Gah!
You all know I'm a pretty big Cincinnati Bengals fan. Well, they just haven't had the season that we all expected, especially considering they were supposedly building on the magical 2005. Anyway, they had lost a bunch of winnable games in the middle of the season making the last bit of schedule, the toughest part against some of the best teams in the league, all the more important to win.
They had a bid for a wild card playoff spot, and Santa delivered a bunch of gifts on Christmas Eve. Two other wild card contenders lost earlier in the day, meaning that if the Bengals could just beat the Broncos that day, they'd be in the playoffs. On the first play of the game, Bengals safety Dexter Jackson intercepted a pass and returned it to the Broncos 5 yard line. 1st and goal from the 5. Game's looking good already and there has only been one play.
Well, the Bengals failed to score. A few plays later, Carson Palmer was intercepted in the endzone when he threw the ball over the head of wideout TJ Houshmandzadeh. However, the Broncos did nothing and were forced to punt. The Bengals returned the ball to the Denver 30 yard line. Not quite 1st and goal from the 5, but still excellent field position. I don't even remember what happened here, but we didn't score.
Later in the game, Pro Bowl wideout Chad Johnson had his first career lost fumble and also had a ball bounce off his chest while wide open on what would have been a sure touchdown. Also, wideout Chris Henry had a touchdown called back on an illegal shift by I think Chad Johnson, and Carson Palmer overthrew Chad Johnson on another deep route in which he beat coverage and would have been a big gain if not a touchdown. Running back Rudi Johnson lost a fumble for the second time in two games, before which he touched the ball 500 times without a lost fumble (a period that stretches back to last season).
The offense was not playing well and Santa was running out of gifts...
The Bengals held a 3-point lead at one point, but that was erased after a Broncos touchdown and then field goal. The Bengals; however, have a pretty explosive offense normally and were able to pull it together for one last drive. They were down by 7 with just a couple of minutes on the game clock and a long way to go. They concocted a pretty impressive drive, including a 4th and 8 conversion on a 22-yard pass to TJ Houshmandzadeh and culminating in a touchdown pass to the same. 23-24 Denver, with about 45 seconds left on the game clock and the PAT coming up. This game's going to OT, right?
I knew it deep down that something was going to go wrong. I knew it. Personally I thought we were going to miss it wide. But no, it was a bad snap. So still 23-24 Denver.
We line up for the onside kick. Useless, usually. But this time no! We recover the kick! But rookie linebacker Ahmad Brooks was offsides and we had to rekick, which we kicked right into the hands of a Broncos player. The Broncos offense kneeled the ball, killing the clock (and the Bengals) once and for all.
The botched snap served as a summary for the rest of the game. Poor execution and missed opportunities. If the Bengals could just execute on the many miscues, it would have been a blowout. Alas, the Broncos were the better team that night.
But our hopes were still alive. If only the Dolphins could beat the Jets last night, and we beat the Steelers next week, we're still in.
Well, the Dolphins and Jets were tied until like the last minute and a half of the game. Chad Pennington dumped off a 3-yard screen pass that the receiver turned into a 64-yard gain, setting up an easy field goal for Mike Nugent that put the Jets ahead by 3 with 10 seconds left. No chance for the Dolphins, who were playing for pride anyway.
The Bengals still can get in if the Jets lose against Oakland (fat chance) and we beat the Steelers. That likely will not happen and we'll have to point back to that fateful Denver game in which we had everything in our hands and were given many early Christmas gifts and couldn't do anything with them.
