Stripes

Pretty obvious move. Worth a shot.

Bring in Moss, draft Chase, draft Marshall, and let's go win the CFB national championship.

I don’t vote Chad first personally, but I suspect fans might. I probably vote Lemar Parrish before Ken Riley. Whatever though, they’re all great and deserving.

It’s a bizarre offensive explosion to start the season, largely driven by Naquin. So sure: gloat. I don’t trust this roster to maintain anything like this though. Also, Joey Votto needs to be moved down in the order. He’s an all-time great and should be an easy Hall of Famer. But it’s time.

Cool. Four inaugural names, two of which are Muñoz and Paul Brown. Who should the other two be? It’ll be fan voted so I’m not sure it’ll be completely obvious. My first instinct is Kenny and Chad.

I think Chad's initial departure was a little rocky. He has more than made amends though. I'll view him more fondly as a Bengal of recent memory than I ever will his quarterback.

Not a critical position and quite replaceable. Hopefully Perine can function in blitz pickup, but that's not a singular factor around which I will invest emotion -- especially given Burrow's proclivity for empty sets. Thanks for a great tenure, Gio. For my money he finishes as a top-4 all-time Bengals half back.

Not a bad situation. I've seen some pundits give the Bengals an A already because they can't lose.

The Darnold trade is a minor bummer for us, since it takes the Panthers out of the trade up equation.

Lost in the ~protect Burrow~ rhetoric is that the running game sucked last year, and an offensive lineman figures to help with that problem more than a receiver would. Both would have some tangible impact. Anyway, if those positions are the first two picks, I no longer give a damn what order they come in.

The 'generational talent' narrative of this draft class has been rather remarkable. I don't mean to be cheeky in saying so -- it could be valid for everyone. Lawrence - generational QB Chase - generational WR Pitts - generational TE Sewell - was once treated as a generational OT, though not at this point Hell, even Zach Wilson is starting to get that kind of treatment from some sources. It's very difficult to gauge how seriously it should all be taken, particularly given that it's Pro Days driving much of the dialogue. I am content to view Lawrence that way just because it's been the projection for about three years. Otherwise if the talk is even half valid, this should be one of the best set of top five-ten picks since the turn of the millennium.

I feel like the majority of these singular historical references are meaningless. We can do it with tight end too -- none has been taken as high as #5 in the draft by anyone since 1972, and only two have been taken by #6 since that date. I hope the Bengals assess players predominantly by on-field performance and treat pro day measurables as tiebreakers.

My instincts tell me the arm length gripe is analogous to Burrow’s small hands. I won’t die on that hill just yet though. I’m sure someone somewhere has compiled the data necessary to show at least some correlation between arm length and OT performance. I’d like to see that.

Sewell has his work cut out for him. Chase and Pitts couldn't have solidified their stock much better than they did.

His primary gripes seemed to be with the fans, and I don't think he was wrong. He can certainly fuck off though.