new World Football League that takes hold in 1976 and is said to be worth the unfathomable price of $250,000. But Bengals founder and head coach Paul Brown, fearing a raid of his six-year-old expansion team that is already coming off its second division title, is furious and has already beaten Bergey to the punch.

Rookie flashbacks as Bengals greeted with change
Andy Dalton looked up from his surface that blinked and clicked with new downloads and he smiled when someone mentioned that after talking to some of his offensive linemen it sounded like the Bengals are going to have a different approach up front. “You could say that about everything we’re doing on offense,” Dalton said Monday as the first day of voluntary off-season workouts came to an end. “It’s going to be different.”

Quick hits: Players see big changes; Slim Mixon; Driskel improves after costly catch
Marvin Lewis may be going into his 16th season as head coach, but some of his most veteran players on both sides of the ball sound like they’re going back to their rookie seasons. After getting his first look at the playbooks during Monday’s first day of off-season workouts at Paul Brown Stadium, quarterback Andy Dalton declared, “All of it is new.”

MLCF Clinic Offers Unique Perspective to Youth and High School Coaches
USA Football’s Andy Ryland has seen a lot of coaching clinics in his role as senior manager of education and training. The Marvin Lewis Community Fund Coaching Clinic is his favorite. “There’s nowhere I’ve ever been where the entire staff from strength and conditioning to special teams to individual position coaches spends time with the local community coaches,” said Ryland.

AFC North Bytes

Art Rooney II thanks James Harrison for 'contributions to Steelers football'
Steelers president Art Rooney II released a statement on Monday thanking James Harrison for his time with Pittsburgh. Harrison announced his retirement on Instagram Monday morning. "Thank you James for all your contributions to Steelers football throughout your career," Rooney's statement read. "Best of luck with your family in retirement."

Random Bytes

The Moneyball Guide to the 2018 NFL Draft
Moneyball is much more than a set of commandments about how to build a team, a talk-radio euphemism for stuff "Real Football Guys" hate or an excuse for going 1-31 for two seasons. Moneyball—or analytics (a more accurate, less loaded term)—informs everything the NFL does these days, from running a trick play on 4th-and-goal in the Super Bowl to—you guessed it—deciding who to draft and when.

Nick Mangold Retires from NFL After 11-Year Career with Jets
The 34-year-old veteran spent all 11 years of his career with the Jets before getting released Feb. 25, 2017, in a cost-cutting move. After parting ways with Gang Green, Mangold made it clear the organization would always hold a special place in his heart

NFL Draft 400: Top LBs for 2018 NFL Draft
We tracked, scouted, graded and ranked the top 400 prospects with help from scouting assistants Marshal Miller, Dan Bazal and Jerod Brown. Together, we viewed tape of a minimum of three games per player—the same standard NFL teams use. Oftentimes, we saw every play from a prospect over the last two years.