Tyler Boyd is the type of competitor the Bengals need

The Bengals lost to the Miami Dolphins and now the best they can hope for this season is 2-14. That will put them at the very bottom of the league, which means they are now officially on the clock, with the 1st selection in the 2020 NFL Draft.

Obviously fans are not happy with the team’s performance this season, but while some fans were desperately hoping for a win every week, others were watching LSU games and counting losses, looking forward to the prospect of the 1st overall pick.

Tyler Boyd recently expressed his view that fans cheering for a Bengals loss are not true fans. Obviously this upset a lot of people.

Regardless of what you cheered for this season, would you want a player who was okay with losses or would you want this guy?

Boyd had nine receptions for 128 yards and two touchdowns against the Dolphins last week.

How bad did Boyd want to win that game?

He wanted it so bad that he literally crawled on his hands and knees to get lined up because the Bengals did not have any timeouts and if the officials called an injury timeout a 10-second runoff would have ended the game.

That was not a meaningless game to Tyler Boyd, and it wasn’t meaningless to a lot of other people either.

Boyd recently signed an extension. He could have laid down on the field, accepting the loss and waiting for a new young QB to throw balls to him in the fall knowing he would still have a spot on the roster and a nice big contract.

Most players don’t have that luxury.

Players like Stanley Morgan, Fred Johnson, and Greg Mabin just to name a few are fighting for their careers. They may or may not be in Cincinnati next season, but every snap they get is an opportunity to prove they belong in the NFL.

Their film is who they are, and will determine if they get a shot at this or any other roster in 2020.

So Boyd called out fans for hoping for a loss, which is exactly what a competitive player should do. He not only talked about wanting to win, he went out and proved how bad he wanted to win. Obviously a player with that kind of fight is not going to like anyone who doesn’t share this conviction to win every Sunday. This is exactly the kind of player you want on your roster.

Winning isn’t easy. Drafting a quarterback 1st overall and making big additions through free agency or trades doesn’t automatically make you a winner (just ask the Browns). It is about having a culture where everybody expects everybody else to compete like Tyler Boyd.

Obviously we all want the 1st pick and the majority of Bengals fans are all-in on Joe Burrow, but make no mistake, nobody on this roster is not “in on the tank.”

What we all really want is a team that is competing for a Super Bowl, and although we aren’t getting that this year, the current players, many of whom will be a part of getting the team there, need to be fighting for a win every single day.