FanPost

Bengals Defense Confounded by Little League Offensive Playbook

Bengals defense is being gashed by a pee wee football offense approach. Anyone that has either played, coached, and/or watched little league football (7-8 year old children) has seen how the offense simply tries to expose the defenses lack of line integrity and inability to protect the edges. Offenses simply run sweep plays (over and over) with their fastest players (qb/rb) around the ends and pick up huge gains because the children don't have the discipline, ability, knowledge, or patience to protect the edges and push the ball back inside. Any NFL or college level team only tries to sweep the ball 2-3 times a game to try and open up the middle because it is rarely effective with a disciplined defense.

When I saw this was Pittsburgh's OC's strategy, I laughed to myself. First of all, I thought it was very juvenile and desperate for a team with no QB and no wins. I thought for sure there is no way the Bengals would allow this strategy to work and surely they would have the ability, knowledge, and discipline to shut it down. So the winless Steelers stuck to the weak game plan (shovel passes and sweeps) and completely obliterated the Bengals defense. Pitt often ran the same play several times (even in succession) and the Bengals couldn't adjust/respond.

Any peewee football coach knows you just need to flank the defensive ends wider (When I coached, I even would have defenders straddle the bounds sideline to force the runner/action inside). What did the Bengals do: continue to over pursue the QB and get blocked down. What did the Steelers do: continue to sweep the ball around the edge. I guess maybe Hubbard, Dunlap, and Lawson get paid for sacks, so stopping the run and protecting the edge are not a priority. The DB's are just running around aimlessly chasing WR's.

So now a blueprint (actually created 2 weeks before) has been created to not only beat, but embarrass this defense. Do Bengals self scout? Yet still no adjustments and the Ravens make even a bigger mockery of the Bengals defense. QB runs for almost 200 yards. I am not very intelligent, or I would be able to add several clips to this post to exemplify what I'm talking about, yet I'm still smart enough to know how to protect the edge of the defensive line.

This is truly the most frustrating aspect of this season. The incompetence of the coaches and players have reached a new low...and I have been a fan since 1979.

This is a FanPost and does not necessarily reflect the views of Cincy Jungle's writers or editors. It does reflect the views of this particular fan, which is as important as the views of Cincy Jungle's writers or editors.