WhoDeyRevolution

Bernard Scott Has Finally Made It

I admittedly have not taken the most straight and narrow path. But now I think I can put all that behind me. I'm not playing for Abilene Christian anymore. No school, no haters, legally free stuff given to me. I'm set. I can just focus on the important stuff. Like being the best player Cincy has ever seen. I can't believe I'm walking into an NFL locker room. This is a dream come true.

Is that Graham putting sequins on a denim jacket? Why is Brad St. Louis walking around the locker room saying, "Meth here, I've got the meth here." Can't Chris Henry wait to take a dump in a trash can until after he's done playing a midget in scrabble. And where are the midget's pants? 

Oh Come On!!!

Clear Channel Follow Up

This week Clear Channel put the ax to many of its radio stations, including 1530 Homer and WLW.  This was a national move where almost 600 jobs were eliminated across the country, but the effects of this move will have a huge impact in the Cincinnati sports community.  Whatever your opinion of talk radio, having a local talk radio station, full of honest, dedicated, and hard working journalists provide a service that ESPN, Fox Sports, or any other national media outlet are unable to deliver.  Without local media, the only thing that will be talked about is Chad Johnson and Bengals getting arrested.  ESPN and other national outlets will not put the time/effort/money into researching and developing new stories.  It was up to the local guys to investigate the stories, and have the national guys pick it up.  Cincinnati now has ONE local sports program from 3-6 pm hosted either by Lance or Mo.  Who is hosting the show depends on a number of factors including if the Reds play, who the starting pitcher is, whether it will rain, the current zodiac sign, the Chinese calender, the smog alert level, and whether Clear Channel has it in its heart to allow a local program instead of the Jim Rome Repeat.

Now, I am not a "hate on Clear Channel" and other corporate media guy.  I understand that they are a business, and times are tough.  But WE, fans of Cincinnati need to let Clear Channel know that we are NOT interested in Jim Rome, or some other national program.  We get that enough.  We want LOCAL guys talking about local issues.  So please, listen to Lance or Mo at 3 pm, the Reds games on 700, and post game talk with Lance.  But do not listen to whatever national guy they put on in the morning.  In 3 months if ratings of national programs are down 20% and local shows are up 20%, Clear Channel may be forced to bring back local programming. 

Update:  C Trent is still blogging here. 

More after the jump.

While We're Talking About Jason Peters...

...check out some of the stuff about the Eagles motivations for this deal and what Andy Reid has to say about his offensive line in the articles about the trade:

"I have always believed that success in the NFL is derived from the strong play of the offensive and defensive lines. This offseason we have added two young, top-flight offensive linemen in Jason and Stacy Andrews."

Agreed, Andy Reid, couldn't have said it better ourselves...oh wait, we already did in the Manifesto.

Also, the articles note that the Eagles acquired two tackles even though they only needed one to replace departed free agent Tra Thomas.  Why did they spend megabucks and draft picks on two tackles then?  Because aging star Jon Runyan will need to be replaced and they wanted to plan ahead.

Correction:  Runyan is a free agent, however, it's less that he is a free agent than he has some injury issues that may affect him going forward that prevents the Eagles from resigning him.  Regardless, they needed a plan to replace him.

Decisions Mike Brown Would Never Make: Chad Johnson & Jason Peters Edition

Other than what would happen with the draft, which is now settled, the biggest question mark for me was what the Bengals might do with Chad Ochocinco.  So let's talk about Chad by way of Jason Peters...

Jason Peters got his chance with Buffalo as an undrafted tight end.  Buffalo developed Peters, eventually moving him to left tackle where he made a couple pro bowls.  Realizing they had a good one on their hands, the Bills signed the young, talented Peters to a contract.  Not long into this contract Peters up and decided he wanted to be the highest paid tackle in the game (sure, why not?).  And he backed up his threat with consecutive off seaons of discontent (didn't report until the day before the opener in 2008 and made noise this off season).

Who Dey Rev's Best Sources/Supporters Vaporized By Clear Channel

Well today is not a good day for the sports media landscape in Cincy and more importantly for Who Dey Rev. The Enquirer is reporting that Clear Channel has let the other shoe drop by letting C Trent, Doc and Cutler go. As if coverage of Cincy sports team wasn't thread bare enough. Somewhere Mike Brown and Baghdad Hob are laughing maniacally at this good turn of fortune for them.

Look Out Himes...

...after he's done breaking your jaw, he's coming for your girl:

(h/t to reader Michael "Woolshin" Woloshin)

Maybe Dr. Nick Would Have Been Better for Levi...

In Doc's TML post today, he notes the following:

Levi Jones was among several prominent Bengals who said not nice things on and (mostly) off the record about the Bengals medical staff. Wonder if he'll have any parting thoughts.

Lack of best in class medical staff and facilities is one of the WDR Manifesto demands.  We at WDR arrived at this manifesto demand mostly through our keen powers of deduction.  Though it's difficult to quantify, it sure seems like there is an abnormal frequency of injuries to our players along with a disturbing slowness or inability to recover fully after suffering injuries.

Like, Doc, I'd be really anxious to hear what Levi has to say when he's gone.  Particularly about his health and medical care.

MJD Has It All Wrong

While even I couldn't criticize the first few picks of the Bengals' draft, I think we can all agree that the Bernard Scott selection in the sixth round was indefenisble.  To call the guy a character concern would be like calling the swine flu panic inducing. 

Where, oh where, can we begin.  He didn't play his senior season of high school after an off-field fighting incident.  So he was 17 years old and got in a fight, no big deal, right?  He's been arrested at least five times.  Yeah, well, that can happen to anybody?  He got kicked out of Central Arkansas for hitting a coach (which he denies).  Hey, coaches can be dicks sometimes.  In 2006, he was charged with stealing an iPod.  Maybe he was just trying to make sure the person didn't have any illegally downloaded music.  He was arrested on June 28th of last year for fleeing an officer.  Maybe his foot slipped onto the gas?

Bernard Scott is obviously a candidate for Redeeming.  After all, the guy has talent!  Check out this quote from a former coach, "He hates school, doesn’t trust a lot of people and obviously has some anger issues. I’m hoping that he’s matured some, but he maybe is one of the best pure running backs as far as balance, skills sets, vision and elusiveness."  Hey, the guy hates doing what is required of him and has some trust and anger issues, but damnit can he run!  Another coach had this to say, "He’s like Barry Sanders. You can contain him, contain him, contain him, and then all of a sudden, it’s over."

Basically, there is an 85% chance this guy gets arrested at some point in Cincinnati.  Somewhere around .001% of the time he'll become the next Barry Sanders.  Cue Mike Brown:  SO YOU'RE SAYIN' THERE'S A CHANCE?

Over at Shutdown Corner, MJD asks, "But does it always have to be the Bengals who are giving the second (or sixth) chance?"  Quite simply, yes!  Mike Brown is a redeemer.  Not just a redeemer, he's The Redeemer.  He Redeems all of those lost souls out there in draft-land (as long as they have talent).  After all, he's already taken all of these risks on guys with major character concerns, and none of them have panned out.  Don't you think he'd be kicking himself if he passes on the next guy with major character concerns and he actually HAS turned his life around?

MJD is absolutely right on one thing.  Marvin Lewis does not have to be the patron saint of wayward football players.  Mike Brown already is.

Milacron Dumps Bengals Suite

In July of 1998 Milacron, Inc., a Cincinnati based plastics processing machinery company, signed a Cincinnati Bengals Suite Licensing agreement contracting with the Bengals organization for a 10 year license expiring in March of 2010.  Earlier this year, Milacron filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcyas part of a restructuring deal with its investors, however vowing to maintain its loyalty to its shareholders and continue day-to-day business operations despite the restructuring and current economic downturn.  Rather than turning to the government with palms up and hands out looking for TARP funds and continuing with a preexisting plan to renovate its Afton plant outside of Batavia creating a luxurious office for its executive staff, the company put its executives into empty cubicles at its existing plant and conducted business as usual.

Cutting waste and pinching pennies is what this company has done to save face and live up to the standards its shareholders expect of it.  With that in mind Milacron, at the time it filed Chapter 11, still had an outstanding debt to the Cincinnati Bengals for the tenth and final year of their seat licensing agreement.  Under their restructuring obligations, Milacron has, in their best business judgment, determined that dumping their Bengals Suite is in the best interest of the company and its creditors (Court Order can be seen here).  The Bengals did agree to the stipulation of breaking the Agreement, however is keeping their security deposit.

Such a move by this business flies in the face of what Mike Brown stands for.  A company that looks out for its "better business judgment", its shareholders, and for the good of the company is certainly something that Mike Brown cannot relate to, let alone conducting business from a cube.  This was a company that was a loyal Bengals fan for 9 (or more) years struggling in a down-turned economy while Mike Brown is retaining their security deposit and paying himself millions in GM bonus money.  Milacron's business ethics should be ringing heavily in MB's ears, but unfortunately that most likely is not the case.  Although Milacron may have been "forced" into making this "judgment call" regarding their suite, it is but a decision that again may help to send Mikey the message.  If only a lesson to be learned...  Loyalty to Mike Brown's Bengals will get you no where. 

Credit Due

Around this here corner of the intertubes, we make a living criticizing Mike Brown.  As a matter of fact, stay tuned on that front because we have some very interesting information to share with you guys this week.  Overall, Mike Brown is quite possibly the worst owner in all of American professional sports and has no business making personnel decisions on a day-to-day, year-to-year basis.

However, in any way you want to look at it, it's hard to knock the man for what he did this weekend.  You can say he got lucky that certain guys essentially fell into his lap.  A fair point.  You can say a broken clock is right twice a day, which is certainly true.  You could even point out that it was silly to make all 11 selections, because they can't all make the roster.  I'd agree with you there. 

Still, it's hard for me to take any sort of serious, sky-is-falling, negative outlook on the Bengals' draft in 2009.  Obviously, we don't know how all of these guys will pan out.  For all of their production at the college level, all picks in the NFL Draft have "bust" potential.  However, to be perfectly honest, it would be hard for me to pin their failures on Mikey Boy. 

Now, I know I'm just a guy who writes for a blog, but let's run down all 11 picks and I'll give my opinion.  I could be wrong, I could be right, I could be grossly misinformed, but I'm going to do it anyway.

Round 1, Pick 6 - Andre Smith, OT, Alabama

As has been mentioned in this space before, Andre Smith was a consensus top 3 pick on January 1st.  Then, he missed the Sugar Bowl, left the Combine, and took off his shirt.  Now, don't get me wrong, there are some red flags with him.  His weight is an issue, as is his maturity and motivation.  However, you could find some red flags with all of the top flight tackles.  Jason Smith basically never put his hand on the ground at Baylor.  Some people questioned whether or not he'd transition well to the NFL.  Eugene Monroe, for all of his talents, has knee problems which is obviously a huge concern for a man his size.  Michael Oher has all-world upside but lacked consistency.  Fact is, the Bengals needed a tackle.  No matter which one they took, there was some downside.  To be honest, I'd rather have Monroe, but it's hard to kill them for this pick.