Speaker 1: I get everybody. I'm Dan Horde and thanks for downloading
Speaker 1: the Bengals Booth Podcast. The It's too late, It's too soon,
Speaker 1: or is it tick tick tick tick tick tick Boom
Speaker 1: edition as we check in with the greatest leader in
Speaker 1: Bengals history, former NFL MVP Boomer Asiasin. Plus, it's a
Speaker 1: new round of fun facts with Mike Brown. With the
Speaker 1: Olympics going on in Tokyo, would it surprise you to
Speaker 1: learn that the last time that Tokyo hosted the Games,
Speaker 1: fifty seven years ago, Hall of Famer Paul Brown was
Speaker 1: among the spectators. In between his coaching stops in Cleveland
Speaker 1: and Cincinnati. I'll discuss that and much more with the
Speaker 1: Bengals team president. The Bengals Booth Podcast is presented by
Speaker 1: bud Light. Seltzer Refreshed the Game and here's a quick
Speaker 1: reminder that you can have the latest edition of this
Speaker 1: podcast delivered right to your phone, tablet, or computer by
Speaker 1: subscribing on iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, Spotify, or pod Bean.
Speaker 1: It's the greatest thing since a fast gas pump. There's
Speaker 1: nothing worse than when you go to fill up your tank,
Speaker 1: squeeze the trigger and the digits on the gas pump
Speaker 1: begin to turn over very slowly. A job you thought
Speaker 1: was going to be quick and easy becomes a pain
Speaker 1: in the you know what. On the flip side, it's
Speaker 1: highly satisfying when you begin filling the tank and those
Speaker 1: numbers start spinning so quickly that you feel like you're
Speaker 1: about to set a world record. I had that experience
Speaker 1: this week at a UDF on Beechmont, av not far
Speaker 1: from the Reeves golf Course. I have dubbed it the
Speaker 1: Usane Bolt of gas pumps. Now, let's get to football.
Speaker 1: The Bengals open training camp this week and on Thursday,
Speaker 1: about two hours before taking the field for practice, Joe
Speaker 1: Burrow sat down for a TV taping with former Bengals
Speaker 1: quarterback Boomer Assiasin. The producers of the segment came up
Speaker 1: with a great idea as the two qbs watched and
Speaker 1: discussed each other's game film. I got to listen into
Speaker 1: quite a bit of it, and I am sure it
Speaker 1: will be a great segment. It will run on Thursday
Speaker 1: Night Football when the Bengals host Jacksonville in Week four.
Speaker 1: This was only the second time that the two of
Speaker 1: them have seen each other in person. The first time
Speaker 1: they met, Boomer, handed Burrow a Cincinnati Helmett and welcomed
Speaker 1: him to the Bengals family on the CBS pregame show
Speaker 1: the day after Joe won the Heisman Trophy. After taping
Speaker 1: their segment for the NFL Network on Thursday, the nineteen
Speaker 1: eighty eight, NFL MVP discussed Burrow with me and my
Speaker 1: broadcast partner Dave Lapham. Do you believe in an IT
Speaker 1: factor for quarterbacks? And if so, does Joe have it? Yeah?
Speaker 1: You know, I do. I absolutely do. I'd like to
Speaker 1: think I had it, whatever it was, But I know
Speaker 1: what the in factor is. The effect is when you
Speaker 1: walk into the room, there's an immediate respect that it's
Speaker 1: accorded you because of the way you carry yourself you're
Speaker 1: both on the field and in the meeting rooms, and
Speaker 1: your dedication to the sport, and then of course your
Speaker 1: relationships that you have. So think about the way that
Speaker 1: he played last year as a rookie. Think about how
Speaker 1: he handled the offense and everything else. He's making checks
Speaker 1: at the line scrimmage, he's calling for his own number
Speaker 1: on a quarterback draw when he reads a defense. Ebra
Speaker 1: Flews tried to flush him out with his own blitz
Speaker 1: and he stood in there knowing that he had enough
Speaker 1: blockers and hit T Higgins down the sideline. Those are
Speaker 1: things I was incapable of doing. I just faked it.
Speaker 1: But he doesn't. You know, he's the real deal. You
Speaker 1: can tell, and you could tell that he has that
Speaker 1: part of it physically, and I think his mental game
Speaker 1: is really about as sharp as you know you would expect.
Speaker 1: What's the first time you met him when when he
Speaker 1: came to CBS for the Heisman Trophy, you know, ceremony
Speaker 1: type deal, the show. What was your first impression of
Speaker 1: What was it about him stood out to you? I
Speaker 1: was surprised how big he was. He didn't look that
Speaker 1: big on TV, maybe because he was playing at LSU
Speaker 1: when he's playing against other big teams and he was
Speaker 1: on a big team himself. But I was shocked at
Speaker 1: how big he was. I thought he was two inches
Speaker 1: smaller than that. And seeing him now from that was
Speaker 1: probably about what eighteen nineteen months ago, maybe twenty months ago.
Speaker 1: He's a man. Now, he's a full fledged man, so
Speaker 1: he looks great, and I know he was dedicated this
Speaker 1: offseason to overcoming the knee injury, which is another part
Speaker 1: of the responsibility of view as a player and of
Speaker 1: course the ultimate leader of the team. So he's dedicated
Speaker 1: himself to be ready to go one hundred percent, and
Speaker 1: I think all the players will respond to that. So
Speaker 1: with a segment you recorded today, that's the longest amount
Speaker 1: of time you've spent with him so far. What stood
Speaker 1: out in that conversation. He's pretty relaxed. I mean, he
Speaker 1: could do TV right now if he wanted to. I'm like,
Speaker 1: what you just did that one? Take hold on. It's
Speaker 1: not supposed to be that easy. But I guess this
Speaker 1: generation's a little bit more advanced than our generation is.
Speaker 1: He knows his stuff. You know, he knows his players,
Speaker 1: he knows where credit needs to be given. You could
Speaker 1: tell that. You know, he wasn't sitting there extolling his
Speaker 1: own virtues. He was talking about a center. He's talking
Speaker 1: about his wide receiver, talking about his running back. Look
Speaker 1: at this block here by this offensive tackle. I mean,
Speaker 1: so he loves his coaches and you could tell that.
Speaker 1: You know that part of him that is the biggest
Speaker 1: question mark for every coaching staff and every organization is
Speaker 1: easibly answered and he has it. He definitely has it.
Speaker 1: The thing that a trait that you and he have
Speaker 1: in common. In my opinion, you both have unbelievable people skills,
Speaker 1: and you make everybody feel important, you know. I mean,
Speaker 1: there's not one guy that's involved in the mix that
Speaker 1: you don't make feel like he's the most important guy
Speaker 1: and his contribution is the most important. That's a hell
Speaker 1: of a talent to have. Hell yeah, it is probably
Speaker 1: the most important talent. Especially when you're in a huddle
Speaker 1: with ten guys games on the line, They're looking at you.
Speaker 1: They know whether or not you have what it takes
Speaker 1: to call the right play, to get the team into
Speaker 1: the right play, to make sure you have the right
Speaker 1: pass protection, communicating with your other ten players within five
Speaker 1: second sound bites at the line of scrimmage, whether it
Speaker 1: be hand signals, whether it be yelling something at the
Speaker 1: top of your lungs, but just generally leading your football team.
Speaker 1: So it's an attribute that you want to be able
Speaker 1: to check the boxes of a player. So he's got
Speaker 1: the size, he's got the arm strength, he can run,
Speaker 1: and now he has the most important aspect to who
Speaker 1: he is, and that's the dedication to the game that
Speaker 1: everybody else feeds off of. But he does it in
Speaker 1: a way that is not condescending, which is really important
Speaker 1: for a leader to carry himself that way. So, if
Speaker 1: I know one thing, he's a better player than I
Speaker 1: ever was already. You know, I can see it. Really, yes,
Speaker 1: I do think it, and he's a much more accurate
Speaker 1: pastor than I was. But he's also fearless. He's not
Speaker 1: afraid to throw the ball down the field, which is
Speaker 1: in today's game, is going to be valuable for them
Speaker 1: to move forward and to be successful. I think he's
Speaker 1: going to be. He'll be in the running for Comeback
Speaker 1: Player of the Year. I believe even though he played
Speaker 1: ten games, he's still got hurt. He's still had to
Speaker 1: overcome an injury here this offseason, and I think they
Speaker 1: have like an underrated, sneaky kind of talent here. I'm
Speaker 1: not going to sit here and tell you they're going
Speaker 1: twelve and five, but I think that you know, they're
Speaker 1: going to be in the mix because these other teams
Speaker 1: in this division aren't perfect. They all have scars or
Speaker 1: wartz somewhere along the line. And you know, Cleveland is
Speaker 1: probably the best team, I think, but that doesn't mean
Speaker 1: that Cincinnati can't sneak up on them as well. Ken
Speaker 1: Anderson told me last week that Burrow is going to
Speaker 1: be better than he ever was. You're saying that he
Speaker 1: already is. I think that might be a little bit
Speaker 1: of an exaggeration, but that's pretty extraordinary that the two
Speaker 1: best quarterbacks in this franchise's history have seen a guy
Speaker 1: play ten games at the NFL level and are already
Speaker 1: saying those types of things. Well, the only reason I
Speaker 1: said that is because Carson Palmer told me that. And
Speaker 1: he's another one. You know, Jordan worked with Joe a
Speaker 1: lot when he was coming out in college, and Carson
Speaker 1: told me, Boomer, this kid is great and he was
Speaker 1: not wishing for the Bengals to draft him. And I'm
Speaker 1: sitting there going, wait a minute, he's from this area,
Speaker 1: that he's this is the perfect guy for this team,
Speaker 1: can't miss. And I think we all think that because, look,
Speaker 1: he won a Heisman, won the national championship, so his
Speaker 1: arc of success is far ahead of where we were
Speaker 1: at this time in our and our careers. And I
Speaker 1: think that's why we all feel this way. So it's
Speaker 1: it's a good thing to feel this way. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of pressure on the young man, but he seems
Speaker 1: like to absorb it. Seems like he absorbs it very
Speaker 1: well and probably fuels him to be even greater, and
Speaker 1: hopefully he does. Oh, we all want a Super Bowl championship.
Speaker 1: That would be great, and maybe that would kick off
Speaker 1: this whole new kind of reflecting back on the great
Speaker 1: players of this organization, which has been long overdue. When
Speaker 1: I played in the seventies and eighties, the game was
Speaker 1: one way. When you guys were playing in the late
Speaker 1: eighties and into the nineties, that Super Bowl era, it
Speaker 1: was a lot different. How different is today's game from
Speaker 1: when you played? More wide open now than ever before.
Speaker 1: You know, the rules are such where offenses really need
Speaker 1: to be able to throw the ball down the field
Speaker 1: to big, wide receivers, and this is exactly what the
Speaker 1: Bengals have. They're loaded at these positions. Jamar Chase, you know,
Speaker 1: has a potential to be a Rookie of the Year.
Speaker 1: That's how good. You know. I think that this team
Speaker 1: can be offensively, especially with Joe and Jamar in their
Speaker 1: history at LSU. But you know, back an hour day,
Speaker 1: you know, it was more run oriented. I still think
Speaker 1: you have to run the ball effectively. You still have
Speaker 1: to be a more physical team than the team you're
Speaker 1: playing against. You can only especially in outdoor weather stadiums
Speaker 1: like we have at Paul Brown Stadium. You have to
Speaker 1: be able to run the football. It can't always be
Speaker 1: about throwing the ball forty five times and completing you know,
Speaker 1: you know, thirty five passes for four hundred yards, because
Speaker 1: you're gonna up losing those games if the other team
Speaker 1: is controlling the football. So I think there still has
Speaker 1: to be balanced, but there's definitely an uptick in the
Speaker 1: big play capabilities of the offense since we were playing.
Speaker 1: Final question for me, what do you think the biggest
Speaker 1: challenge is he faces coming back from his knee injury.
Speaker 1: Just trusting that he's one hundred percent, you know that
Speaker 1: first couple of times he gets hit. I'm sure every
Speaker 1: running back will tell you that, every wide receiver will
Speaker 1: tell you that. Anybody who's ever played and had a
Speaker 1: knee injury, we'll tell you that. So it's going to
Speaker 1: be trusting that it's stable and that he can that
Speaker 1: he can take a hit. I think he feels pretty
Speaker 1: comfortable about it just talking to him, but that's probably
Speaker 1: the biggest thing, and I bet you he's itching to
Speaker 1: get on the field. You know, he sat there and
Speaker 1: he told me he watched all of Justin Herbert's games
Speaker 1: and how much fun it was to watch Justin Herbert.
Speaker 1: He wants to be that guy again, and I know
Speaker 1: he can't wait to get back on the field. So
Speaker 1: I think he's going to be ready and rare to go,
Speaker 1: and it's gonna be fun to watch. A quick question,
Speaker 1: I have one more follow up to what you're talking about. Hit.
Speaker 1: Everybody has boxes to check after surgery and getting a hit,
Speaker 1: that one hit is the final one. Get up. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm good. Do you think he should play in the preseason.
Speaker 1: He seems like he wants to take some snaps in
Speaker 1: the preseason in the organization doesn't want any part of it.
Speaker 1: What do you what do you think? You know? I
Speaker 1: think I would think like him. I'd want to play.
Speaker 1: I wanted to play in the preseason. I wanted to
Speaker 1: get hit. I wanted to feel the rush of the game,
Speaker 1: even though the game didn't mean anything. You're still out
Speaker 1: there with your teammates. You're calling your plays, even though
Speaker 1: they may be the most basic of plays, but you
Speaker 1: still want to feel like you can go out there
Speaker 1: and do it and I hope they let him play
Speaker 1: at some point. I'm not saying that they. I doubt
Speaker 1: the third preseason game any starters playing, so it's probably
Speaker 1: going to be the second preseason game. I would think
Speaker 1: at least give him a couple series, or give him
Speaker 1: a quarter, or give him two quarters, and just let
Speaker 1: him wet his feet, let him know that that need's okay,
Speaker 1: and let him take some hits. I mean, it's part
Speaker 1: of the game, that's part of the whole situation. And look,
Speaker 1: he's been out now for what eight months? I guess
Speaker 1: there are nine months, yeah, nine months, So I think
Speaker 1: it's he's ready to go. And he's not a running back,
Speaker 1: he's a quarterback, and you know he needs to feel
Speaker 1: the pressure and feel the pocket and live hitting. So
Speaker 1: that's why I would want him to play. And I
Speaker 1: know that I would want to play me too. I
Speaker 1: mean that's the same thing as a players all want
Speaker 1: to They want to get before the regular season starts.
Speaker 1: You want to take that hit and get up and
Speaker 1: say final box checked. Everything's good. All right. My last question,
Speaker 1: I can't talk to you without talking about Gunner and
Speaker 1: we're all Dad's here. What you've done as a father
Speaker 1: chokes me up. I mean, it's unbelievable. And your son,
Speaker 1: you've extended his life, You've given him a better quality
Speaker 1: of life. He just got married. I mean, Boomer, it's
Speaker 1: unbelievable what you've done. You know, I will tell you.
Speaker 1: It's probably my proudest moment is watching him walk down
Speaker 1: the aisle. But right prior to that, a lot of
Speaker 1: people didn't know that it was on Father's Day weekend.
Speaker 1: I don't know if they set that up. I'm not
Speaker 1: really sure because Darcy, his wife, is really close with
Speaker 1: her dad as well. And the Thursday night before the wedding,
Speaker 1: he and Darcy handed me my Father's Day gift and
Speaker 1: it was a sonogram in a plexiglass frame, and I've
Speaker 1: started bawling. I've never been so emotional in my life.
Speaker 1: And the interesting thing about Gunner, because of cystic fibrosis,
Speaker 1: if you want to be the biological father, they have
Speaker 1: to go in and they have to take your sperm
Speaker 1: out of your testicles, which is not a very which
Speaker 1: is not easy at all. But you have to be
Speaker 1: dedicated to do this and he is and obviously is dedicated,
Speaker 1: and his wife was going through ivy app on the
Speaker 1: other side for the woman, which is not easy either,
Speaker 1: and they had to go through all the genetic testing
Speaker 1: and everything else. And they had four eggs. And I'm
Speaker 1: always saying this publicly because they've written about it and
Speaker 1: they've talked about it. They placed one end, they didn't
Speaker 1: know whether it was going to be male or female,
Speaker 1: and then after four about four months, they found out
Speaker 1: that it was a baby boy. And I've always said
Speaker 1: this about everything that I've ever done in the world
Speaker 1: of the fibrosis, that my only two goals are one
Speaker 1: that my son outlived me in the second is that
Speaker 1: he becomes a father himself. And when they handed me
Speaker 1: that thing, I just I couldn't talk. My daughter was
Speaker 1: laughing at me, and that whole weekend was like a
Speaker 1: blur to me. And it's everything that I could have
Speaker 1: ever asked for. That is tremendous. Yeah, this is such
Speaker 1: a treat. Thank you so much for your time. We
Speaker 1: always appreciate it. It's fun. It's fun to see you guys.
Speaker 1: Since its inception, the Boomeris Siasin Foundation has raised more
Speaker 1: than one hundred and fifteen million dollars to support research
Speaker 1: toward a cure for cystic fibrosis. As well as programs
Speaker 1: directly benefiting the cf community. The Bengals Booth podcast is
Speaker 1: presented by Bud Light Seltzer. It's light and refreshing with
Speaker 1: a hint of fruit flavor. At the beginning of the week,
Speaker 1: just before training camp got under way, the Bengals held
Speaker 1: their annual media luncheon, where Zach Taylor and his coordinators
Speaker 1: discussed the upcoming season with Cincinnati area reporters. It's also
Speaker 1: the one time each year the team president Mike Brown
Speaker 1: does an extensive series of interviews, including a few offbeat
Speaker 1: questions from me. Time for a new round of fun
Speaker 1: Facts with Bengals President Mike Brown and Mike As we
Speaker 1: record this interview, the Olympics are going on in Tokyo.
Speaker 1: The last time the games were there in nineteen sixty four,
Speaker 1: your father wasn't coaching at the time, and he attended.
Speaker 1: Did you ever talk to him about him making that trip,
Speaker 1: what events he watched, people he met, etc. I did,
Speaker 1: and he was very impressed with the nation of Japan.
Speaker 1: He came back and said how ordered and cleanly everything was,
Speaker 1: the people were. They behaved towards visitors in a way
Speaker 1: that you would want. They won him over and he
Speaker 1: was a guy was in the service during World War Two,
Speaker 1: so that just speaks to the Japanese nation. That was
Speaker 1: the nineteen sixty four Summer Olympics. In sixty eight, Tommy
Speaker 1: Smith won the gold medal in the two hundred meters
Speaker 1: and famously did a Black Power salute on the metal
Speaker 1: podium with bronze medalist John Carlos. Shortly after that, Tommy
Speaker 1: joined the Bengals and he was with this franchise for
Speaker 1: three years. His only catch went for forty one yards
Speaker 1: and he dislocated his shoulder on that play. What are
Speaker 1: your memories of Tommy Smith? I remember him fondly. He
Speaker 1: was a nice young man. He was the fastest sprinter
Speaker 1: in the world at the time, but oddly in football,
Speaker 1: speed is majored in a shorter distance and his takeoff
Speaker 1: was not as fast his ending spurt, if you will,
Speaker 1: which was phenomenal. Once he got up and running, he
Speaker 1: had this mammoth stride and he just ran away from people.
Speaker 1: But over forty yards we had a number of players
Speaker 1: who could match him, and that was something that registered
Speaker 1: with me because it showed how quickness counts in football
Speaker 1: we believed at the time, and I believe still that
Speaker 1: people have the right to have their say. He did
Speaker 1: what he did. I don't know how much planning went
Speaker 1: into it, but it made such an impact. It was incredible,
Speaker 1: but it didn't seem hostile. It was more a statement
Speaker 1: about we're here, part of everything, don't forget us. I
Speaker 1: took it in that sense, and I can say is
Speaker 1: once more as a person. He was a wonderful young man.
Speaker 1: I know you love baseball and watch Red's games regularly.
Speaker 1: Are there any other sports that you enjoy watching the NBA, golf,
Speaker 1: the Olympics, anything else? Pretty much anything I like watching sports.
Speaker 1: I watch golf. I find those guys incredible. The pressure
Speaker 1: on them is just something that has to be seen
Speaker 1: to believe, and they have to bear up under it,
Speaker 1: and they do. I watch the NBA games. My prospective
Speaker 1: grandson in law affiliated with the NBA basketball and he
Speaker 1: on occasions tolerates my questions and helps me understand what's
Speaker 1: going on. But they're incredible athletes. They have this huge
Speaker 1: ability to run, jump, shoot at the far out distances.
Speaker 1: I don't know how they do it. They're fun to watch.
Speaker 1: We're doing fun Facts with Bengals President Mike Brown the
Speaker 1: Cleveland Indians are in the news for choosing a new name,
Speaker 1: the Guardians. The Browns, of course, were named for your father.
Speaker 1: Did he like that or did it make him a
Speaker 1: little uncomfortable? This one will amaze you. I never talked
Speaker 1: to him about it, and as far as I know,
Speaker 1: neither did anybody else. It was a dead topic what
Speaker 1: the name was. And I do know that there were
Speaker 1: suggestions by some that it was named after Joe Lewis,
Speaker 1: the Brown Bomber, and I don't think so. As all
Speaker 1: I can say there, the story was that they ran
Speaker 1: a contest in a Cleveland paper to name the team,
Speaker 1: and they came out with the name Panthers as the winner.
Speaker 1: My father felt that Panthers had already been taken by
Speaker 1: the University of Pittsburgh and he didn't want to have
Speaker 1: the same name. Then they paid the guy the award
Speaker 1: for picking the winner and chose another winner instead, and
Speaker 1: he did that. And if you find out, let me
Speaker 1: know why. Once Cinnati got a franchise, was there any
Speaker 1: talk of taking the Brown's name in Cincinnati. Well, it
Speaker 1: was in Cleveland at the time, obviously, and what happened
Speaker 1: there was unlike what happened in Cleveland recently with the Indians,
Speaker 1: where they had some sort of massive study to come
Speaker 1: up with the name Guardians for the future. You can
Speaker 1: say that's a great choice or not, but ours was
Speaker 1: very simple. There was a luncheon. It was my father
Speaker 1: and John Sawyer. Dave Gamble was there and that was it,
Speaker 1: and they discussed how to name the team, and my
Speaker 1: dad said, well, someone thought we should name it the
Speaker 1: Rhinos because that would tie into the German background in Cincinnati. Rhine,
Speaker 1: and it's an animal, big and powerful. And my dad
Speaker 1: said his sister, my aunt had called him and told him, Paul,
Speaker 1: whatever you do, don't name that team the Rhinos. A
Speaker 1: rhino is a big, dumb, slow animal, and you don't
Speaker 1: want your team known in that way. So they settled
Speaker 1: on Tiger. John and Dave both went to Princeton. That
Speaker 1: was all right with them. My dad said it was
Speaker 1: all right with him. He had coached the masslind Tigers
Speaker 1: for nine years and he said, I know how to
Speaker 1: use that kind of symbol. And since I didn't have
Speaker 1: a vote and was just sitting there, I said nothing.
Speaker 1: So that's how the name came to be. Among your
Speaker 1: father's many innovations was the use of game film as
Speaker 1: a teaching tool. You rarely miss a practice. I know that.
Speaker 1: What about watching game film? Is that something that you enjoy? Well,
Speaker 1: I am curious about it. I take time to look
Speaker 1: at our game film. I do it after every game,
Speaker 1: and then I go home. It satisfies curiosity. You build
Speaker 1: up false ideas of what really happened, and then when
Speaker 1: you run it back and forth a few times and
Speaker 1: look at it closely, the reality of it comes across
Speaker 1: and you accept it for what it is. I am
Speaker 1: astonished anymore at how quickly we have that available. It's
Speaker 1: a nice thing. In my book, Seattle coach Pete Carroll
Speaker 1: turns seventy in September, Bill Belichick is sixty nine. Your
Speaker 1: father was sixty seven when he retired, and the team
Speaker 1: won eleven and three in his final season. That's the
Speaker 1: best winning percentage in franchise history. Why did he stop
Speaker 1: at sixty seven? And did you try to talk him
Speaker 1: out of it? Believe me, I would not have tried
Speaker 1: to talk him out of anything that he had decided
Speaker 1: to do. It would have just said yes, sir and
Speaker 1: marched on. He called me over and told me he
Speaker 1: was going to retire as a coach. He thought it
Speaker 1: was time. He was aware of some other guys who
Speaker 1: were active and he thought stayed too long and he
Speaker 1: didn't want to just front. It was the term he used,
Speaker 1: and it was a decision that he wrestled with, but
Speaker 1: he felt it was proper time and did what he
Speaker 1: thought was best for him, his reputation, and for the
Speaker 1: team's future. We had good people. We had Bill Johnson
Speaker 1: and Bill Walsh as coaches on the team. We had
Speaker 1: people to turn to. This is the anniversary of the
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty one Super Bowl team, and if you pulled
Speaker 1: fans on the greatest game in Bengals history, the overwhelming
Speaker 1: winning answer would be the Freezer Bowl January of eighty two.
Speaker 1: Air temperature nine below windshill fifty nine below, beat the
Speaker 1: Chargers to go to the Super Bowl. San Diego owner
Speaker 1: Gene Kleine tried to get you to move that game
Speaker 1: to San Diego. Correct. Yes, he ran into me upstairs
Speaker 1: in the press box area close to it and had
Speaker 1: this good idea of postponing the game and moving it
Speaker 1: to San Diego because it was so cold. No one
Speaker 1: should win to have a game in this temperature should they.
Speaker 1: That was an easy one for me. We saw that
Speaker 1: as a considerable advantage. We were able to play in
Speaker 1: that kind of weather. It fit us. They had fouts,
Speaker 1: the top quarterback who probably would have played better in
Speaker 1: the sunshine. It was something that amused me at the
Speaker 1: time and still does. But I don't fought him for asking.
Speaker 1: It doesn't hurt to ask, that's for sure. Did you
Speaker 1: have any issues that day along the lines of did
Speaker 1: your car start, did the pipes freeze at riverfront? Anything
Speaker 1: like that? Well, we went through a cold time in Cincinnati.
Speaker 1: I don't know much about weather, but for two or
Speaker 1: three years around that Super Bowl year, the weather was
Speaker 1: just The winners were just colder than here, a colder
Speaker 1: here than they have been otherwise ear in my lifetime here.
Speaker 1: And you got used to things. You really did the
Speaker 1: kid icicles in the living room. But that he would, uh,
Speaker 1: it was just phenomenally cold, day in and day out.
Speaker 1: To his credit Forrest, Greg was our coach and he
Speaker 1: had played up at Green Bay. That was his background,
Speaker 1: and he did not give into the cold, and he
Speaker 1: would not allow the players to give into the cold.
Speaker 1: We practiced just as normal, We did everything just as
Speaker 1: though it were sunny and eighty degrees, and it was
Speaker 1: a leadership he generated on that that our players began
Speaker 1: to see it as an advantage, something that they could manage,
Speaker 1: and whoever we were going to play would have problems with.
Speaker 1: And I think they were right on that. You and
Speaker 1: Forrest were great friends. You and your wives socialized together.
Speaker 1: What would people be surprised to learn about Forrest greg Well,
Speaker 1: he was seen as a big, strong guy, and he
Speaker 1: was that, and he was seen as a tough guy,
Speaker 1: a demanding With the football team, he was that, but
Speaker 1: away from the football team, in private, he was just
Speaker 1: a big pussy cat. He was a wonderful guy. I
Speaker 1: really delighted in his company. I loved the guy. We
Speaker 1: were good friends when he was here, and I think
Speaker 1: back in those times with great fondness. You've said before
Speaker 1: you consider that eighty one team to be the best
Speaker 1: Enfranchise history. What was it about that team that makes
Speaker 1: you feel that way. Oh, we had all the pieces,
Speaker 1: and we were ahead of the curve and some of
Speaker 1: the things we did head of the wave. It was
Speaker 1: a combination of both. We had a good quarterback and
Speaker 1: Ken Anderson. There wasn't much lacking on that team. So
Speaker 1: when we lined up against people, we were confident, and
Speaker 1: unfortunately in the Super Bowl we lost to the forty
Speaker 1: nine ers. I honestly think we were the better team.
Speaker 1: I felt that. It just I still feel that we
Speaker 1: fumbled the ball away. Things happened, but if we played
Speaker 1: them ten times, I still believe we would have won
Speaker 1: the majority of them. This has been a treat As always,
Speaker 1: I appreciate your time. Thank you very much. Okay, I
Speaker 1: appreciate visiting with you. Thanks the Boomer and Mike. And
Speaker 1: that's going to do it for this episode of the
Speaker 1: Bengals Booth Podcast, brought to you by Bud Light Seltzer
Speaker 1: refreshed they If you haven't done so already, please subscribe
Speaker 1: and if you have a minute, give it a rating
Speaker 1: or share a comment that helps more Bengals fans find
Speaker 1: this podcast. I'm Dan Horde, and thanks for listening to
Speaker 1: The Bengals Booth Podcast