This Bengals team needs to get angry

He said what?

“I feel really good about where we’re at,” Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow told Paul Dehner, Jr. of the Atlantic.

This after losing 32-13 to a Cleveland Browns team on life support, in a game that was not nearly as close as the final score indicated. This after falling to 4-4, dropping a game behind the Baltimore Ravens in the AFC North Division race and facing a Carolina Panthers team that very nearly knocked off the Atlanta Falcons this past weekend.

Oh, and let’s not forget the fact that the Bengals’ offense is operating without it top wide receiver, Ja’Marr Chase, for at least the next couple of weeks, and the defense just lost its best player, cornerback Chidobe Awuzie, for the season with a torn ACL.

“When you got Nine behind center, all things are possible,” tight end Hayden Hurst said. “We are not freaking out. We are not going crazy. We are going to figure this thing out.”

That’s all well and good but, guess what guys, you’re running out of time. If you don’t figure this thing out soon, the season for all intents and purposes will be over.

But it’s not like it’s never happened before. The last time Cincinnati went to a Super Bowl and lost, after the 1988 season, the Bengals finished 8-8 the following season and missed the playoffs. Is history going to repeat itself?

“My message today, I’m going to be a demeanor hound,” Cincinnati center Ted Karras said. “I don’t want to see any sulking or any pouting.”

You know what, I don’t either. But what I do want to see is some emotion. I want to hear somebody say, “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take it anymore.” Because I’m mad as hell, but there’s not a darn thing I can do about it. The players, on the other hand, can.

Despite what any of the talking heads tell you, Cincinnati can turn this thing around, get back to the playoffs and even find its way back to the ultimate game. But it’s time to get angry. You played like crap Sunday against the Browns. Punch a hole in the wall (metaphorically speaking), then get ready to take it out on the Panthers.

What we don’t need is more of the same.

“I’m confident that’s not not who we are,” Bengals’ coach Zac Taylor said after the Cleveland debacle. “But we can make the corrections and flush this one away quickly, turn our attention to Carolina on the six-day week.”

Who and what you are is a team that is 4-4 and fading. Forget all of the motivational coach speak, get mad, and go out and kick some butt. We saw plenty of that last year, and ended up in the Super Bowl. We haven’t seen much of that this year, and you see where we are.

I don’t know about you, but I’m mad as hell, and I don’t want to take it anymore.