Speaker 1: Higat everybody on Dan Horde and thanks for downloading The
Speaker 1: Bengals Booth podcast the Do You Remember the Time edition
Speaker 1: as I sit down with Bengals President Mike Brown to
Speaker 1: reminisce about the nineteen people under consideration for the Bengals
Speaker 1: initial Ring of Honor class. Mike has tremendous stories to share,
Speaker 1: like feeling the earth move when Corey Dillon ran by,
Speaker 1: laughing at the sight of a scrawnye Chris Collinsworth with
Speaker 1: his shirt off at the NFL scouting combine, and traveling
Speaker 1: to tiny Augustana College to scout the greatest quarterback in
Speaker 1: franchise history, Ken Anderson. I think you'll really enjoy our conversation.
Speaker 1: The Bengals Booth Podcast is presented by bud Light. Seltzer
Speaker 1: Refreshed the Game and here's a quick reminder that you
Speaker 1: can have the latest edition of this podcast delivered right
Speaker 1: to your phone, tablet, or computer by subscribing on iTunes, Stitch,
Speaker 1: your Google Play, Spotify, or pod Bean. It's the greatest
Speaker 1: thing since learning how to type. It's been a long
Speaker 1: time since I graduated from high school. I don't remember
Speaker 1: anything about algebra, trigonometry, and despite taking Spanish for several years,
Speaker 1: and even spending time abroad as an exchange student. All
Speaker 1: I can do now in the Spanish language is count
Speaker 1: to eight. It's pitiful. But the one thing I learned
Speaker 1: in high school that hasn't slipped at all is the
Speaker 1: ability to type. I remain relatively fast and accurate, and
Speaker 1: it's been an essential skill in my profession. So thank you,
Speaker 1: missus King, my typing teacher at Southwestern High I've never
Speaker 1: had to hunt and peck thanks to you. Now, let's
Speaker 1: get to the Bengals Ring of Honor. This Monday morning,
Speaker 1: May twenty fourth, at nine am, Ring of Honor voting
Speaker 1: begins for Bengal season ticket members. Voting will last until
Speaker 1: June eighteenth. That's roughly four weeks, and anybody it has
Speaker 1: season tickets or purchases them by June eighteenth is eligible
Speaker 1: to vote. The first two members of the inaugural class
Speaker 1: are Paul Brown and Anthony Munio's. The final two members
Speaker 1: will be chosen from a ballot that features seventeen former players.
Speaker 1: Nobody knows more about the group or has better stories
Speaker 1: to tell about them than Bengals President Mike Brown. We
Speaker 1: sat down in his office this week to look back
Speaker 1: at nineteen legendary figures in team history. The Bengals are
Speaker 1: adding a Ring of Honor in twenty twenty one. The
Speaker 1: initial class will include Hall of famers Paul Brown and
Speaker 1: Anthony Munio's along with two players that will be voted
Speaker 1: in by season ticket members. And today we are going
Speaker 1: to reminisce about the candidates with Bengals President Mike Brown.
Speaker 1: Let's start with your dad, arguably the most innovative coach
Speaker 1: in sports history. You obviously have a unique perspective at
Speaker 1: your father, But what stands out when you think of
Speaker 1: your dad as a football coach? Oh, many things. He
Speaker 1: was very successful as a coach. He was extremely organized
Speaker 1: and he had an ability to cut through things to
Speaker 1: get to what mattered. For example, his practices were the
Speaker 1: shortest of any team, and he did that because he
Speaker 1: felt people could only concentrate so long before they lost
Speaker 1: their ability to apply themselves. I think that was true.
Speaker 1: He didn't break up his players and practices they were
Speaker 1: almost non contact. The contact they had was just a
Speaker 1: player two on Fridays and the rest of it was
Speaker 1: running against dummies. Everyone understood you weren't supposed to hit
Speaker 1: the guy and they didn't. They knew that they shouldn't,
Speaker 1: and so the teams were healthy teams. Generally, he was imaginative.
Speaker 1: He did things ahead of his times that became every
Speaker 1: day procedures for modern practices. The things that he did
Speaker 1: that were different that people know about are the face mask,
Speaker 1: and that came about when Otto Graham had his face
Speaker 1: cut up when a forty nine Ers player plowed into
Speaker 1: him as they went out of bounds. The next week
Speaker 1: at practice, my dad said, the equipment manager for the Browns,
Speaker 1: get the face masks, not the heavy kind of iron
Speaker 1: face masks that then existed, but one that would be
Speaker 1: light and wouldn't interfere with Otto's vision. They came up
Speaker 1: with an extruded plastic bar that was as strong as
Speaker 1: need be, and that's what they used. It became the
Speaker 1: basis for what is today the standard face mask. It's
Speaker 1: a light piece of equipment and it provided vision. In
Speaker 1: other words, the vision wasn't interrupted or interfered with, as
Speaker 1: the old style face masks seemed to do. He was
Speaker 1: good at innovation on the field. The plays they used.
Speaker 1: The one story that a lot of people know is
Speaker 1: how the draw play came into existence. The draw plays
Speaker 1: a regular part of football today. It first was used
Speaker 1: by the Old Browns. It happened when Battle Graham faded
Speaker 1: back to pass and Marion Motley and he collided. One
Speaker 1: of them had to be wrong. Neither admitted to it.
Speaker 1: The ball popped up in the air. Marian saw it
Speaker 1: in the air above his head, reached up, grabbed it,
Speaker 1: tucked it away, looked up, saw an opening that was
Speaker 1: just a natural opening, and ran through it for a
Speaker 1: good game. And the next day, when my father and
Speaker 1: his coaches were looking at the play, they saw what happened,
Speaker 1: they made it into a regular play. He had the
Speaker 1: ability to see something that went awry and make something
Speaker 1: useful out of it. The other thing that a lot
Speaker 1: of people remember about him is that he integrated his team,
Speaker 1: the Browns, that when football was still segregated, and he
Speaker 1: signed Bill Willis and Marion Motley. They were the two
Speaker 1: players that broke the color line in the old All
Speaker 1: American Football Conference that was in nineteen forty six. It
Speaker 1: took ten years or longer for teams to catch up
Speaker 1: with that, and it never occurred to him that it
Speaker 1: should be otherwise. Beyond that, he was smart enough to
Speaker 1: know that these two guys could play football and that
Speaker 1: would help his team make it better. That weighed with him,
Speaker 1: and he would freely say so, but that was good.
Speaker 1: I once heard Jim Brown said that was the right
Speaker 1: reason to do what he did, not some kind of
Speaker 1: do good or a reason, but because he thought they
Speaker 1: deserved the same answers to anybody else. And that was
Speaker 1: what my father did believe, and that's what he acted
Speaker 1: on when others weren't prepared to do that. So in
Speaker 1: many ways, the few I just recited our examples. He
Speaker 1: was ahead of his times, but he wore that in
Speaker 1: a very unassuming way. It never occurred to him that
Speaker 1: anything was special about it. It was just, well, why
Speaker 1: don't we do this, It's a better way to do it.
Speaker 1: And off they went and did it, and it worked
Speaker 1: and made his teams better, made them more successful than
Speaker 1: the competition. He had a wonderful clear mind. He was
Speaker 1: a great coach and I thought a great father. I
Speaker 1: respect him to my core to this day. I tell
Speaker 1: the story where he would come in the room and say, Mike,
Speaker 1: it would be two feet up in the air doing
Speaker 1: whatever he told me to do, before he even it
Speaker 1: even registered with me what it was that he was
Speaker 1: told me to do so. He had my attention, but
Speaker 1: he had the attention of his players too. They had
Speaker 1: a good relationship with him after they played. He was
Speaker 1: friends with them. They were many of them dear friends
Speaker 1: of his in later life. But when they played, he
Speaker 1: kept his distance and he insisted that they live up
Speaker 1: to the code. You made Anthony Munio as the third
Speaker 1: pick in the draft back in nineteen eighty. Several other
Speaker 1: NFL teams rolled him out, at least in the first
Speaker 1: few rounds because he had had three knee surgeries at USC.
Speaker 1: That decision certainly paid off. He is widely considered to
Speaker 1: be one of the best tackles in NFL history. We
Speaker 1: think he was the greatest tackle and NFL history. Anthony
Speaker 1: was well known in coweage as a top player, but
Speaker 1: his senior year he was injured. I think it was
Speaker 1: in their first game and he didn't play until the
Speaker 1: final game USC had that year. That was the Rose
Speaker 1: Bowl when they played Ohio State. It just happened that
Speaker 1: my brother, Pete and I were out in California visiting
Speaker 1: my father who had a home out there, and the
Speaker 1: three of us sat on the couch to watch the
Speaker 1: Rose Bowl and we began to laugh and chuckle because
Speaker 1: Anthony was dominating. He just was, Oh, I've never seen
Speaker 1: anything better. And we knew or thought we could get him. Well.
Speaker 1: We had this reputation for a bad knee, and we
Speaker 1: asked our team to doctor doctor George Bellu to tell
Speaker 1: us whether he was okay or not. And doctor Bellu said,
Speaker 1: in his opinion, he was okay, and we took that
Speaker 1: as the standard and we accepted it. I think some
Speaker 1: other teams questioned it. Who knows. Anyway, we had Anthony
Speaker 1: and what a great player he was. You knew it
Speaker 1: the minute he walked in that you had something special
Speaker 1: with him. He had all the physical dimensions at the
Speaker 1: time he would have been a big man with long arms,
Speaker 1: and more than that, he had this athletic ability that
Speaker 1: just popped right out. He could move like a little man,
Speaker 1: and he could bend his knees and he could retain
Speaker 1: his balance. He was very well coached in college, and
Speaker 1: he came here with a style of play that was
Speaker 1: right at the top. He was a equally great run
Speaker 1: blocker and pass protector. I remember when we played Buffalo
Speaker 1: and Bruce Smith, Yes, you remember Bruce Smith. Was the
Speaker 1: defensive for Buffalo thirty young in his career back then,
Speaker 1: and maybe just learning Anthony was at his peak ability
Speaker 1: and Anthony dominated him. He just kept him from getting
Speaker 1: anywhere near the passer and on run plays he flowed
Speaker 1: him right into the ground. It was an example of
Speaker 1: Anthony at his best against another player who became a
Speaker 1: Hall of Fame player. We had not only a great player,
Speaker 1: an Anthony, we had a great individual, good person, person
Speaker 1: that has dedicated his life after football to work in
Speaker 1: the community. If you know him personally, he's someone who's
Speaker 1: easy to like, you are drawn to him. So we
Speaker 1: had ourselves a great player, and it's so easy joy
Speaker 1: When you get one like that, it just makes everything
Speaker 1: else work a little bit better. And we were better
Speaker 1: because we had Anthony, a Hall of Famer in every
Speaker 1: sense of the word. So your dad and Anthony Munio's
Speaker 1: make up half of the inaugural Ring of Honor class.
Speaker 1: Seventeen others are on the ballot. We're going to look
Speaker 1: at them alphabetically, beginning with a quarterback that you traveled
Speaker 1: to Rock Island, Illinois to scout at tiny Augustana College,
Speaker 1: Ken Anderson, and here's what you wrote in your scouting
Speaker 1: report quote discounting experience, this is the best quarterback prospect
Speaker 1: I have seen in college. Well, I liked him. The
Speaker 1: story behind that amuses me still. My brother Pete was
Speaker 1: her scouting director. We were always talking about players. He
Speaker 1: said to me, well, there's this guy out at Augustana.
Speaker 1: I said, Augustana, where it's that. I guess there are
Speaker 1: at least two of them there. Made me more. But
Speaker 1: this was right on the Mississippi River, a Quad Cities area,
Speaker 1: and Pete had heard about the guy from another scout
Speaker 1: in a conversation. He wasn't especially well known by the public,
Speaker 1: if known at all. I went out there and watched
Speaker 1: a game. He was acron He threw the ball with
Speaker 1: what I call a classic motion, which was a type
Speaker 1: motion the way you draw it up, and his release
Speaker 1: was close to perfect, meaning the ball came off in
Speaker 1: a dead spiral. He was athletic, He could move around.
Speaker 1: He could find people down field. Of course, in that league,
Speaker 1: the people downfield might have been five foot tall. There's
Speaker 1: a story of Kenny later in life. He would get
Speaker 1: together with his players Sam Augustan, and I remember seen
Speaker 1: him with the offensive tackle on that team who came
Speaker 1: up to Kenny's shoulder, but you could tell it didn't
Speaker 1: matter what the level of competition was. He showed that
Speaker 1: he was special. We brought him in after we drafted him,
Speaker 1: and I sort of took pride in his being our pick.
Speaker 1: We were out at spinning Field, our old practice facility,
Speaker 1: and the first day Kenny was there, they put him
Speaker 1: out in the field, the coaches to see what he
Speaker 1: would could do, and it was just dreadfully he couldn't.
Speaker 1: He could hit the sight of a barn. And remember
Speaker 1: my dad looking at me. This process unfolded, but nothing
Speaker 1: was said. We went forward and the course reverted to form,
Speaker 1: and it became a great player for us, that's for sure.
Speaker 1: Up next another Anderson, the great Road Greater at right tackle.
Speaker 1: Willie Anderson a gigantic three hundred and forty pound man
Speaker 1: and certainly one of the best offensive linemen of his era,
Speaker 1: any era. He was special. Willie was massive and he
Speaker 1: had quick feet, the feet of the answer. He had
Speaker 1: long arms. When anyone got to him, it didn't do
Speaker 1: him much good because he was so big and strong
Speaker 1: and they couldn't throw him off balance, and he could
Speaker 1: dance with them, glide with them to the outside when
Speaker 1: they tried to get around to the outside, so they
Speaker 1: couldn't go outside, they couldn't go inside, They didn't go anywhere.
Speaker 1: They just stayed where they were, and we had a
Speaker 1: right tackle that was as good a right tackle as
Speaker 1: this league has seen. He should be in the Hall
Speaker 1: of Fame along with Anthony. As a pair there was.
Speaker 1: There wouldn't have been two better than those two. I
Speaker 1: am glad that he's a candidate for our Ring of Honor,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure he will be selected soon. We moved
Speaker 1: to the all time leading scorer in team history and
Speaker 1: the Bengals kicker for thirteen years wearing that little size
Speaker 1: five shoe on his kicking foot, Jim Breach. We came
Speaker 1: up with Jimmy. He was let go by Oakland and
Speaker 1: I don't know what I'll befell him out there, but
Speaker 1: he came here and he wasn't long as kickers go,
Speaker 1: but he was a great competitor. You could turn up
Speaker 1: the heat on him and it didn't matter. We'd be
Speaker 1: in a game where we had to have a field
Speaker 1: goal to win it, and when he was kicking, he
Speaker 1: didn't have much concern about it because he just was
Speaker 1: good for it. He made him all it seemed. That
Speaker 1: might seem to the casual observer as nothing so special.
Speaker 1: Why shouldn't he That's what he's paid to do. They
Speaker 1: might say, Well, believe me, that's not what most of
Speaker 1: them do do. They don't manage to hold up when
Speaker 1: the pressure's on. But Jimmy did for us for a
Speaker 1: good number of years. I think he still has the
Speaker 1: most points of anyone ever with the Bengals, never missed
Speaker 1: a kick in overtime, A perfect nine for nine Jim Breech.
Speaker 1: I've heard the next player on the list referred to
Speaker 1: as the toughest player pound for pound in team history,
Speaker 1: running back James Brooks. James was a player we acquired
Speaker 1: from San Diego. We traded Pete Johnson, who was a
Speaker 1: fine player, and we got in return James Brooks. They
Speaker 1: were opposites. Pete was a big power back. James was
Speaker 1: an offsized, fast, quick scooter. He could catch the ball,
Speaker 1: had wonderful hands, great receiver. He was excellent running two.
Speaker 1: You would have misjudged him if you looked at him
Speaker 1: and said, well, he's too small to be a great runner.
Speaker 1: But he was a great runner, not just outside but
Speaker 1: inside as well. And he did one other thing that
Speaker 1: was exceptional. He was a terrific pass protector. He was small,
Speaker 1: but he knew how to go about pass protection. He
Speaker 1: took these rushers on. They could be big people, defensive lineman,
Speaker 1: and he would pop right up into him and jolt them.
Speaker 1: He didn't back down, he wasn't afraid, and he knew
Speaker 1: which ones to pick up. That too, takes a little
Speaker 1: bit of skill. You have to sort him out, and
Speaker 1: he could and did so. He had everything that a
Speaker 1: back should have. He could run the ball, he could
Speaker 1: pass protect, he could catch the ball. And you referred
Speaker 1: to him as tough. Well, I don't know for sure
Speaker 1: sometimes exactly what tough is, but if you're talking about
Speaker 1: it meaning a football player who did everything ask of him,
Speaker 1: James Brooks was a game in nineteen eighty one. Your
Speaker 1: top two draft picks were wide receivers, the sculptor David
Speaker 1: Verser out of Kansas in round one, and then a skinny,
Speaker 1: gangly kid out of Florida in a round two who
Speaker 1: turned out to be pretty darn good, Chris Collinsworth. The
Speaker 1: story on Chris goes back to when they had what
Speaker 1: was the equivalent of the combine. In those days, it
Speaker 1: was down in Tampa. They way and major players and
Speaker 1: work them out. They did that back then differently, but
Speaker 1: they did it then as they do it today over
Speaker 1: in Indianapolis when we have the combine. Chris walked out
Speaker 1: on the not the stage as it would be today,
Speaker 1: but he walked out in front of the assembled scouts,
Speaker 1: which were probably twenty some days in the room, looking
Speaker 1: up at the scales where the players would be weighed.
Speaker 1: And Chris got on the scales and you could hear
Speaker 1: the snickers. And Chris understood, he knew what was going
Speaker 1: on in their minds, and he, to his credit, laughed
Speaker 1: and they laughed with him. I forgot what he weighed,
Speaker 1: but it certainly wasn't very much, and he was tall
Speaker 1: six four plus and just as skinny as you could
Speaker 1: draw one up. So when it came to the draft,
Speaker 1: we picked David Verser in the first round, who had
Speaker 1: all the majorables you could imagine, very fast, good size,
Speaker 1: very productive, and a player in college. And then in
Speaker 1: the second round Linda and Fante, who was an assistant
Speaker 1: coach for us, the equivalent of the offensive coordinator, if
Speaker 1: you will. I don't think we gave him that title.
Speaker 1: No one had titles back in those days. He argued
Speaker 1: for Chris and my father, who could say yay or
Speaker 1: nay on the draft as to which player we took
Speaker 1: or didn't take. He kept hearing Lindy when we were
Speaker 1: in the first round, and then in the second round.
Speaker 1: He didn't give up. He still went on and my
Speaker 1: father said, all will take him too. We doubled up
Speaker 1: on receivers. And what a good thing it was for
Speaker 1: us that we did. When Chris came on a recall,
Speaker 1: being out a Spinney field our practice site and watching
Speaker 1: and you knew immediately you had a special player. He
Speaker 1: was for a big guy, tall guy quick. He could
Speaker 1: move side sideways quickly, and he had acceleration, he had
Speaker 1: top end speed, he could catch everything, and he seemed
Speaker 1: to have his wits about him all the time. You
Speaker 1: knew right away that you had a special player. And
Speaker 1: occasionally you you have that experience. You drafted guy, he
Speaker 1: comes in and you just know you have one, and
Speaker 1: when you get the good ones, that's what makes your
Speaker 1: team special. And he was one of those. A great receiver.
Speaker 1: He played the role of country bumpkin early in his career,
Speaker 1: but went on to get a law degree. It's had
Speaker 1: a great broadcasting career. He's the honor of Pro Football Focus.
Speaker 1: Obviously a guy that's had a tremendous career after football. Yes,
Speaker 1: he's been very successful in his endeavors after football. I
Speaker 1: remember what you were referring to Country Bumpkin. He put
Speaker 1: on an act if you will, that the ah shucks,
Speaker 1: poor country boy me. How could you expect me to
Speaker 1: know anything? And that's when he was being interviewed by
Speaker 1: the media. But he wasn't that way with the guys
Speaker 1: or anybody else. That was just something that he tried
Speaker 1: out for a while and to his credit, discarded not
Speaker 1: soon enough and became his real self, which is all
Speaker 1: you would need to be very successful in a media career.
Speaker 1: And just look at the success he's had. You know
Speaker 1: you're great. If you forced the league to change the
Speaker 1: rules and wide receiver is Curtis was getting mugged so
Speaker 1: badly by defensive backs that your father convinced the league
Speaker 1: to pass a role only allowing contact for the first
Speaker 1: five yards from the line of scrimmage. So they say, now,
Speaker 1: the reality of that one is that the offense in
Speaker 1: the National Football League had ground down. The defense had
Speaker 1: come to dominate, and back in those days you had
Speaker 1: to pass protect with your hands against your chest, and
Speaker 1: you had to run patterns against cornerbacks who could bump you,
Speaker 1: push you, cut you, shove you all over the field. Well,
Speaker 1: that made it hard to throw the ball. And there
Speaker 1: came the time when finally my father who was on
Speaker 1: the competition committee, Don Shula Tex Sram they were on
Speaker 1: the competition committee, and they met about the predicament the
Speaker 1: league had found itself in, and they came up with
Speaker 1: the changes in the rules which allowed the use of
Speaker 1: the hands to some degree on past protection and limited
Speaker 1: bumping a receiver to five yards down field. Well, that
Speaker 1: opened the game up. For most of his career, Isaac
Speaker 1: played under the old rules. Just at the end, when
Speaker 1: he was probably at the downside of his career, he
Speaker 1: had the benefit of the new rules. But if he
Speaker 1: had had the benefit earlier, I think he would have
Speaker 1: rewritten the record book, not just the Bengals, but the
Speaker 1: National Football League record book. He was a splendid white out.
Speaker 1: He had a great, great speed. He was fast enough
Speaker 1: to try out for the Olympics, and he was close
Speaker 1: to making it. He had great hands, and I told
Speaker 1: the story maybe you've heard it, where he went down
Speaker 1: on the sideline against Cleveland on a go pattern and
Speaker 1: he was on the right side and reached up with
Speaker 1: his outside arm his right arm and just pulled the
Speaker 1: ball in with one hand in stride and ran away
Speaker 1: from the cornerback. And later in the game he did
Speaker 1: the same thing on the other side with his left
Speaker 1: hand and just two one handed catches that kept him
Speaker 1: right in stride. And I've never seen anything like that since,
Speaker 1: let alone see it twice by one player in the
Speaker 1: same game. I remember we played Houston one time we
Speaker 1: had to win to get in the playoffs, and he
Speaker 1: caught a ball with Hurdley. It was like soccer extra time.
Speaker 1: I mean the clock was gone and he caught the
Speaker 1: ball and it ran through about their whole team for
Speaker 1: fifty yard touched score and it was a great, great
Speaker 1: critical play for us. He was a top receiver. Many
Speaker 1: people would say he was the Bengals all time top receiver,
Speaker 1: and I wouldn't argue with him. We are reminiscing about
Speaker 1: the Bengals Ring of Honor candidates with President Mike Brown.
Speaker 1: The team's all time leading rushers, Corey Dillon, who ran
Speaker 1: Angry for seven years in Cincinnati and had two of
Speaker 1: the best games of all time two hundred and forty
Speaker 1: six yards as a rookie and then two seventy eight
Speaker 1: against the Broncos in two thousand, an NFL single game
Speaker 1: record at the time. I remember that game. They couldn't
Speaker 1: stop us, and Corey just ran right over top of him.
Speaker 1: It was so bad that the next week they their
Speaker 1: defensive coordinator. I thought that was somewhat unfair. Corey was
Speaker 1: power back, and when you first saw him, what you
Speaker 1: saw was a guy that ran heavy. He was a
Speaker 1: two hundred and thirty pound guy, and when he ran
Speaker 1: he had balance. He seemed to sink into the ground
Speaker 1: as he ran. You hit him and you were hitting
Speaker 1: a stump. He had the ability to run inside, the
Speaker 1: ability to run outside, and you say angry. I don't
Speaker 1: know if that's exactly the right word, but determined, There's
Speaker 1: no question about that. And he did have emotion. He
Speaker 1: carried it with him. He was our top runner of
Speaker 1: all time, and unfortunately we couldn't hang on to him.
Speaker 1: We couldn't manage hims. At the end, he got out
Speaker 1: of sorts about what I don't even remember, but we
Speaker 1: couldn't keep him content, so we felt obligated to trade him.
Speaker 1: We traded him up to a Belichick in New England,
Speaker 1: and for them, he took the Patriots to two Super Bowls.
Speaker 1: So he did it here, he did it there. He
Speaker 1: could do it period wherever he was. And yes, a
Speaker 1: top player, a great player. I remember you describing observing him.
Speaker 1: I think it was at Spinnyfield early in his Bengal's tenure,
Speaker 1: and it was like the earth moved when he got going. Oh.
Speaker 1: I remember being on the sideline and he ran by
Speaker 1: after he had caught a ball out wide, and he
Speaker 1: was close to me, and as he ran by, I
Speaker 1: honestly felt the ground shake underfoot, and that registered with me.
Speaker 1: I've never had that experience with another back, but you
Speaker 1: wouldn't have wanted to detected him if you were a cornerback.
Speaker 1: I can guarantee you that two quarterbacks have been named
Speaker 1: MVP while leading the Bengals to the Super Bowl. We
Speaker 1: talked about Ken Anderson earlier. Now we get to Boomer
Speaker 1: Assias and one of the most charismatic leaders in team history.
Speaker 1: Boomer was a lively personality. My first experience with that
Speaker 1: is when I went up to Maryland where he played
Speaker 1: college football. A friend of mine, Jack Schiff, and we
Speaker 1: drove up there to watch him, and this was a
Speaker 1: scouting trip, I guess. Anyway, We're sitting in the stands
Speaker 1: and we happened to find ourselves amongst the Maryland football
Speaker 1: coaches wives, and the strangest thing would happen. They would
Speaker 1: talk to Boomer as though he were right in front
Speaker 1: of him. They would Boomer, why are you you know?
Speaker 1: It just they so that somehow they connected with him.
Speaker 1: Boomer had that ability to get the attention of people,
Speaker 1: and it came with him. He brought up here. He
Speaker 1: had it. When he came in that game, he injured
Speaker 1: himself badly, hurt his shoulder. He went out of the
Speaker 1: game and came back in the second half and then played.
Speaker 1: He was tough. He could play under harsh conditions that
Speaker 1: would be physical injury or that could be whatever else,
Speaker 1: but he was not deterred. The players liked it, and
Speaker 1: he was a leader that they all respected for his
Speaker 1: abilities as a player. But it wouldn't beyond that. He
Speaker 1: had a way of talking to him and they acknowledged
Speaker 1: him as the first amongst equals. If you will. They
Speaker 1: listened to him. The thing that sent him apart as
Speaker 1: a player was when we had Sam Whites as their
Speaker 1: coach and our coaches came up with the no huddle offense.
Speaker 1: This was new to football back then. It had been
Speaker 1: used at the end of the halves in desperation, but
Speaker 1: what Sam and Boomer did was use it during the
Speaker 1: whole game, and this created substitution problems for our opponents.
Speaker 1: It was all within the rules, but it upset the
Speaker 1: coaches because they didn't know how to contain the opposing coaches,
Speaker 1: and they worked on the league office to restrict what
Speaker 1: we were doing. That made a little less effective, but
Speaker 1: it was still effective and we had real success with it.
Speaker 1: We went to the Super Bowl with the Boomer and
Speaker 1: Sam and that was part of what took us there.
Speaker 1: Another of the game changers in franchise history was David Fulture.
Speaker 1: You didn't see safeties that were sixty three, two hundred
Speaker 1: and thirty eight pounds who could be used in so
Speaker 1: many ways before him. Yeah, he was a big safety,
Speaker 1: to say the least. We Dick Laboul was our secondary
Speaker 1: coach and he took Folture and used him in a
Speaker 1: way that got out of David what he had to give.
Speaker 1: But that sounds as so I am describing a player
Speaker 1: who was slow. He wasn't slow. He was just big.
Speaker 1: And when I say big at the end of his career,
Speaker 1: I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say he was
Speaker 1: actually at two sixty. Tell me when you last saw
Speaker 1: a safety at two sixty. The way they used him,
Speaker 1: the way we used him was we had him up
Speaker 1: closer to the line of scrimming as much as possible.
Speaker 1: And not that he couldn't play deep. He could, but
Speaker 1: up front he was like an extra linebacker and he
Speaker 1: would nub him. When he hit him, they were hit
Speaker 1: and stopped. He was an exceptional player, one of a kind.
Speaker 1: I've never seen one quite like him before or since.
Speaker 1: The Bengals all time leader in receptions, receiving yards, and
Speaker 1: names on the back of his uniform Chad Johnson slash
Speaker 1: Ocho Cinco. There was certainly never a dull moment in
Speaker 1: his ten years in Cincinnati. Chad was a splendid player,
Speaker 1: but he was even greater as a performer. He was fun.
Speaker 1: He did things on the sideline in the end zone
Speaker 1: during games. He made people smile and they liked it,
Speaker 1: and he liked it. When they liked it, that was
Speaker 1: fun for him too, and so he came to think
Speaker 1: that was part of what he wanted to do. Probably
Speaker 1: we wished he had done a little less of it.
Speaker 1: But as a player he was excellent. He had quickness,
Speaker 1: he could get separation. And we had Kurtson Palmer as
Speaker 1: our quarterback, and the two of them connected up on
Speaker 1: this We would call it a deep end pattern. About
Speaker 1: eighteen yards down field. He would break inside away from
Speaker 1: the cornerback or hook up in case they were in
Speaker 1: his own they couldn't cover it, and he was fearless
Speaker 1: in there. He would catch the ball no matter what
Speaker 1: the traffic was. He is a package, was unique. You
Speaker 1: had tried to keep your finger on him with all
Speaker 1: the annachs he was he's involved in, and that wasn't easy.
Speaker 1: But as a package, you would take him every time
Speaker 1: because he could win games. Were there times in situations
Speaker 1: where you didn't want to laugh, but you couldn't help yourself. Oh,
Speaker 1: there were times that I remember dimly the Oh he
Speaker 1: would be in the sideline and I don't know, he
Speaker 1: would suddenly be kneeling and proposing to somebody. Or doing
Speaker 1: some an He had a whole list of these things
Speaker 1: that he worked on beforehand, and they were can but
Speaker 1: you couldn't help but laugh when you saw them. They
Speaker 1: were better earlier than they were later, as they were
Speaker 1: on at least for me. But I admit that he
Speaker 1: was a entertaining player beyond his football abilities. A tenth
Speaker 1: round draft pick in nineteen eighty three, became one of
Speaker 1: the best defensive players in franchise history, a guy who
Speaker 1: led the team in tackles five times as a nose guard,
Speaker 1: which is unheard of. Tim Cromry. Yeah, Timmy came to
Speaker 1: us out of Wisconsin. He wasn't anything that we thought
Speaker 1: much about when he came. He was off size small
Speaker 1: for a defensive tackle when they went home. This was
Speaker 1: after the draft. He came when they went home. We
Speaker 1: had to get together with the players. Later. We brought
Speaker 1: him in for some work and we didn't even bother
Speaker 1: to tell him to come because we didn't think he
Speaker 1: could do anything much. But he came anyway, which showed
Speaker 1: you how he saw the world, and he was dead right.
Speaker 1: He could do a whole heck of a lot. He
Speaker 1: became a great player, and he had tremendous competitiveness. He
Speaker 1: just would compete until he dropped. He had no give
Speaker 1: in him. He was a high school wrestler, college wrestler,
Speaker 1: and that showed. I've always respected the kids plays who
Speaker 1: were wrestlers, because in my book, that's the toughest sport.
Speaker 1: Of all those guys, they can't quit because if they
Speaker 1: get quit, they just get demolished. They learned not to.
Speaker 1: Timmy was that way. He didn't have any quit in him.
Speaker 1: And I remember, of course, in the Super Bowl game
Speaker 1: done in Miami when he broke his leg, and that
Speaker 1: was a tragedy for him and us both. Without him,
Speaker 1: we weren't quite the same defensively, and if he hadn't
Speaker 1: been hurt, we would have had a better chance in
Speaker 1: that game. My broadcast partner, Dave Lapham, was smart enough
Speaker 1: off the field to get admitted into Harvard although he
Speaker 1: chose Syracuse, and smart enough on the field to play
Speaker 1: all five offensive line spots in the same game multiple times.
Speaker 1: Dave was smart enough knowing questions that, but that's never
Speaker 1: what stood out about him in my mind. He went
Speaker 1: beyond that. He was built like a football player. The
Speaker 1: first time I ever saw him, he was in his
Speaker 1: shorts and a training table at the Blue Gray Game
Speaker 1: down in Alabama, and Jeez, I looked at him and
Speaker 1: I said, this guy, he's built like they're supposed to be,
Speaker 1: big go over. He was an excellent player and he
Speaker 1: could play anywhere you needed him. But it went beyond that.
Speaker 1: He has become someone tied to the Bengals in his
Speaker 1: own special way. He was a player for us, and
Speaker 1: later he was an announcer for us. He can tell
Speaker 1: our story. He's been around here close on to fifty
Speaker 1: years as a player and as an announcer. He knows
Speaker 1: all the guys that were here from the beginning and
Speaker 1: he can tell about them. He's a good storyteller. You know,
Speaker 1: this doesn't have much to do with being in the
Speaker 1: Ring of Honor, but as a personality, you like being
Speaker 1: around him. He's fun and that isn't something unique with me.
Speaker 1: Everyone feels that way. They gravitate towards him because he
Speaker 1: just makes the occasion happier. I'm glad he's in this list.
Speaker 1: He's deserving. I could not agree with you more. Lap
Speaker 1: was the starting left guard on the nineteen eighty one
Speaker 1: Super Bowl team, the starting right guard in both Super Bowls.
Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, was Max Montoya, probably the
Speaker 1: greatest guard in franchise history. He was a great player.
Speaker 1: Max had a cherubic face. You would have thought he
Speaker 1: was innocent as a lamb, but he had a dark
Speaker 1: heart as a football player. He showed no mercy. He
Speaker 1: was he was rough, and he could dish it out.
Speaker 1: He could take it when he was on the field,
Speaker 1: there was no quarter given or asked. But for us
Speaker 1: he was with a great group of offensive lineman that
Speaker 1: that group that he was a member of was my
Speaker 1: favorite of all time for us. And Max could not
Speaker 1: only block straight ahead, he could pull and run to
Speaker 1: the outside where he was very effective, probably the best
Speaker 1: pulling guard we ever had. I have a high regard
Speaker 1: for Max. He's done well with his life after football,
Speaker 1: and I respect him. I respect him as a player
Speaker 1: and as a man. One of the many great nicknames
Speaker 1: in team history is Leaping Law Lamar, for Lamar Parish,
Speaker 1: who scored thirteen touchdowns on returns and recoveries and set
Speaker 1: a team record by averaging nearly nineteen yards per punt
Speaker 1: return in nineteen seventy four. Lamar deserves more people remembering
Speaker 1: him than do I. Don't know why. That's so. During
Speaker 1: his time here I think was about seven years he
Speaker 1: played for US. He was the most talented cornerback we
Speaker 1: ever had, and we've had some great cornerbacks, but he
Speaker 1: was also the best returner we ever had. And the
Speaker 1: one story that he stood out in my mind about
Speaker 1: Lamar was when we played Washington here. They had a
Speaker 1: good team and we had something like three yards total
Speaker 1: offense that we didn't move the ball at all. We
Speaker 1: won the game. We went it on returns. Lamar, on
Speaker 1: one punt return, went into a group of players that
Speaker 1: looked like a ball of players that he dove into
Speaker 1: and somehow he ran out the back end of all
Speaker 1: this accumulated group of players and went on without losing
Speaker 1: stride for a touchdown. It was a very odd looking play,
Speaker 1: and when he came off the field, my dad said, Lamar,
Speaker 1: how did it look when you ran inside with all
Speaker 1: those players? Oh? He said, coach, it was dark in there.
Speaker 1: How he explained it. And my dad loved this story,
Speaker 1: and I loved it because he loved it. But it
Speaker 1: was just a description about Lamar, who could do exceptional
Speaker 1: things at his position. He had exceptional, unique almost quickness,
Speaker 1: he could cover like a blanket. The receivers didn't get
Speaker 1: open on him, and he could play the ball we
Speaker 1: had on the other side that Kenny was over there,
Speaker 1: and we had two corners the equal of any team ever.
Speaker 1: And Ken Riley's the next player on our list. From
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty nine to nineteen eighty three, he intercepted sixty
Speaker 1: five passes. That's the most of anybody who was not
Speaker 1: in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Came to the
Speaker 1: Bengals as a scrambling quarterback and a Rhodes Scholar candidate
Speaker 1: in college. Well, he was smart, and he was roommates
Speaker 1: with Lamar, and he could manage Lamar as best of
Speaker 1: anyone could around here. Kenny came here as a quarterback
Speaker 1: and we had Greg Cook. This was before Greed got injured.
Speaker 1: Training camp and the quarterbacks would stay and pretty much
Speaker 1: watched Greg, and it was obvious who was going to
Speaker 1: be the quarterback. Greg was the best player we ever had,
Speaker 1: and Kenny was standing there when my dad came over
Speaker 1: about the third day he had been in camp and
Speaker 1: said to Kenny, you go over there, And that was
Speaker 1: the extent of the conversation. Over there was with the
Speaker 1: defensive backs, and Kenny went and proceeded to play for US.
Speaker 1: I don't know how many years, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, whatever
Speaker 1: it was, it was forever. He was a player with
Speaker 1: great composure. He could play the ball in the air,
Speaker 1: all his poise, knew what was going on, was in
Speaker 1: position as he should be on every play, and even
Speaker 1: though he was somewhat slight and billed, he was a
Speaker 1: firest tackler, one player. One maneuver he had that was
Speaker 1: his alone. I've seen other guys do it, but not
Speaker 1: not do it as a regular routine, or they would
Speaker 1: do it just on occasions when it happened without thinking.
Speaker 1: Kenny do it purposefully. He would come up on these
Speaker 1: guys who caught the ball in front of him, and
Speaker 1: as they were catching the ball looking back towards a
Speaker 1: line of scrimmage, he'd come from behind and hit him
Speaker 1: right under the rump and they would go for a
Speaker 1: cart wheel in the air, literally, and not all of
Speaker 1: them kept the ball. When that went on, he would
Speaker 1: dislodge the ball from them. But it was a maneuver
Speaker 1: that was routine for him, and I've often wondered why
Speaker 1: others didn't pick it up and do it as just
Speaker 1: a regular way of play. It didn't seem to hurt anybody.
Speaker 1: They went for a ride, but they all came down
Speaker 1: in a heap and got right back up. It wasn't injurious.
Speaker 1: It was just enough of a blow that it caught
Speaker 1: their attention. It would catch your attention if you saw
Speaker 1: it as well. So Kenny had the ability to be
Speaker 1: rough and tough as well as smart. And he's so deserving.
Speaker 1: Everyone knows that he should be in the Hall of Fame,
Speaker 1: and why he isn't as a mystery, but certainly he'll
Speaker 1: be an armoring of honor soon enough. Long before there
Speaker 1: were great receiving tight ends like Tony Gonzalez and Travis Kelsey,
Speaker 1: the Bengals helped pioneer moving the tight end all around
Speaker 1: the formation with a twelfth round draft pick named Bob Trump.
Speaker 1: He Trump had a storied relationship with the Bengals as
Speaker 1: a player. As an announcer, he became a public figure
Speaker 1: here locally as a radio call in show host. He
Speaker 1: was good at that. But as a player when he
Speaker 1: started out here, he was probably off size for where
Speaker 1: we put him tight end, but he could really run
Speaker 1: and he would take cover too. That's when they have
Speaker 1: two safeties in the middle of the field run right
Speaker 1: through it and they couldn't keep up with them. The
Speaker 1: safeties couldn't keep up with them alone, let alone the linebackers.
Speaker 1: He made big plays for us. It helped that Greg
Speaker 1: Cook was the quarterback for him one year when Greig
Speaker 1: was our quarterback before he got hurt, and then Kenny
Speaker 1: Anderson came along. Bob bought the attention of other teams
Speaker 1: that we played at. Kansas City, for example, at that time,
Speaker 1: was the top team in the league, and they wanted
Speaker 1: to trade for him right away after we played them,
Speaker 1: and I always remembered how insistent they were, and that
Speaker 1: was a no go with us. We had Bob for
Speaker 1: a long career here as a tight end, and he
Speaker 1: was a receiving tight end, but a willing blocker. He
Speaker 1: would face up on guys and he wasn't afraid to
Speaker 1: do it. But as a receiver, he was as good
Speaker 1: as they came at his position. Finally, a linebacker from
Speaker 1: your alma mater, Dartmouth College, who was a Bengal starter
Speaker 1: for fourteen years, Reggie Williams. Reggie and I both went
Speaker 1: to Dartmouth, so when he came along up there. I
Speaker 1: was anxious to get him for US. I knew about him,
Speaker 1: and Dartmouth isn't so much a powerhouse as a football
Speaker 1: team and Ivy League team. I think Dartmouth did win
Speaker 1: the national championship in the twenties one time. Flad Reggie
Speaker 1: came along much after that, and at Dartmouth today he's
Speaker 1: considered the best player they've ever had here. He was
Speaker 1: very athletic, very willing, very competitive and determined, and he
Speaker 1: was a steady player for US for I think fourteen
Speaker 1: or fifteen years, whatever it was. I played a long time,
Speaker 1: and he was smart as well as tough. Now that
Speaker 1: you're going forward with a ring of honor, how do
Speaker 1: you feel about it? All the public ones that And
Speaker 1: on a personal level, my granddaughter who works for US now, Elizabeth,
Speaker 1: she's pretty keen on what the public wants and she
Speaker 1: told me so. So we are going to go forward
Speaker 1: with this. I might have had thoughts about why it
Speaker 1: might wait for a later but we're going forward and
Speaker 1: public has reacted very well. They appreciate the fact that
Speaker 1: we're going to have it, and the old players like it.
Speaker 1: That's the part that has meant the most. To me.
Speaker 1: They really perked up their ears when this started. They
Speaker 1: want to be involved with it. It's something that gets
Speaker 1: their interest, so we'll try to do it right. I
Speaker 1: think it'll be well received. We're going to make it
Speaker 1: a process that goes on for a number of years,
Speaker 1: and we're gratually going to build up the players who
Speaker 1: are included as the years go on. But it'll be
Speaker 1: fun as we go through it, no question about it.
Speaker 1: This has been a treat for me. I really appreciate
Speaker 1: your time. Thank you very much. We'll enjoy doing it too.
Speaker 1: Thanks to Mike Brown, and if you're a season ticket member,
Speaker 1: perhaps Mike's memories will impact your vote. Once again, it
Speaker 1: gets underway on Monday morning at nine am. That's going
Speaker 1: to do it for this episode of the Bengals Booth Podcast,
Speaker 1: brought to you by bud Light Seltzer. Refresh the game.
Speaker 1: If you haven't done so already, please subscribe and if
Speaker 1: you have a minute, give it a rating or share
Speaker 1: a comment that helps more Bengals fans find this podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm Dan Horde and thank you for listening to The
Speaker 1: Bengals Booth Podcast.